I've spewed countless compliments upon this movie, or more accurately
the DVD, in the print magazine over the past year, and like a good
consumer my fondness eventually gives rise to the question, "What else
can I BUY?" Not all of my favorite movies have Star Wars in the
title, and some (Die Hard, The Hunt for Red October) have
yielded precious little tie-in merchandise, and so when an unusual
product like the Old Century Master and Commander game is
released, I am compelled to take note.
Home networking is about to hop forward with the arrival of SkipJam, a hardware/software solution for watching, listening to, and digitally recording entertainment content housewide. With a wired or wireless network and an iMedia Center box in your stack of home theater gear, enjoy TV (including satellite) and more on the PC and share any audio/video source with an iMedia Player anywhere in the home, view/hear PC files in the living room, or bypass the computer altogether and simply network all your A/V devices directly, with high-quality audio and video including 24-bit/192-kilohertz DAC/ADCs with 114db dynamic range. Look for a hands-on review in an upcoming issue of Home Theater.
This year's Oscars no doubt hastened the Blu-ray release of the exceptional original Tinker, while ABC's centennial-timed Titanic approaches the familiar tale from a fresh perspective. And who doesn't love an inspired horror movie?
How do you make a blockbuster film based on the all-too-familiar tale of the doomed luxury liner Titanic? Try giving it a context of modern-day exploration and discovery, weave in a resonant theme of class struggle and the folly of ambitious men, and put at its heart a romance that epitomizes the sweet stupidity of young love. And don’t forget to execute it all with an unprecedented technical genius.
Okay, you’ve got the iPad. Now are you ready to find out just how much it can really do? From covers and stands to speakers and subwoofers (yes, subwoofers) and more, here are 10 accessories worth checking out.
The vast capabilities of the Sony PlayStation Portable are realized not only with the latest games and movies, but with the targeted devices and software that pop in, snap on, and lord over the content and hardware. The following items are HT Gamer tested and approved.
The Lite-On LVC-9006 DVD+VHS Recorder meets consumer need to record TV directly to DVD and to backup VHS to disc, all in a single chassis and compatible with a wide variety of blank media.
The duplication of VHS onto DVD is nothing new, but a single-component solution is clearly the way to go, and the aggressive pricing we've seen over the past year surely helps as well. While upon close inspection the Lite-On LVC-9006 does appear more streamlined than the Lite-On LVW-5005 DVD Recorder I reviewed in the December 2004 issue of Home Theater—the front-panel inputs (digital video, composite video, analog stereo) are now exposed, and the optical audio output is gone altogether—I cannot overlook the obvious, namely the addition of an excellent four-head Hi-Fi stereo VHS VCR. Yes, it might finally be time to retire your old VCR to Miami (or at least the kids' room), or take it put back behind the woodshed and put a bullet between its fast-forward and rewind buttons. Chief among the LVC-9006's strengths remains the "All-Write" technology which enables it to recognize and record onto most popular blank media types: DVD+/-R, rewritable DVD+/-RW, and even more affordable CD-R/RW. Choose whatever works best for you, if you know for example that a friend's DVD player doesn't support DVD+RW. It is that compatibility, combined with the Easy Guider menus (now seamlessly enhanced for its increased functionality) which virtually hold our hand every step of the way, that make Lite-On recorders such a particular pleasure to use.
PCs and home theaters have long posed the old square-peg/round-hole quandary to consumers, as the fundamental incongruities have slowed the adoption of potentially sophisticated, versatile computer gear into the living room. Expanded functionality brings with it an increased level of complexity that more proactive, simplified operating systems like Microsoft's Windows Media Center Edition have only begun to address. Of course, the hardware itself needs to be powerful enough to provide a glitch-free user experience, as well.
Chris Chiarella
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