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PHOTON MENACE

Stewart Filmscreen’s Phantom Rejects The Light

HEAVENLY SOUND FROM HIGH ABOVE Origin Teams With B&O On In-Ceiling Speakers

REVIEWED MRSPEAKERS AEON HEADPHONES

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OCTOBER 2017

GETSHORTY! SONY’S LASERDRIVEN VPL-VZ1000ES ULTRA-SHORTTHROW PROJECTOR IS READY FOR ITS CLOSE-UP

CUE THE Q!

SAMSUNG’S Q9 QLED SHINES A NEW LIGHT ON OLD BACKLIGHTS

LOADED TO THE GILLS ONKYO DELIVERS HIGH PERFORMANCE & MODERN FEATURES IN THE 11.2-CHANNEL PR-RZ5100 SURROUND PROCESSOR

DEMAND PRECISION WE DON’T CHASE TRENDS, AND ARE NEVER CONTENT FOLLOWING — ALWAYS BETTER WITH CONTROL IN OUR HANDS. Demand Series bookshelf speakers are proof of this ethos, conceived and executed under Southern California’s golden hue of innovation.

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OCTOBER 2017 Volume 82 No. 8

ON THE COVER Get Shorty! Sony VPL-VZ1000ES. Additional gear from Denon, Onkyo, Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen, Samsung, and Stewart Filmscreen.

ON THE WEB

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Sony VPLVZ1000ES UltraShortThrow PJ

COLUMNS Rob Sabin Track One: Is Virtual Reality Ready for the Masses?

Michael Antonoff Apptitude: Sleeping With Apps Al Griffin Ask S&V: MQA Explained Ken C. Pohlmann Signals: Ode to MP3 John Sciacca The Connected Life: Outfitting a Custom Toolkit

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DEMAND MORE DEMAND SERIESâ„¢ LEARN MORE AT DEFINITIVETECHNOLOGY.COM

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REPORTS DEPARTMENTS

FEATURE REVIEWS

Letters What’s up with SiriusXM? And your thoughts on small speakers.

Sony VPL-VZ1000ES SXRD 4K UltraShort-Throw Projector The big short. by Al Griffin

Perfect Focus New gear, top news, how to, and more.

New Gear A look at the hottest new A/V gear and gadgets.

Entertainment Logan and Unforgiven, and more on Ultra HD Blu-ray.

Premiere Design Steinway Lyngdorf S-15 Speaker System

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TEST REPORTS

P36-40

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P42-64

Onkyo PR-RZ5100 Surround Processor Old faithful.

by Daniel Kumin

42

Samsung QN65Q9 LCD Ultra HDTV Q and me.

by Thomas J. Norton

48

Denon HEOS AVR A/V Receiver Fascia of the future.

by Mark Fleischmann

54

Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen BOC106 In-Ceiling Speaker Sophistication from above.

by Darryl Wilkinson

58

Stewart Filmscreen Phantom HALR Ambient Light Rejecting Screen Photon menace.

by Michael P. Hamilton

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ON THE WEB

Visit The “How We Test” link on our Website for a detailed explanation of our testing regimen and a list of our reference gear. soundandvision.com

TrackOne October 2017

STILL BAKING

Virtual reality is being commercialized, but is it ready for the masses?

Last June, I was invited to a press tour and demo of a new IMAX VR Experience Center in New York City. The company best known for entertaining big audiences with big screens had created a space in the lobby of a popular AMC multiplex on Manhattan’s East Side to deliver one-on-one virtual reality entertainment to walk-in customers. It was their second

BY ROB SABIN, such facility, after a standalone pilot location in EDITOR Los Angeles.

The complex in New York consists of 12 individual “pods”— walled-in cubes with an open front. VR headsets, haptic vests that provide tactile sensations to the wearer’s back and chest, surround sound headphones, and various interactive controllers and/or tactile seating in each pod allow customers to fully immerse themselves in VR sequences created in conjunction with content partners. Some of the experiences, such as a virtual roller-coaster ride, were more “sit-back,” but most involved moving around inside an approximately 8 x 8-foot space (virtual netting pops up to warn you when you approach a real physical boundary). Flat-screen monitors in each pod allow friends and passersby to observe the virtual action.

The typical experience lasts 7 to 12 minutes, with pricing at about $1 per minute.

I’m not much of a gamer, but I’m interested in VR and its brother AR (augmented reality) as they might someday pertain to consumption of movies or music videos, so I’ve tried most demos available to me. Up to this point, I’d not been impressed, in part because most involved a smartphone installed in some knock-off of Google Cardboard glasses. Even the Samsung VR is powered entirely by a handheld phone. Phones lack the multiple motion sensors and computing power to execute the video processing and head tracking necessary for a pristine visual experience—and one that does not induce nausea due to image lag, at least in sensitive types like me.

IMAX laid claims to a state-of-the-art experience, so I went in with high hopes. Most pods featured the HTC Vive headset, or in some cases the Starbreeze Star VR headset, which is known to have a wider field of view to create a more immersive experience. The content ran from customized versions of popular video games to movie-themed experiences. Content providers include studios and game companies such as ILMxLABs, Sony, Lionsgate, VRC, Starbreeze, Survios, and Ubisoft.

I tried three different VR experiences, with mixed results. The best by far was the Raw Data video game. After being equipped with a haptic vest, headphones, and HTC Vive VR headset and gun/holster controllers, I was set loose to defend myself against an endless barrage of full-size humanoid robots intent on destroying me. Unlike prior VR solutions I’ve tried, the head-, hand-, and body tracking were dead-on responsive, with virtually no nausea-inducing lag, and the 3D virtual space remained crisp and in sharp focus no matter where I turned. By comparison, my experience attempting a

Vive-driven tightrope walk between the old Twin Towers, based on The Walk, the 2015 movie about Philippe Petit’s famous 1974 stunt, was exhilarating in its photorealistic rendering, but its soft focus pulled me out of the scene.

The Starbreeze-powered Mummy Prodigium Strike turned visitors into There remains a mummy-shooting commando and real inconsistency in began with my sitting on a bench that the delivery of VR.” mimics the motion and vibration you might feel with your feet dangling from an open helicopter hatch, automatic machine gun in hand. While the video-game animation was highly engaging and immersive, I found the glasses a less-than-perfect fit for my head, resulting in some lack of focus and a bit of annoying error between the eyepieces.

Taken in total, my three demos convinced me that there remains real inconsistency in the delivery of VR based on the equipment used and the content itself—even in a curated situation like this.

So...we’re getting there. But until everyone can have a superlative and convincing experience every time, VR won’t really be ready for prime time.

In Other News...

I am proud to announce Sound & Vision’s appointment to membership in EISA, the European Imaging and Sound Association. For those unfamiliar, EISA is an organization of nearly 50 special-interest magazines in 24 countries covering audio, video, home theater, car audio, photography, and mobile products for enthusiasts and general consumers. The group administers the annual EISA Best Product awards, in which winners are selected after an arduous nomination and voting process by the editors of the publications in each segment. Sound & Vision is now a member in the Home Theatre Audio group, while our sister publication Stereophile, which covers high-end audio, has joined the Hi-Fi group; Stereophile editor John Atkinson and I will both be actively participating in the product nominations and voting for the 2017–2018 awards that will be announced at the IFA audio show in Berlin next summer. We are honored to be the first members invited to the group from outside Europe. You can learn more about EISA and view the most current award-winning products at eisa.eu.

Closer to home, I’d also like to call your attention to a new video podcast we’ve launched called “Pixels & Bits.” Twice a month (for starters, at least), contributing technical editor Steve Guttenberg and I will be sitting down for a freewheeling, 15-minute or so discussion about, well, whatever we feel like, as long as it pertains to the world of A/V. From our enthusiast and industry perspective, we’ll be chatting and occasionally arguing about products and trends we like or don’t like and sharing some of our favorite gear. New episodes get archived on our YouTube channel (youtube.com/ soundandvision) and are featured on our website. You can get notifications of new episodes by following us on Twitter (@ soundnvision) or Facebook (@soundandvisionmag).

Customer Service And Subscriptions soundandvision@emailcustomerservice.com, call (800) 264-9872 (international calls: 386-447-6383), or write to: P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235. Please include your full name, address, and phone number on any inquiries.

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October 2017 Volume 82/Number 8

PERSONA

®

PURE

BERYLLIUM

• Pure Beryllium Midrange and Tweeter • Patented ART™ Surrounds for a 3db gain in output and a 50% reduction in distortion • Crafted in Canada for a lifetime of performance • Anthem Room Correction (ARC™): “Among the numerous room correction systems I have tested, the Anthem ARC currently stands out as the best...” David A. Rich, Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity

Editor-in-Chief: Rob Sabin Executive Editor: Claire Crowley Managing Editor: Courtney McKinnon Senior Editor, Technical Editor, Video: Thomas J. Norton Audio Editor: Mark Fleischmann Technical Editor, Audio: Mark J. Peterson Editors-at-Large: Bob Ankosko, Darryl Wilkinson Contributing Technical Editors: Kris Deering, Barb Gonzalez, Al Griffin, Steve Gu enberg, Michael P. Hamilton, Daniel Kumin, Fred Manteghian, Geoffrey Morrison, John Sciacca, Michael Trei, David Vaughn Contributors: Michael Antonoff, Anthony Chiarella, Brandon A. DuHamel, Avi Greengart, Corey Gunnestad, Fred Kaplan, Josef Krebs, Ken C. Pohlmann, Leslie Shapiro Music Editor: Mike Me ler Movies Editor: Chris Chiarella Logistics Manager: John Higgins Technical Consultant: Joel Silver, Imaging Science Foundation Art Director: Heather Dickson Copy Editor: Ken Richardson Web Monkey: Jon Iverson Contributing Photographer: Jorge Nunez General Manager: Keith Pray, 212-915-4157, kpray@enthusiastnetwork.com Associate General Manager: Ed DiBenede o, 212-915-4153, edibenede o@enthusiastnetwork.com Advertising Sales Manager: Mark Aling, MAC Media Solutions Central & West Coast Manufacturers, National Retailers, Classifieds 289-828-6894, emailing.mark@gmail.com Advertising Operations Manager: Monica Hernandez Advertising Coordinator: Lorraine McCraw Sales Coordinator: Rosemarie Torcivia, 212-915-4160, rtorcivia@enthusiastnetwork.com Marketing Director: Shawn Higgins ENTERTAINMENT GROUP MANAGEMENT Production Director: Kasey Kelley VP, Finance: Ma Cunningham DIGITAL GROUP Director of Engineering: Jeff Kimmel Senior Product Manager: Marc Bartell Digital Content Strategies Manager: Kristopher Heineman TEN: THE ENTHUSIAST NETWORK, LLC SVP/GM, Performance Aftermarket: Ma Boice Chairman: Peter Englehart VP, Financial Planning: Mike Cummings Chief Executive Officer: Sco P. Dickey SVP, Business Development: Mark Poggi Chief Financial Officer: Bill Sutman SVP, Business Intelligence: Dan Bednar President, Automotive: Sco Bailey SVP, Automotive Digital: Geoff DeFrance EVP/GM, Sports & Entertainment: Norb Garre SVP, A ermarket Automotive Content: David Freiburger Chief Commercial Officer: Eric Schwab SVP, In-Market Automotive Content: Ed Loh General Manager, Video Programming: Bobby Akin SVP, Digital Advertising Operations: Elisabeth Murray Managing Director, Studio TEN: Jerry Solomon SVP, Marketing: Ryan Payne EVP, Operations: Kevin Mullan VP, Human Resources: David Hope SVP, Editorial & Advertising Operations: Amy Diamond CONSUMER MARKETING, ENTHUSIAST MEDIA SUBSCRIPTION COMPANY, INC. SVP, Circulation: Tom Slater VP, Retention & Operations Fulfillment: Donald T. Robinson III

Listen, and really hear.

Visit paradigm.com to find a dealer near you and schedule a demonstration of the new Persona.

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PERSONA

®

“FOR ALL THEIR VISUAL BEAUTY...

THE PERSONA SYSTEM DID THAT MYSTIFYINGLY MAGICAL ACT—ONE THAT ALL GREATEST SPEAKERS ASPIRE TO—OF DISAPPEARING COMPLETELY FROM PERCEPTION AND LEAVING BEHIND ONLY THE MUSIC OR MOVIE SOUNDTRACK.” Darryl Wilkinson, Sound & Vision

ROOM CORRECTION

Visit paradigm.com to find a dealer near you and schedule a demonstration of the new Persona.

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Pe

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Triton

Redefi

“UNDENIABLY STELLAR delivered only by cost-n

n Reference

fines Ultra High-End Performance and Value!

R … Yes, it does deliver the sort of performance previously no-object speakers.”

– Dennis Burger, Home Theater Review

Letters

We welcome questions and comments

E-mail them to HTLetters@sorc.com. Please note: Questions about the features and functions of a

particular product are best directed to the manufacturer. Questions about what product you should buy are best directed to a dealer who knows all the details of your system, your preferences, and your personal habits. All submissions are considered the exclusive property of Sound & Vision magazine and TEN: The Enthusiast Network.

We reserve the right to edit letters for brevity. Due to the volume of mail that we receive, we regret that we cannot respond to every letter.

Sirius Mistakes I read with interest the article by Ken Pohlmann on why he didn’t buy the Benz (“Why I Didn’t Buy the Benz,” Signals, July/ August 2017), which I found especially interesting considering that I own two Benz vehicles and have also been disappointed with the Sirius Radio sound quality. When I discussed this with the Benz salesperson I know, he indicated that he was aware of the situation, and he provided me with a copy of a posting on MBForum that may help explain the underlying cause of the problem. If this posting is accurate, then it would seem that the overall sound quality on Sirius has deteriorated across the board: “Ten years ago, Sirius used 48-to64-kbps AAC compression for all of their channels. Since then, they have added a bunch of new ones, and as a result, these days they are

all encoded at 24-to-46-kbps, which, subjectively speaking, is only marginally better than AM radio.”

Randy Bolling Via e-mail

I could have used Ken Pohlmann’s help exactly five years ago. His article “Why I Didn’t Buy the Benz” struck a raw nerve with me. It also provided me some validation.

In July of 2012, I bought a brand-new Acura TL SH-AWD, fully loaded with their “Advance” package. It didn’t take long for me to realize I hadn’t properly test-driven the audio system.

I didn’t realize that Acura was still featuring a silly DVD-Audio surround system they’d been using in models several years prior. There was little to no bass. The deck was so integrated into the front console that there were

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no replacement units I could purchase to try to do a retrofit on my brand-new car.

With a mere 2,000 miles on it, I put the car up for sale. I talked myself out of it for a time, thinking it was ridiculous to get rid of a car because of its bad audio system. I suffered for another 1,000 or so miles until I broke down and drove a beautiful 2013 Audi A6. The factory-installed Bang & Olufsen audio system sounded as breathtaking as the European masterpiece drove.

Oh, what a financial loss it was, driving the wrong car off the lot, with its crappysounding audio system, and losing several thousand dollars to depreciation. Yet, to this day, I have no regrets. The Audi A6 drives and sounds as sweet as ever. OK, maybe one regret—wishing that Sound & Vision had published Mr. Pohlmann’s article about five years and a couple of months earlier.

Joe Parrino Denver, CO

Without pointing a finger at SiriusXM here, or attempting to verify exactly why the performance of their service is found lacking in any specific vehicle, Pohlmann drove home (pun intended) a critical point to be heeded by all who plan to get behind the wheel. If you care about sound quality (and if you’re reading these words, you probably do), you can’t buy any vehicle, new or used, without carefully auditioning the sound system. I am reminded of the joint editorial project I worked on last year with Automobile magazine (April 2016 issue, available at soundandvision.com), in which we critically auditioned the audio systems in eight pricey luxury vehicles. They ranged from unlistenable to good-but-noticeably-flawed to sublime. The cost of the vehicle and the audio brand affiliated with the carmaker was no guarantee of sound quality. Of interest here is that we used CDs and ripped CD/hi-res digital tracks as test material for those auditions, and at least one reader scolded me later for not reporting how the cars sounded with either satellite radio or a Spotify or Pandora Bluetooth feed from a phone—sources that people probably listen to most often. You can’t use that kind of inconsistent lower-quality content to fairly gauge an audio system, but I’ll agree that some qualified comments would have been useful. Bottom line: Most of us spend way too much time listening to music in our cars and have way-too-educated ears to suffer with poor autosound. So pay attention before you buy.—RS

Small Speakers Still Suck A few months ago, Ken Pohlmann’s Signals column mentioned that home audio was making a comeback, thanks to new speakers that can listen to your voice commands (“Home Audio Comes Roaring Back,” May 2017 and soundandvision.com). However, one part of home audio still concerns me: the small speaker sizes. Even at 80 hertz—and a good sound reproducer needs to go this low to deliver an accurate rendition of even the human voice—a soundwave is more than 13 feet long, and much

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air must be moved to produce it. I’m sorry, but a 2-, 3-, or even 4-inch-diameter “woofer” cannot go that low without rather extreme voice-coil and cone motion. Most consumer electronics cover up for that lack of bass response by artificially boosting frequencies in the 150-to-300-Hz range. While this may sound great to the uneducated, casual listener, to someone like myself, who listens to large floorstanding speakers that go fully down to below 40 Hz, this sounds quite drummy, hollow, and unnatural. This is probably why most sound-quality-educated people are repulsed by the sound of “boomboxes” and other common mass consumer electronics devices. Yes, amplifiers and other electronics can be miniaturized, but faithful sound reproduction still requires a good-sized speaker.

Michael Kiley Crestwood, IL

Available as single or dual subwoofer systems, with outboard DSP and amplification. © 2017 JL AUDIO, Inc. For more information on our complete line of subwoofers, please visit your local authorized dealer or www.jlaudio.com. Authorized JL Audio Dealers do not sell via the Internet. Subwoofers pictured with grilles removed.

Customers in Canada should contact GemSen Distribution: www.gemsen.com.

We have long proffered in these pages that, when it comes to reproducing bass, you cannot fool the physics that requires the propagation of large amounts of air. I will not sit here and try to deny that a large tower with one or more good-sized woofers will go genuinely lower and louder and (if well designed) sound more natural and punchy in the bass region than any small, subwooferunassisted bookshelf monitor. That said, I’ll make two points here, the first being that we are being assailed in the market these days by dozens and dozens of small, self-powered speakers, many equipped for wireless operation, because that’s what people want. We can argue all we want as enthusiasts about what folks are missing by not planting themselves in the sweet spot of a serious hi-fi or theater system, but there’s a reason products like receivers, audio separates, and the waist- or chest-high towers that were popular in the old days are going away and being replaced by soundbars and—heaven forbid—Bluetooth or Wi-Fi speakers. Point two is that, while hardly a replacement for said tower speakers, we should acknowledge that the best of these little guys today are not the thumpy little charlatans we associate with cheap bookshelf speakers trying to pretend they have real bass. The combination of powerful and good-sounding Class D amplifiers and fancy digital signal processing to better control today’s small, high-excursion drivers can make for some pretty impressive sound, even in the bass, and even accounting for different volume levels. Will they deliver the genuine visceral punch of a big tower or high-quality subwoofer/satellite system? Of course not. But the best portable and small speakers I’ve heard sound very natural and inoffensive in the bass region, if ultimately limited.—RS

Not Made in China As a longtime subscriber going back to 1972, I look forward to reading the equipment reviews

each month. Currently, I’m in the process of researching and auditioning new speakers to replace my 1980 Infinity Quantum 5 speakers.

One concern for me is where the speakers are manufactured. I have looked at over half a dozen speaker brands and have discovered major price differences for similar speakers in terms of size and design. What I have discovered is that the lower-cost speakers are being manufactured in China. The speaker brands I’m referring to are brands that are highly regarded amongst the audio press, including your magazine. The information is not always available on manufacturers’ websites, which makes me suspicious. I had to call several companies to speak to their sales departments to determine where their speaker(s) were made.

I believe it would be helpful if your reviews stated where the items being reviewed are built.

In my case, I would prefer not to purchase an item that’s made in China.

Tom Sha uc Via e-mail

We mention in passing the country of manufacture in some but not all of our speaker reviews, but except for situations where some fabulous, unthinkable value requires explanation, I don’t think it’s relevant. Readers will sell themselves short by eliminating the many high-quality brands that now produce at least part of their offerings in China and other Asian countries, and, frankly, it will restrict your choices. Companies build in Asia because the quality of the manufacturing and even engineering there is mostly superb, and because it’s cost effective and results in a high-quality product delivered at a more affordable price.

Tom, you didn’t say why you’d prefer not to purchase Chinese-made goods. Any old stereotype of poor manufacturing quality is now outdated. However, if you hold a passionate stance on human rights, for example, it’s reasonable to seek product made elsewhere.

You’ll find a few European-made brands, perhaps. Paradigm still assembles product in Canada. And Magnepan, which offers a range of great-sounding affordable-to-expensive planar magnetic speakers, builds everything in good ol’ Minnesota.—RS

CORRECTION: Our September review of the Dayton Audio Epique CBT24 speaker incorrectly cited inventor Don Keele as having once worked for the U.S. Navy. Also, Parts Express promo pricing as of early August was $995/pr for the kit and $1,495/pr assembled. Finally, readers should be advised that our industry-standard quasi-anechoic measurements might not provide the usual degree of accuracy due to the nature of constant-beamwidth transducer design. You can learn more about CBT at Keele’s YouTube page at tinyurl.com/ CBT Chronicles.

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– Darryl Wilkinson - Sound&Vision, July/August 2017

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“ oldenEar’s New Triton Reference Redefines Ultra High-End Performance and Value! ” “Hearing my reference tracks on those über-expensive ( $85,000) speakers, I was surprised at how well the Reference compared … unbridled excellence” - Al Griffin, Sound & Vision

“ The Triton Reference presents a serious challenge to speakers in the multi $10K range” – Robert Deutsch, Stereophile

GoldenEar’s Triton One is one of the best selling high-end loudspeakers ever, consistently thrilling listeners and reviewers alike and winning an enviable and unmatched collection of the industry’s most prestigious awards, including “Loudspeaker-of-the-Year” and “Product-of-the-Year” from key publications all around the world.

Clearly, we knew that the One would be a very hard act to follow.

There was a spirited discussion within our product development group about an all-out assault on the ultimate, cost-no-object, state-of-the-art, to produce a six-figure loudspeaker to do battle with the most esoteric and expensive loudspeakers on the planet.

However, after much soul-searching, rational minds won out, and the decision was made to create a new GoldenEar flagship, positioned above the Triton One (of course still current and available), that would joust with the best, but still stick to our trademarked slogan, “We Make High-End Affordable.” We are pleased and proud to introduce the new Triton Reference. The Reference has begun gathering its own collection of honors, winning the prestigious and coveted CES Innovations Design and Engineering Award, Digital Trends Best Home Audio Tech at CES, HD GURU Best High Fidelity Loudspeaker at CES and What HiFi Stars of CES! And Triton Reference won the grand slam from Absolute Sound at CES, where all four of their writers honored T Ref with their highly coveted accolade, “Best Sound (for the money)”!

“ Undeniably stellar … Yes, it does deliver the sort of performance previously delivered only by cost-no-object speakers.” – Dennis Burger, Home Theater Review The Triton Reference is an evolution of everything that we have achieved with the Triton One, but taken to a stunning new level of sonic performance and sophisticated visual design. All the components in the T Ref: including larger, more powerful, active subbass drivers with huge “Focused Field” magnet structures, upperbass/midrange drivers with “Focused Field” magnet structures, and High-Velocity Folded Ribbon tweeter with 50% more rare earth neodymium magnet material, are brand new, and have been specifically developed for use in the Reference. The powerful 1800 watt subwoofer amplifier, with level control to fine tune the bass to your room, and 56-bit DSP control unit are a significant evolution of those in the Triton One and our SuperSubs.

There are a myriad of other significant upgrades and refinements, including: new internal wiring with a specially developed twist, further development of our signature balanced crossover including

film capacitors bridged across the high-pass section on the upperbass/midrange drivers, a unique proprietary mix of long-fiber lamb’s wool and Dacron for more effective internal damping, intensive work with a high-resolution accelerometer to determine the most effective implementation of complex internal bracing, a 3/32˝-thick steel plate built into the medite base to further stiffen it for increased stability, new stainless steel floor spikes and cups, all of which results in higher resolution of subtle details … and the list goes on and on.

“ They are flat-out incredible, knock-your-damnsocks-off, jaw-droppingly realistic, enrapturing speakers.”

– Caleb Dennison, Digital Trends Visually, the Reference offers a strikingly beautiful upgrade to the classic Triton styling, with a gorgeous hand-rubbed piano gloss-black lacquer finished one-piece monocoque cabinet. Sleek, statuesque and refined, the Reference is simply an elegantly gorgeous statement piece that will excite listeners with its dynamic visual presence, as well as its extraordinary sonic performance.

Sonically, the Reference has been engineered to perform with a dramatic and authoritative voice, comparable to speakers that sell for ten and more times its surprisingly affordable price. T Refs completely disappear, with superb three-dimensional imaging that will open up your room, stretching from wall to wall and beyond, and depth that makes the wall behind them seem to vanish. The astonishing bass is rock-solid, with low-frequency performance that is tight, quick, highly impactful and musical with extension flat to 20Hz and below. Another GoldenEar signature is a silky smooth high end that extends to 35 kHz with a lifelike sheen but no trace of fatiguing hardness, sibilance or stridency so common with lesser tweeters. Tremendous time and energy has been put into the voicing of the speaker and the seamless blending of the drivers, for unmatched musicality with all types of music, and home theater perfection. Rarely do speakers excel at both, but with their world-class neutrality, the Reference absolutely does. A special bonus is the Reference’s extremely high 93.25 dB sensitivity, which gives them tremendous dynamic range and allows use with almost any high-quality amplifier. You must experience T Ref for yourself !

www.goldenear.com PO Box 141, Stevenson, MD 21153 (410) 998-9134 Like us on Facebook! facebook.com/goldenear

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Call us or check our website for your nearest dealer

Perfect focus NEW GEAR, TOP NEWS, HOW TO, AND MORE...

Edited by Claire Crowley

Apple Revisits Home Audio Remember iPod Hi-Fi? Of Course You Don’t.

I tried to contain my excitement when Apple announced HomePod, declaring it “a breakthrough wireless speaker for the home that delivers amazing audio quality.” And to think that it will use “spatial awareness to sense its location in a room and automatically adjust the audio.”

Fantastic! With that kind of technology, I might be forced to end my longstanding (but tenuous) relationship with Windows once and for all, trade in my Samsung Galaxy for an iPhone, and embrace Apple Music.

As I pondered Apple’s place in the burgeoning smart speaker market, I scanned the internet to gauge the media’s reaction to the HomePod, trying to decide whether Apple is fashionably late to the party Amazon started three years ago with the Echo ($180) or just plain late. The speaker is due out in December, so we should have an early read on how it’s doing after the holiday smoke clears— assuming Apple gets it to market before Christmas.

If you’re like us, you’re probably wondering why Apple waited so long to address a category that has taken off like a rocket and shows no signs of

18 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

abating. A recent forecast by Global Market Insights sees the market surpassing $13 billion over the next six or seven years with sales of more than 100 million units.

Even Google, a company not exactly known for its hardware prowess, joined the fray with its Google Home speaker ($129) last November. And since launching Echo, Amazon has upped its smart speaker game to include the Echo Dot ($50), Amazon Tap ($130), and, most recently, the video-enabled Echo Show ($230).

The aggressive stance is paying off. Big time. Amazon is expected to control just over 70 percent of the voice-enabled speaker market this year, according to a recent eMarketer forecast, and Google is on its way to capturing almost a quarter of the market, leaving the crumbs to a number of smaller players.

All of which brings us back to Apple.

Despite all the hype surrounding the HomePod announcement, Apple is not new to the speaker game. Way back in February of 2006, Steve Jobs introduced the iPod Hi-Fi as a companion for the most popular music player on the planet, which at

the time was on its fifth generation and commanded a 78 percent share of the MP3 player market. As Jobs put it, the speaker was “home stereo reinvented” in the form of a universal docking station with adapters to accommodate every iPod model. At $349, it was also expensive.

Acknowledging iPod docks from Bose and others, Jobs said, “The problem with these products is that none of them really offers home stereo quality. While you might get one of these, you’re not getting rid of your home stereo because the quality level just isn’t quite there.” Describing himself as an audiophile—a claim Wired confirmed years later—Jobs said, “I’m actually getting rid of my stereo, which cost a lot, to go with these things.”

Although our own Mark Fleischmann had good things to say about the iPod Hi-Fi—calling it “amiable, pragmatic, sleek, minimalist, and musical”—others were less kind, perhaps expecting more for $349 (the same price as the HomePod). For whatever reason, iPod Hi-Fi never caught on and was quietly laid to rest a year-and-a-half later, joining other Apple flops, including Newton (a Personal Digital Assistant, or PDA, released in 1993), Macintosh TV (1993), and Pippin (a gaming console introduced in 1995).

When engadget inquired about the status of the speaker, which had mysteriously disappeared from Apple’s online store, the company issued this statement: “Apple has decided to focus priorities on the iPod and iPhone and will not be making more iPod Hi-Fi units. There are over 4,000 accessories in the iPod ecosystem and hundreds of speaker systems designed specifically for the iPod, which provide customers with a wide variety of options.” Was Apple

too late to a market that was already overflowing with docking stations, or were they simply asking too much for a not-so-special product that fell short of expectations?

It remains to be seen whether Apple will be able to work its magic with the HomePod, which, of course, is far more sophisticated than its long-forgotten predecessor. Will its sound quality, operation, smarthome chops, and integration with Apple Music justify its significantly higher price? And how will Siri fare compared with rival assistants Alexa (Amazon) and Google Assistant? What do you think, Siri?—Bob Ankosko

This Just In...

By Mark Fleischmann

Vizio Is Bringing HDR10 to its E-Series models with a firmware update. Models range from 55 to 80 inches, at $550 to $3,400, and include 16 zones of full-array LED backlighting...

BitTorrent Live, Dolby Vision has been added to Oppo UDP-203 ($549) and UDP-205 ($1,299) Ultra HD Blu-ray players as a firmware update. It is also coming to TCL’s U.S. TV line for the first time via the P Series ($499 to $999) and C Series ($699 to $1,000)...

data cap limits HD viewing unless you use Wi-Fi...

Netflix and Net Neutrality are no longer on the same side. “We’re big enough to get the deals we want,” says CEO Reed Hastings...

Comcast’s XG4 TBS and TNT are expanding their mobile presence to include the Roku, Chromecast, and Vizio SmartCast platforms. They are already on Android, iOS, Apple TV, and Amazon Fire...

is a new wholehouse DVR that includes Ultra HD resolution, HDR enhancement, and six tuners. Arris is just starting to manufacture it for limited availability...

Charter Is Combining AccuWeather is now an app for Android TV. That brings it to smart TVs from Sony, Philips, TCL, and others...

Netflix and similar services into its set-top box, thus integrating pay-TV and non-cable subscription services. YouTube may be next on the list...

0.8 percent, says SNL Kagan. As we’ve seen before, the biggest losses were among satellite and telco TV operators...

BroadbandConnected TVs are in 69 percent of U.S. households, reports Leichtman Research Group, up from 50 percent three years ago. Twenty-five percent of adults watch internet programming versus just 11 percent three years ago...

Smartphones Are Number Two on the Consumer Technology Association’s list of most-owned products. That puts them behind TVs (still) but ahead of Blu-ray and DVD players (for the first time)...

DirecTV Now, AT&T’s shot at luring cord-cutters, now streams on Roku. The set-top box was the last major platform without the streaming service...

AT&T’s Latest Unlimited Choice mobile package provides 60 DirecTV channels for $70, which is 10 bucks more than the regular UC bundle and 30 bucks less than previously. But the 3-Mbps

Pay-TV Subscriptions are forecast to hit a billion in 2022, largely thanks to international growth, says Digital TV Research. “We believe that the worst of the losses is over now for North America,” says an analyst, with a projected loss of 5 million by 2022...

U.S. Pay-TV Subscriptions plummeted by 802,000 in the first quarter, a decline of

Ninety-Two Percent of Viewing is via traditional TV, according to Nielsen.

Computers, smartphones, and tablets combined represent 7.6 percent...

One-Third of Video Streaming Trials result in a paid subscription, according to Parks Associates. The other two-thirds are beating the system...

a peer-to-peer video streamer, is ceasing operations. It offered 15 free channels, including NASA TV UHD and inexpensive add-on news packages, and might have given P2P a legal reason to live...

Integra Wed Chromecast in a firmware update for the DRX-R1, DRX-7, DRX-5, DRX-4, DRX-3, DRX-2, and DSX-3 AVRs as well as the DRC-R1 pre/pro and DLB-5 soundbar. The update also finds music from supported streaming services via Google Home and supports additional voice-activated features via Google Assistant...

touchscreens, remote controls, and mobile apps...

Control4’s First Triad products are the Garden Array outdoor speaker (GA4 SAT, $300 each) and subwoofer (GA10, $1,000).

They are designed to be mounted not under eaves, but throughout the yard for even coverage and less impact on neighbors...

Russound XStream Phase Technology’s DARTS (Digital Audio Reference Theater Systems) has become a separate brand name with a dedicated sales channel. It remains under the ownership of MSE Audio...

BluOS and URC have teamed up to bring the latter’s Total Control system to the former’s wireless ecosystem. Owners of NAD and Bluesound audio products can now control them with URC’s tabletop and in-wall

streaming audio products are now controllable via URC Total Control systems. This applies to both new and existing systems...

Best Buy and Vivint will bring the latter’s connected home products, installation, security monitoring, and tech support to the retailer’s customers. Packages start at $700, and service plans are $39 to $49 per month...

RadioShack Closed its last 1,000 stores. This is the end, my friend... soundandvision.com 19

Hands

MrSpeakers Aeon Headphones Performance Build Quality Comfort Value

MrSpeakers Aeon Headphones

By Steve Guttenberg

See Me, Hear Me, Touch Me PRICE $799 AT A GLANCE I MEET A LOT OF AUDIOPHILES who flat out refuse to give headphones a chance. They go on about the headphones they bought in college when Michael Jackson released Thriller and won’t even try the new breed of ’phones. This one here, the MrSpeakers Aeon, might be the headphones that turn them around. The complete package— the sound, the shape, the smooth feel of the carbon fiber earcups, the luxuriously thick earpads, and best of all, the price—might win over even the most curmudgeonly of resistors.

The lightweight Nitinol “memory metal” and real leather headband help to keep the Aeon’s weight down, so these headphones are a pleasure to wear for hours at a time.

The earpads’ excellent seal on my noggin was also noteworthy, so isolation from noise on the NYC subway was stellar. If you wear Aeons to bed, your partner will remain blissfully unaware of what you’re listening to.

The Aeon’s unusually low impedance—13 ohms—makes these headphones easier to drive with portable music players than most high-end ’phones. I can attest to their compat-

20 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

Plus Q Closed-back, planar magnetic design Q Made in San Diego, California Q Beautifully balanced sound

Minus Q Non-standard connectors on the earcups

ibility with my iPhone 6S; I never felt shortchanged by the sound.

On-the-go audiophiles will also appreciate that the Aeons come with a rugged carry case. With it, you

can stuff the Aeons into a backpack and never crush the headphones.

The late jazz guitarist Larry Coryell’s Traffic record features drummer Lenny White and bassist Victor Bailey, and the trio’s freewheeling dynamics will blow you away. White’s cymbals’ shimmer and sparkle sounded just right.

I was lucky enough to be present at the recording session, and it was a real thrill to hear this music come back to life over the Aeons.

To put the Aeons’ sound in perspective, I compared them with the $699 Audeze EL-8 closed-back headphones. The Audeze are also a planar magnetic design, and they’re also made in California. Continuing

the theme, I used a $399 Schiit Jotunheim home headphone amp/DAC, also manufactured in the Golden State. The amp further pumped up my estimation of the Aeons’ sonics.

I hadn’t played the EL-8 for some time, so I wasn’t at all sure what to expect. First up, The Secret Sisters come on like a female Everly Brothers on their You Don’t Own Me Anymore album, which

MrSpeakers • mrspeakers.com

THE VERDICT The Aeon are a game changer for MrSpeakers. Their least expensive headphones might be their most accomplished design.

struck me as an honestsounding recording over the EL-8. When I switched over to the Aeons, the imaging grew more spacious and the vocals filled out. Both headphones sounded positively vivid, and they both had tremendous low bass impact and definition. As for comfort, the Aeons win; they’re lighter and fit my ears better.

I liked the sound of the Aeons straight out of the box, but MrSpeakers includes thin foam inserts you can place inside the earcups to slightly warm up the bass-to-midrange tonal balance and soften the highs a bit. I tried listening with and without the inserts and preferred the sound without them.

If you listen to a lot of heavily compressed music, though, the inserts might work for you.

I’ve reviewed a number of more expensive MrSpeakers headphones in these pages, but the Aeons are my favorite. Since I don’t have the other models on hand for comparison, I can’t comment on the sound differences, but there’s just something about the Aeons’ sound, style, feel, and comfort that clicked with me. The Aeons truly are more than the sum of their parts.

This is a closed-back design, but an open-back Aeon is imminent and will be the same price as this one.

MrSpeakers is hardly resting on their considerable laurels. Their longawaited electrostatic headphones will, they hope, be available by the time you read this.

SPECS Type: Closed-back, over-theear • Driver: Planar magnetic • Impedance: 13 ohms • Weight (Ounces): 12

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PlayOn Records Streams

Apptitude michaelantonoff

Sleeping with Apps With mobile screens dominating your waking hours, app makers have begun targeting the time you spend sleeping. Touch the Sleep button, and some apps will lull you into slumber with tranquil audio or mask invasive sound with white noise.

They’ll graph your snores, chart your turnovers, and rate the quality of your experience. They can wake you with good vibrations. While most apps rely solely on your smartphone, others require a Bluetoothconnected pillow or under-mattress sensors.

Given S&V’s penchant for speakers, I decided to lay down with the ZEEQ Smart Pillow by REM-Fit. The pillow (26.5 x 16.75 x 5.5 inches) embeds eight wireless speakers (four on each side), a microphone, two vibration motors, a three-axis gyroscope, a rechargeable lithium-ion battery (affording about two weeks of usage), and a wired remote. The 7-pound pillow is a bit hefty, but the electronics are buried under an outer foam shell that makes pressing your head against it surprisingly snug. A white pillowcase and extra fill are included.

You download the ZEEQ app (for Android phones or iPhones but not iPads)

App makers have begun targeting the time you spend sleeping. and create your sleep profile. (Call me Sandman.) I set my wake-up time to 6 a.m. weekdays; 7 a.m. weekends. You adjust the sensitivity of the microphone for monitoring your snoring, the intensity of the vibrations for waking you to rise or stop snoring, and the default speaker volume. Programming the pillow is complicated, so you shouldn’t do it just before going to bed.

When I hit the sack, a crickets-and-owlsinfused medley percolated from the pillow for 15 minutes. You choose the duration and the effects. I could have selected Resting Shores, but I went with Calming Sounds of the Night Forest so I wouldn’t stress over a tsunami.

22 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

If you’re uninspired by sound effects, you can select downloaded music, a podcast, or an audio book. For streaming from the cloud, you’ll need a Spotify Premium account. The speakers, even when turned up, can barely be heard away from the pillow. This may be the first speaker array purposefully built to be muffled. If you share the bed with someone who craves quiet but you don’t want to wear any device that comes between you and your pillow, ZEEQ is a good thing.

Though the app likened the decibel level of my snoring to a power drill, I never felt the pillow vibrate when it detected snoring. Honestly, I can’t be sure because I was sleeping. But when I feigned snoring, the pillow just lay there, not a single vibration nudging me to cease and desist. As a means to stop snoring, ZEEQ didn’t do it for me.

There’s no option to wake up to music or news. At your prescribed time, ZEEQ simply vibrates. If you fail to touch the app’s wake-up button, the pillow will vibrate at 5-minute intervals for the next 25 minutes.

Don’t give up your clock radio or a dedicated wake-up app.

Upon rising one morning, I achieved a sleep score of 91, a personal best—not that I had any inclination to share my good night’s sleep on social media, something the company encourages you to do. Maybe they see a self-promoting user base in which vying for the title of champion sleeper is Facebook-worthy, but competitive napping isn’t for me.

The pillow has the disconcerting habit of powering itself on, the LED on the wired remote moonlighting as a nightlight. Once the battery drained, I moved the ZEEQ to the top of my closet.

You never know when an extra pillow can come in handy.

The ZEEQ Smart Pillow is available for $299 at rem-fit.com.

Would travel plans or other interruptions prevent you from streaming your favorite programs? PlayOn Cloud proposes to solve that problem by recording the streams of the major networks as well as Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Video, and HBO Now. Download the app for nothing, then buy a recording credit for each movie or show to be recorded. A credit currently costs 40 cents, and they’re available in discounted bundles. The service is not authorized by any of the services or networks being recorded.

The company correctly asserts that the Supreme Court’s 1984 Betamax Decision sanctions home recording; however, it may be in murky waters due to the terms-of-service agreements signed by users.—MF

Sennheiser Goes Pink Sennheiser is offering a Special Edition of its Momentum HD 1 wireless headphones to commemorate the recent Pink Floyd exhibition at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum. The purple steelhinged earcup of this folding on-ear design is graced with the triangular Dark Side of the Moon logo, and the famous album cover is further celebrated with rainbow stitching on the headband.

Features include noise cancellation and Bluetooth with aptX and NFC. Voicing is described as “detailed, pure, and with a slight bass emphasis.” You can buy the headphones at the exhibition or from the online stores of the museum (vam. ac.uk/shop/hd-1-edition-pinkfloyd-headphones-150698.html) or Sennheiser (en-us.sennheiser. com/hd-1-edition-pink-floyd).

The U.S. price is $500.—MF

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Q&A

Hulu Bows Live TV

al griffin

Hulu, the big studio-owned video streaming service, is branching out with Hulu Live TV. The service has launched with 50-plus channels plus Hulu’s ad-supported VOD. You and yours can view in two simultaneous streams and get 50 hours of virtual DVR storage at $40/month. An upgrade to 200 hours of storage costs $15/month extra, or $20 extra with unlimited streams. Showtime is a $9/ month add-on. The service can autorecord your favorite sports teams.

Platforms include Android, iOS, Apple TV, Xbox One, and Chromecast; those to be added later are Roku, Amazon Fire TV, and Samsung smart TV.—MF

MQA Explained What is MQA? Carlos Padrigan / via e-mail

Master Quality Authenticated (MQA) is an audio technology that was originally developed by Bob Stuart, co-founder of British hi-fi manufacturer Meridian Audio, and is now licensed by MQA Ltd. A main idea behind MQA is to take high-resolution master recordings and package them into a standardresolution file size that can be easily downloaded or streamed.

The MQA encoding process manages this using an “origami” technique that “folds” high-frequency information existing outside the main audio band (approximately 20 hertz to 20 kilohertz, the frequency range of human hearing) into the lower frequencies. Since that extended range consists mainly of harmonic information that’s considered inaudible, MQA’s scheme works around the inefficiencies of standard PCM digital audio, which would encode all frequencies equally—even ones outside the human hearing range.

Another issue that MQA addresses is the “time smearing” created by analog-to-digital conversion during the original mastering. It does this by applying a digital correction filter in a process that MQA refers to as “de-blurring.”

In addition, MQA files carry information to

MQA packages hi-res recordings into a standardres file size for download. correct for time smearing effects created on output by the digital-to-analog conversion process in an MQA-certified DAC. While MQA is an end-to-end system that requires encoding on the front end using the company’s proprietary technology, and decoding on the back end using an MQAlicensed DAC or software music player, MQA files can still be played on non-MQA gear. According to MQA, the difference is that, while you get the benefits of the deblurring process, you won’t get to hear the full “unfolded” high-resolution file.

When listening with an MQA-compatible software music player such as the Tidal desktop app or Audirvana+, you’ll get to hear the first origami unfold (to 88 kHz or 96 kHz, depending on the sampling rate of the original file) known as MQA core. Passing on streams to an MQA-certified DAC permits the

24 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

additional unfold steps, allowing you to play hi-res files with up to a 768-kHz sampling rate.

At present, MQA-certified DACs are available from companies including AudioQuest (DragonFly Red and Black), Meridian, Mytek, NAD, and others. MQA-certified integrated amps are sold by NAD and Cary Audio. The Bluesound wireless product range that has been extensively reviewed in Sound & Vision, including the company’s new Pulse soundbar, also features MQA decoding.

While streaming via Tidal (MQA-encoded titles appear under the “Masters” tab in the Tidal Hi-Fi library) is the way most listeners experience the MQA format, content is also available for download from sites including highresaudio.com and the 2L label. And Chesky Records announced a pair of MQAencoded recordings available on CD: Rebecca Pidgeon’s The Raven, and Camille Thurman’s Inside the Moment.

Hi-res audio streaming using MQA will also soon expand beyond Tidal. According to a press release issued in June, The HDtracks music download site plans to launch a new service, HDmusicStream. The service, which will be hosted and developed by the 7digital platform, is expected to go live sometime in late 2017.

See Bob’s Talks for further explanations around the MQA philosophy (bobtalks.co.uk).

I own an Ultra HDTV but am still using a regular Blu-ray player. I have no interest in buying UHD Blu-ray Discs but would like to get the benefits of the HDR 10 and Dolby Vision High Dynamic Range (HDR) formats on my TV. Would an Ultra HD Blu-ray player apply HDR 10 and Dolby Vision HDR effects when upscaling regular Blu-rays to 4K, or are those benefits only available with Ultra HD discs?

Jason BF / via e-mail

No. Viewing high dynamic range movies requires that the source material be mastered for HDR playback, and that means it’s presently limited to the Ultra HD disc format, which recently started to gain Dolby Vision titles. (Prior to June 2017, HDR movies on Ultra HD Blu-ray were exclusively in the HDR10 format.) HDR content is also available for streaming from sites like Netflix, Vudu, and Amazon Video. You can probably access one or more of those directly from your TV. Alternatively, you can use an Ultra HD Bluray player that supports streaming apps, or an HDR-compatible streaming device such as the Roku Ultra.

Fidget with Your Phone Fidget spinners, the latest way to distract the human mind through the wonder of ball bearings, are now available for smartphones. The Fidget Tech Spin Master augments the physical spinning device with a double-sided suction cup that sticks onto a smartphone. That enables it to serve as a phone stand or phone grip.

While it’s OK to hold the phone and spin the spinner, the company doesn’t say anything about holding the spinner and spinning the phone, presumably because that might end badly.

The toy costs $30 from Brooklynbased fidget-tech.com with free shipping and will sell for $20 in stores.

Or you could just buy a generic fidget spinner and double-sided suction cup for 99 cents each on eBay.—MF

BEST MEASURED PERFORMANCES AT ALL POWER LEVELS

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TV Airwaves Evolve

Signals ken c. pohlmann

Ode to MP3 The message on the Fraunhofer website was concise: “On April 23, 2017, Technicolor’s MP3 licensing program for certain MP3related patents and software of Technicolor and Fraunhofer IIS has been terminated. We thank all of our licensees for their great support in making MP3 the de facto audio codec in the world during the past two decades.”

And just like that, it was over.

What this means, practically speaking, is that you no longer need a license to use MP3 in your product in the United States (the European patents expired in 2012). At least for its principle licensors, MP3, one of the most ingenious audio inventions of the century, and among the most lucrative, had lost its money-making mojo. MP3 is free.

Some journalists, in reporting the news, breathlessly declared that MP3 licensing was terminated because the technology was “obsolete.” While not

You no longer need a license to use MP3 in your product in the U.S. exactly fake news, the reporting misses the point. The licensing entities that wrung countless millions from MP3 for 20 years are parting from their money machine not because it is obsolete, nor because the entities are suddenly feeling altruistic, but rather because the last of the vital patents undergirding MP3 have expired. And when a patent expires, the intellectual property it describes becomes public domain.

I’m sure that MP3’s patent attorneys considered legal ways to extend the patent protection. But in the end, they figured it wasn’t possible—or just wasn’t worth it. Their decision also accounts for the fact that the same licensing entities still have the ACC file format in their portfolio, with a few years left to run.

In any case, MP3 enters the public domain. It would be ironic if, now that it’s free, companies started to use it more extensively, thus giving it a lease on life. Of course, no matter what its

26 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

legal status, MP3 will continue to be used as an effective means, albeit not the most efficient means, to reduce audio bitrates.

The story of the development of MP3 is complex, with contributions from many talented engineers. But the greatest credit goes to Karlheinz Brandenburg, working on his doctoral dissertation at the University of Erlangen-Nuremburg, and James Johnston, a researcher at AT&T Bell labs; it was their brilliant collaboration that gave birth to MP3 in the late ’80s.

They realized that audio is not really a question of measurements, but rather one of perception. From Edison onward, engineers strove to make the numbers better, but Brandenburg and Johnston disregarded that game plan.

Exploiting the limitations of the human hearing mechanism, and masking in particular, they devised an algorithm that allowed quantization noise to rise near the threshold of audibility allowed by momentary masking. They also incorporated a dozen other tricks into MP3, each designed to improve its coding effectiveness. As a result, the number of bits needed to code an audio signal could be dramatically reduced.

It is unfortunate that their creation was often maligned. Sure, at low bitrates, its artifacts are severe. But it is wrong to use that shortcoming to entirely condemn psychoacoustic coding. That would be like listening to a 45-rpm record and concluding that 180-gram vinyl also sounds poor. At higher bitrates, while still significantly reducing the signal’s input bitrate, MP3 can be transparent, thus validating its approach. Say what you want, but MP3 is an awesome piece of engineering.

It is impossible to overestimate how profoundly MP3 changed the trajectories of audio companies, the practices of consumers, and the fortunes of the music industry. MP3 may be leaving the corporate spreadsheets as a revenue generator, but it will be moved to a pedestal to stand alongside a select few other inventions that changed audio forever.

The television broadcast spectrum, the oldest source of programming, is getting a spiffy new broadcast standard but may suffer from regulatory changes that would consolidate ownership and dilute local programming.

ATSC 3.0, the eventual new broadcast standard for the U.S., is already coming to South Korea in LG TVs. Koreans will be getting Ultra HD, HDR, and next-generation surround from the airwaves before we do. U.S. consumers are interested, though. A SmithGeiger survey finds that when consumers are informed about ATSC 3.0 features, their likelihood of buying a smart TV rises from 55 percent to 74 percent, and they’re willing to spend $205 more, raising the average selling price to $1,155.

Emergency alerts may suffer under the new ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard despite its hip geotargeting and other features, warns the American Cable Association. Not that the new standard doesn’t do emergency alerts brilliantly—the problem is that it is not backwardcompatible with existing ATSC 1.0, and some broadcasters may try to wiggle out of simulcasting requirements. That’s a problem because Americans prefer broadcast TV for emergency alerts over other media by four to one, according to a survey conducted for the National Association of Broadcasters.

The process of TV stations evolving from local institutions to cookie-cutter corporate entities is accelerating under new FCC chair Ajit Pai. He is preparing to loosen the commission’s TV-station cross-ownership rules. The likely result will be fewer companies controlling more stations in what The New York Times is describing as a “deal-making frenzy,” most recently Sinclair broadcasting’s acquisition of 14 New York– area stations for $240 million. Though Sinclair-owned stations include affiliates of multiple networks, they are all required to air “must-run” news content with a conserFCC Commissioner vative bent. During the Mignon Clyburn 2016 campaign season, that included several “exclusive interviews” and other stories favorable to President Trump.

Another blow to localism would be the proposed elimination of the “main studio rule” for TV and radio stations. The 70-year-old rule requires a station to maintain a studio in or near the community it serves. The studio is required to have full-time management and staff, to originate local programming covering local issues, and to accept input from the community. Foes of the main studio rule claim “modern communications” make it a needless regulatory burden. But FCC commissioner Mignon Clyburn says stations should have “either boots on the ground or someone there answering the phone to ensure that the public interests are upheld.”—MF

•

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The Connected Life john sciacca

Outfitting a Custom Toolkit Having the right tool makes any job easier—or even possible—and when my company’s vans show up for an installation, they are loaded down with a huge array of gear to help us overcome virtually any hurdle. Between specialized drill bits, to hand tools for terminating an assortment of fittings, to fiber-optic cameras for peering into walls, having the right tool on hand can make the difference between a job well done and an impossible one.

If you’re looking to do some basic installation work—such as mounting a flat-panel TV or retrofitting new in-ceiling speakers for a Dolby Atmos setup— assembling a basic toolkit isn’t hard or expensive. Over the next couple of columns, I’m going to dissect some basic installations you can tackle on your own. Below is a list of gear you’ll want on hand to make sure the jobs finish looking like they were done by a pro.

Wire Strippers/Cutters One of the most useful tools you can have when working with wire is a good set of strippers/cutters. If you’ve ever struggled to strip/cut a wire with a bad set of strippers, you’ll appreciate just how invaluable a good set is. Every member of our company carries a medley of Klein Tools; two models worth considering are the #1010 and the #11046.

Cordless Drill with Various Bits Whether it’s drilling through a top plate or screwing in a speaker, a cordless drill makes fast work of a variety

Drywall Jab Saw A good drywall saw can be had for less than $10 and makes short(er) work of cutting in speakers and wall boxes.

Labor-Saving Devices Some of our most frequently used tools come from a company called Labor Saving Devices Inc. (lsdinc. com), and two of our favorites are the Wet Noodle magnetic in-wall retrieval system and the Creep-Zip flexible rods. The Wet Noodle is great for retrieving wiring in tight places where you can’t reach, and the Creep-Zip rods help you snake wiring down inside wall cavities.

Small Flashlight Whether it’s behind a rack, in an attic, or under a house, there are many times when you’re going to be working in dark places, and the light on your phone isn’t always convenient. And, gross as this may sound, pick out a light you can hold in your mouth to keep both hands free, or invest in an adjustable LED headlamp.

Colored Electrical Tape and Sharpie

Assembling a basic toolkit isn’t hard or expensive. of jobs. A 14-18-volt model with an extra battery is a good start. Also, pick up a 3/16-inch bell hanger bit, which is terrific for making small, probing holes that can be covered with some caulk.

Tape Measure Centering a TV on the wall, finding how far off a light can to start cutting, or seeing if you can fit a new 65-inch 4K TV all require a tape measure. Better-quality tapes can handle more severe drops without breaking, have measurements printed on both sides, and have a longer stand-out (the distance you can extend it unsupported without it breaking).

Great for quickly securing wiring together or for affixing an IR emitter to a component, electrical tape is cheap and useful for a range of tasks. Colored or white electrical tape is also great for writing on with a Sharpie so you can label all of your wire runs for future reference.

Six-in-One Screwdriver Handy for driving an assortment of screws and nuts, this fits in your pocket—or tool belt—and makes it easy to do different tasks without having to change to a different tool.

Socket Set For times when you need to drive something larger than a screw—say, a lag bolt to secure a heavy TV— you’ll need a socket set.

Cable Zip Ties Level Nothing says “total rookie move” like a TV sitting crooked on the wall. I like to carry a bullet level for small things like setting in-wall speakers or wall boxes, and a longer 48-inch level for flat-panel TV mounts.

A home theater or home audio system is going to have a ton of wiring back at the electronics, and zip ties make the perfect means of bundling these cables together into a single, manageable trunk that will keep the back of your rack looking neat and finished.

Alexa: I Control the World Amazon is many things to many people, and now it’s become the king of the smart-speaker market. Parks Associates reports that the online retail giant dominates smart speakers with 70.6 percent of sales, adding that smart speakers are in 11 percent of U.S. broadband households.

The secret sauce in Amazon’s Echo, Dot, and Tap speakers is Alexa voice control, which is also winning new friends on its own. The Dish Network is adding Alexa to its Hopper DVR and Wally sat receiver. (In related news, its Dish Anywhere app now plays live or recorded content on the Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick.)

Amazon is adding to Alexa’s charms by enabling the voice assistant to turn the speaker into—wait for it—a phone. Update Alexa’s Android or iOS app, and it imports the contacts from your smartphone.

Then you’ll be able to call or send voicemail to other Alexa-device owners or users of the app. Alexa is the new Bell System! It will even tell you who’s calling. The next step is video calling, which will be a feature of the Echo Show speaker, available for $230 by the time you read this.

Audio and Internet of Things manufacturers can’t afford to ignore voice activation in speakers or other potential products. The Apple HomePod speaker uses Siri in a comforting ball-of-yarn form factor.

[Editor’s Note: Also see “Apple Revisits Home Audio, page 18.]

Another new entry, the Harman Invoke speaker, will use Microsoft’s Cortana voice-activation platform. TiVo is also planning voiceactivated products, according to a group of trademark requests uncovered by blogger Dave Zatz.—MF

PERFECT FOCUS

Reference Tracks mikemettler

Little Steven Heads Back to the Garage, Emerges With the Eclectic Sounds of Soulfire Believe it or not, even Little Steven—Bruce Springsteen’s longtime guitar foil and songwriting soundboard in The E Street Band, and the decorated Godfather of the Underground Garage and Outlaw Country radio formats—feels the need to recharge the creative batteries every now and then. “This record turned out to be a really wonderful reset, reintroduction, and rebirth of myself,” Little Steven admits about his first solo album in 18 years, Soulfire (Wicked Cool/UMe). “It was a wonderful opportunity to start again and really show my roots in a way I had never done before. I mean, I never put a blues song on a record before, I never did a doo-wop song before, and I never did a cover of anybody before I did this thing!”

Indeed, the man also quite well known by his full name, Steven Van Zandt, really gets to spread his sonic wings on Soulfire, from the spot-on horns and of-era wahwah that drive his cover of James Brown’s 1973 blaxploitation classic “Down and Out in New York City”

MM: To me, that’s part of the discovery process. I like having somebody as the arbiter of taste.

When I hear the Coolest Song in the World on the Underground Garage in any given week, I find it’s usually something I wind up buying, because sometimes I’m not all that familiar with the artist beforehand.

LS: I love it! That’s what it’s all about, man; it really is. We do everything possible to encourage people to buy things. We know that’s an old-fashioned concept, but it’s how these guys live.

to the gutbucket testifying of “Blues Is My Business” to the fervent reclamation of a song he wrote for Southside Johnny and The Asbury Jukes’ same-titled debut album back in 1976, “I Don’t Want to Go Home.”

I recently got on the horn with Little Steven, 66, to discuss when (and when not) to make political statements with your music and why radio is still an important listening avenue.

Don’t be shy—the fat cats in the bad hats are gonna do you a big favor.

MM: I was just talking with one of your Outlaw Country compatriots, Steve Earle, and we both agreed this might be the best time to have a straight-up rock record out there.

Besides, we could just put on your 1984 release, Voice of America, and find

30 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

human nature that enjoys that relationship, because it is a relationship. And the way I treat it on my channels is the way we did it growing up. We had a relationship with our DJs. We had a relationship with our radio stations. We trusted them, and we had a real energy and information exchange.

I also think there’s something nice about being surprised, you know? You don’t know what I’m going to say next, and you don’t know what I’m going to play next! (laughs)

that a lot of its commentary still holds true today.

LS: Yeah, that’s exactly right—and unfortunately true! (chuckles) It’s an interesting moment right now, because people have been going, “Oh, this is the perfect time for you to come out with a political record.” And I go, “No, I really don’t feel the need to do that anymore!” (chuckles again) I felt like I had more freedom with this album, in a funny way.

Even though all of my records have been very thematic, very conceptual, and very political, I just felt there was no need to be political here. Politics is always in the air now, and you can’t get away from it.

MM: How important do you feel radio is today? How vital is it to the current listening experience?

LS: It doesn’t really change, but there is something really different about plugging in your phone and pulling up your playlists, or whatever it is these days to get to your own music when you’re in the car. Or, you can just listen to this voice coming out of the radio.

I think there’s something about

MM: It’s an exchange. You’ve gotta pay for your art.

LS: That’s what I mean. And the more names people see in the credits, the more they’re going to realize, “Hey man, we need to support this in a real way.” And, by the way, that’s half of the reason the radio show was created. Yes, we are playing the best new bands, but we’re also playing the best music ever made, and this is the only place you’re going to hear it.

An extended version of the Mettler–Little Steven Q&A, including a discussion of how to bring vintage artists to the attention of modern listeners, appears in the S&V Interview blog on soundandvision.com.

CD LABEL: Wicked Cool/UMe AUDIO FORMATS: 44.1-kHz/16-bit PCM Stereo (CD), 96-kHz/24-bit PCM Stereo (download) NUMBER OF TRACKS: 12 LENGTH: 57:20 PRODUCER: Stevie Van Zandt; Geoff Sanoff, Marc Ribler (co-producers) ENGINEERS: Bob Clearmountain (mixing); Tony Stanziano, Evan Stark (assistants)

PERFORMANCE SOUND

®

“Ok Google, play rock music in the living room”

TX-RZ920 9.2 - Channel Network A/V Receiver

Onkyo and Google Home make it easy to stream and control your audio experience using Chromecast built-in.

Find Chromecast built-in on all 2016 and 2017 Onkyo RZ Series network receivers, including the all-new TX-RZ920. rzseries.onkyousa.com ©2017 Onkyo U.S.A. Corporation. All rights reserved. All other logos, trademarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective holders. Works with compatible iPhone®, iPad®, Android phone and tablet, Mac® and Windows® laptop, and Chromebook devices. Google Home and Chromecast are trademarks of Google Inc.

NewGear THIS MONTH’S HOT STUFF...

J OEM Systems ICBM-P1 In-Wall Subwoofer You have to hand it to OEM for the clever acronym associated with its Integrated Custom Bass Management System, even if it does conjure images of Cold War–era missiles rising up in a Kansas wheat field.

The ICBM-P1 is aimed at home theater enthusiasts who are determined to go stealth, as in conceal everything—even the subwoofer. In this case, we’re talking a bass-producing setup that includes the P-500Xb bridgeable stereo amplifier/crossover and a custom 8-inch woofer mounted in a special cabinet. What Sub? The elongated enclosure is less than 4 inches deep and built to fit between the studs in standard 2 x 4 construction. Don’t want to mess with an in-wall (or -ceiling) install? Slide it under your couch! The amp has a full complement of bass-tweaking controls and delivers 300 watts into 8 ohms when bridged. Price: $1,348 OEM Systems • (775) 355-0405 • oemsystems.com

G Bell’O TC52-6389-PD25 TV Stand Part of the company’s new Architectural Series, Bell’O’s TC52-6389-PD25 TV stand strikes a perfectly modern balance with its brushed nickel frame, smoked-glass shelving, and Ashland pine side panels. Stylish and Sturdy: The top shelf supports up to 55 pounds and is designed to accommodate TVs with screens up to 55 inches.

At 52 inches wide, 19 inches deep, and 22 inches tall, the stand provides plenty of room for A/V components, books and discs, and maybe even a decorative ornament or two. Price: $380 Bell’O • (888) 235-7646 • bello.com

32 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

J Epson Home Cinema 4000 LCD Projector Although it’s been almost six years since the introduction of the first native 4K projectors for the consumer market, 4K prices still remain beyond the means of many enthusiasts. Which is why Epson is attempting to make its “4K-enhanced” 1080p technology even more affordable, this time in the new Home Cinema 4000 3LCD projector.

Shifty Pixels: When fed a 4K signal, the Epson shifts each pixel diagonally by half a pixel to effectively double resolution to 3840 x 2160. The threechip LCD projector also supports expanded color gamut (100 percent of DCI-P3) and HDR10 high dynamic range with 10-bit color output in addition to upscaling 1080p content to 4K. Color and white brightness is rated at 2,200 lumens.

Price: $2,200 Epson • (800) 463-7766 • epson.com

J Wisdom Audio Sage Series Superbars If you’re looking for the ultimate soundbar and have a very generous budget, you need to check out Wisdom Audio’s Sage Series line of customizable Superbars. Available in lengths up to 8 feet wide, the series comprises four LCR soundbars that use two different speaker modules in stereo and three-channel “LCR” configurations. Mod Squad: The C20m module puts a planar-magnetic tweeter between a pair of woofers, while the C38m module places two woofers on either side of an expanded planar-magnetic section. All models can be used freestanding or mounted on the wall, but you’ll need an outboard crossover and amplifier. With bass rated down to 35 or 40 hertz, depending on the model, you may decide you don’t need a subwoofer. Black is standard, and custom colors are available. Prices start at $8,280 and scale up to $14,548, exclusive of DSP and amplification.

Wisdom Audio • (775) 887-8850 • wisdomaudio.com

J Peerless-AV UltraView 4K Outdoor TV When you’re ready to take your TV viewing to the next level, Peerless-AV has just the ticket: An outdoor TV built to withstand weather extremes and temperatures between –22° and 122° F. Actually, there are three models in the upgraded UltraView line: the 49-inch UV492 ($3,099), 55-inch UV552 ($4,799), and 65-inch UV652 ($6,499). Rain, Sleet, or Snow: All are IP-55-rated for serious protection from dust and water, housed in “maintenance-free” aluminum cabinets, and designed to deliver legible 4K/Ultra HD images in direct sunlight. The TVs support HDMI 2.0 connectivity with HDCP 2.2 copy protection via three inputs and have a compartment for third-party control devices. A water/dustproof universal remote that can be programmed to control up to three additional devices is included.

Peerless-AV • (630) 375-5100 • peerless-av.com

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NewGear TH HIS MONTH’S O ’ HOT O STUFF...

U .

G Polk Audio MagniFi Max SR Soundbar System Polk takes on the typical soundbar-plus-sub competition in the new MagniFi Max SR with two weapons. First, there’s the included pair of wireless rear surround speakers that ensure a room-filling 5.1-channel experience. But the “big” news is the inclusion of Polk’s Stereo Dimensional Array (SDA) technology, the same secret sauce that makes the tiny MagniFi Mini compact soundbar stand out with a giant soundstage.

Chock-Full: The svelte soundbar houses seven drivers and is packed with other features, including Dolby and DTS processing, Voice Adjust for dialogue clarity, a Night mode, three HDMI inputs, 4K/HDR passthrough, and support for Bluetooth and for Wi-Fi with integrated Google Home that lets the bar connect to any Chromecast-enabled device for multiroom functionality. “Smart Remote” setup lets you easily control the bar with your TV remote. Price: $599 Polk Audio • (800) 377-7655 • polkaudio.com

G Outlaw Audio RR2160 Stereo Receiver That’s right, stereo receiver…but not just any stereo receiver. The RR2160 is an update of the venerable RR2150 Outlaw introduced more than a decade ago with the tagline “the last great stereo receiver.” Like a farewell tour that never ends, the company has reinvigorated the product founder Peter Tribeman calls a labor of love, adding a more powerful 2 x 110-watt amplifier, internet radio, an updated bass management/crossover section, and hi-res capability, courtesy of a high-performance Burr-Brown 192-kilohertz/24-bit digital-to-analog converter (DAC). Get Connected: A wealth of connectivity options are provided, including an updated moving coil/moving magnet phono input, coaxial and optical digital inputs, four RCA inputs, USB-A and -B ports, A/B speaker terminals, and a minijack input and ¼-inch headphone jack on the front panel. Removable pre-out/amp-in jumpers accommodate an external power amp. Price: $799 Outlaw Audio • (866) 688-5297 • outlawaudio.com

3 OCTOBER 34 OC O 20177 soundandvision.com s d d

J Sanus VLT6 TV Mount You won’t have to worry about getting a crick in your neck with the Sanus VLT6 TV mount. Designed to support TVs with screen sizes between 46 and 90 inches and weighing up to 150 pounds, the bracket tilts up 7 degrees, down 12 degrees, and extends up to 6 inches from the wall, making it easier to plug cables into the back of the TV. Gimme Three Steps: Installation is a simple three-step process said to take less than 30 minutes, and the VLT6 can be positioned over electrical outlets for easy power hookups thanks to its open design. To ensure you get the TV positioned just right, it has height, leveling, and side-to-side adjustments. The bracket is 30 inches wide, 18 inches tall, and 2.75 inches deep. Price: $135.

Sanus • (651) 484-7988 • sanus.com

J Savant Wally Smart Home Touchscreen As we enter the age of voice control, you may be wondering about the longevity of touchscreen controllers. Fact is, sometimes it’s just easier to walk over to a wall panel and press a (virtual) button, especially when the panel puts control of your climate, lighting, entertainment, and other smart-home systems in a convenient location. Savant’s Wally does just that and is described as perfect for high-traffic areas where quick control is a must. Wally on the Wall: The super slim iPad-like touchscreen creates a personalized control experience from a hi-res 5.5-inch color touchscreen designed to mount over a single-gang electrical box (existing or new). Wally gets low-voltage power via Power over Ethernet (802.3af) and has a presence sensor that activates the screen whenever someone walks into the room.

Price: $850 (5.5 inch) Savant • (508) 683-2500 • savant.com

D BDI Venue Media Cabinet Retrofuturism beckons with BDI’s Venue media cabinet (8649G/W), featuring adjustable shelving, flow-through ventilation, and cable channels with ties to keep wiring organized. Put your A/V gear in the center compartments and reserve the side sections for accessories and prized physical media. The super sleek console is 78 inches wide, 29 inches tall, and only 20 inches deep. Quick Access: You don’t have to be a contortionist when it’s time to change or rewire components: Removable/sliding back panels provide easy access to connectors and spare your back in the process.

If you don’t want to mount your TV on the wall, BDI offers an optional swiveling bracket that attaches to the back of the cabinet. Available in charcoal-stained ash with two wood and two center glass doors (8649G) or satin white with four wood doors (8649W). Price: $2,299 to $3,120 BDI • (800) 428-2881 • bdiusa.com

soundandvision.com 35

TEST REPORT

The Big Short

Sony VPL-VZ10000ES SXRD 4K Ultra-Short-Throw Projector Performance Features Ergonomics Value

By Al Griffin

Sony VPL-VZ1000ES SXRD 4K Ultra-Short-Throw Projector PRICE $25,000 WHEN IT COMES TO SETTING UP a home theater, the main goal should be to get the largest image that your space and budget will allow. In many cases, that’s going to mean hanging a projector from a ceiling mount at the back of the room and attaching a screen to the wall up front. Next come the light dimmers and blackout shades—both necessities if you want to get the best picture possible from your projection rig.

While there are tricks that custom installation outfits perform to minimize the impact of such setups, including projector lifts that magically drop down from a hidden compartment in the ceiling, and framed pictures that slide out to reveal a hidden screen—all of it voicecontrolled by an Amazon Echo speaker, of course—there will be no getting around the reality that your living space has become a movie theater. Buying a huge flat-panel TV is another option, but getting one that delivers the 100-inch-plus picture that even budget projectors provide puts you in the $100,000-plus price range. Suddenly, that custom drop-down ceiling lift doesn’t seem like a bad idea after all.

If the idea of both a traditional projection setup and a crazy-expensive flat-panel TV put you off, you might want to consider an ultra-shortthrow projector like the new Sony VPL-VZ1000ES ($25,000) instead.

Ultra-short-throw (UST) projectors have been around for years—they’re popular in business and classroom settings where placing a projector at the front of the room near the screen is convenient and keeps late-arriving students (or marketing VPs) from

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Sony wraps its ultra-short-throw projector in a furniture-like housing, helping it blend into your room.

36 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

interrupting the picture as they settle into their seats. But these have traditionally been low-performance projectors (by Sound & Vision standards) not intended for dayto-day TV or home theater movie viewing. A new generation of high(er)-performance UST projectors is emerging now, along with new ambient light rejecting (ALR) UST screens that allow them to function in place of a traditional TV. That’s where the VPL-VZ1000ES comes in. Sony’s ultra-short throw is a native 4K (4096 x 2016 resolution) SXRD model that’s capable of projecting an image ranging from 80 inches diagonal when positioned only 2 inches out from a wall, to up to 120 inches when positioned 10 inches out.

The VZ1000ES uses a laser light engine instead of a traditional lamp to beam pictures with up to 2,500 lumens brightness. Not only does the laser light engine provide the benefit of quick startup compared with a traditional projector (I clocked it at 25 seconds), but it’s spec’d by Sony to last for 20,000 hours, so it doesn’t need replacement or require frequent calibrations the way regular projection lamps do. The projector is compatible with both the HDR 10 and HLG high dynamic range formats, and it also does 3D. If you’re among the remaining 3D enthusiasts out there, Sony will sell you its optional TDG-BT500A active shutter glasses for $50 a pair.

Since an ultra-short-throw projector like the VZ1000ES is designed

AT A GLANCE

Plus Q Crisp 4K image Q Projects 120-inch picture from 10-inch distance Q Can be used in average room-lighting conditions

Minus Q Below-average picture uniformity Q So-so contrast Q Pricey

to sit out in a room as opposed to being mounted on the ceiling, Sony put effort into making it look furniture-like. The low-profile black case stands 8.5 inches high by 36 inches wide and 19.5 inches deep.

(An earlier Sony ultra-short-throw model, the LSPX-W1S, measured 43 inches wide—and cost twice as much.) A row of vertical slats lining the projector’s front give it a stately

PROJECTOR

THE VERDICT Sony’s ultra-short-throw projector can dazzle for daytime viewing and fulfills its promise as a big-screen panel TV alternative, but dark-room home theater enthusiasts may be less impressed.

look, and the sides are capped with removable gloss-black panels. A panel on the top slides in to reveal the lens when the projector is in use, and then slides back to keep dust out when powered off. It would be cool if the door were motorized and synched with the projector’s power on/off control, but that action happens manually with the VPLVZ1000ES. While the VZ1000ES looks good by itself when set up on a low table, third-party companies are developing furniture to house the projector.

Salamander Designs, for example, created a custom version of its Chameleon cabinet that holds the VZ1000ES in a compartment on top and provides storage for A/V components and speakers. The Salamander cabinet has a sleek,

contemporary look and features front-facing slats that provide ventilation.

A pair of HDMI 2.0a jacks is located on the rear of VZ1000ES, and the removable panel on its right side provides access to additional connections, including a second pair of HDMI 2.0a jacks, an IR input, a trigger output, and LAN and RS-232C ports for external control systems. There’s also a set of control buttons located on the right side, though you’ll need to remove the side panel to access them.

Sony’s remote control is large, with a clean layout and a fully backlit keypad. Dedicated buttons are provided to switch between picture mode presets and to call up menus for Color Space, Color Temperature, Color Correction, and Reality Creation, among other things. A row of large rocker buttons at the bottom let you easily tweak picture brightness, contrast, and sharpness on the fly.

Setup I received help in setting up the VZ1000ES by Andre Floyd, Sony’s product manager for home entertainment projectors. For the installation, we used a 92-inchdiagonal 5 Series Zero Edge screen frame from Screen Innovations paired with the company’s Short Throw (ST) screen material, which is designed specifically for ultra-shortthrow projectors. (See “Light Bright,” on page 40.) The projector was placed on a low table in my home theater room about 4 inches out from the screen plane and 9 inches below the screen’s bottom edge.

SONY VPL-VZ10000ES SXRD 4K ULTRA-SHORT-THROW PROJECTOR PRICE: $25,000 Sony • sony.com Calling up the projector’s internal test patterns, Andre then used its adjustable feet to dial in the geometry before making fine adjustments with its powered 1.02x zoom, focus, and lens shift controls.

The projector’s setup menu also provides the option to use external test patterns to tweak focus and geometry, and you can adjust the alignment of the red, green, and blue SXRD panels in multiple zones.

Picture presets on the VZ1000ES include two Cinema Film modes, along with Reference, TV, Photo, Game, Bright Cinema, and Bright TV modes. It also offers a wide range of gamma, color temperature, and color space presets, including BT.709 for HDTV and BT.2020 for Ultra HD sources. A two-point custom color temperature adjustment is provided for grayscale calibration, and there’s a Color Correction menu with a full set of color management system (CMS) adjustments.

After making and storing custom adjustments for both standard and high dynamic range signals, I experimented with the Cinema Black Pro menu’s settings for Dynamic Control, a feature that functions much like an auto iris in lamp-based projectors. I set the Laser Light control to 80 percent, a range corresponding to the light level in my room, and switched between the Full and Limited options, eventually settling on Full. I also ended up with the Contrast Enhancer control on Low, a setting that added slightly better black depth without swallowing up shadow detail.

2D Performance Sony’s ultra-short-throw projector is not only designed to look like furniture when

sitting out in your living space, it’s designed to present a bright image with good contrast in a typical, well-lit room. Achieving the latter depends on pairing the projector with the right screen, which is why Sony recommends using an ambient light rejecting (ALR) model such as the aforementioned Screen Innovations Short Throw (ST) screen that I used for this test. ALR screens manage to deliver bright pictures in high ambient light environments by incorporating optical elements that reflect just the light coming from a specific angle. In the case of the Screen Innovations ST, that means that only the light projected upward at the screen from below gets beamed back, while light coming from other sources is effectively absorbed.

Streaming the film Dr. Strange from Netflix with overhead lights in my room going full blast, the picture looked bright and had solid contrast.

In a scene where the Ancient One leads Strange on an astral voyage to the top of Mount Everest, for example, sunlight reflected from the snow-covered mountains looked appropriately intense. And in a later scene where the humbled doctor borrows his first book from the library at Kamar-taj, shadows had good depth, and shadow details like the rows of books in the gloomy space could be easily seen. The picture didn’t match the level of pop I’m used to getting with flat-panel TVs—or from the best regular projector setups using a matte white screen in a dark room, for that matter— but it did exceed my expectations, especially given the huge 92-inch screen size I tested.

While the VZ1000ES can deliver a bright enough standard dynamic range picture to look good

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The front-panel slats and gloss black end caps accentuate the Sony’s elegant aesthetic. soundandvision.com 37

TEST REPORT

Test Bench

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The simplified connection panel includes four HDMI 2.0a inputs.

Sony VPL-VZ1000ES SXRD 4K Ultra-ShortThrow Projector BEFORE Calibration

AFTER Calibration

FULL-ON/FULL-OFF Contrast Ratio: 4,100 :1 PRE-CALIBRATION measurements were made with the Sony’s Cinema Film 1 preset active. Post-calibration measurements were made in User mode. All measurements were made at center screen on the Screen Innovations Short Throw (ST) screen using the second and betterperforming of our two projector samples.

MAXIMUM standard dynamic range contrast ratio was achieved with the Laser Light output set to 75 and Dynamic Control set to Full in the projector’s Cinema Black Pro submenu. With this configuration, the Sony’s black level measured 0.006 ft-L and peak white 24.6 ft-L for a contrast ratio of 4,100:1. Contrast ratio with Dynamic Control turned off was 1,619:1.

Maximum light output was measured at 28.7 ft-L at the default settings in Bright TV mode.

DURING HDR tests using a Murideo Six-G pattern generator and CalMAN 2016 calibration software, the VPL-VZ1000ES managed 102.6 nits light output on a 10% window pattern, 107.3 nits on a 25% pattern, and 101 nits on a 100% pattern. The projector’s measured P3/DCI color gamut coverage when using the same workflow was 90.4%.

BEFORE calibration, the Sony’s default D65 color temperature preset in Cinema Film 1 mode displayed very good tracking, with the Delta E averaging out to 2.5. Calibration in the User mode lowered that average to 1.8, with a high of 4.8 at 100 percent brightness. (Delta E is a figure of merit that indicates how closely a display adheres to the Rec. 709 HD color standard. Experts generally agree that levels below 3 are visibly indistinguishable from perfect color tracking.)

WITH the Cinema Film 1 mode’s default settings active, the Sony’s measured color points were mostly accurate, with the Delta E averaging out to 3.5. Post-calibration using the CMS , the Delta E for color points averaged out to 2.0.

WITH the default Gamma 7 preset active, gamma in the Cinema Film 1 mode averaged 1.9. Post-calibration, gamma tracked the 2.2 target for most of its range with a high of 2.3 at 80 IRE. PICTURE uniformity was poor, with white full-field test patterns showing uneven brightness and color shifts on two separate test samples. Viewed from off axis, the SI screen/Sony projector combination showed very good brightness uniformity compared with head-on viewing, which reflects the screen performance. A degree of light spray could also be seen when viewing in dark room conditions. The Sony performed mostly well on our suite of HD video processing tests. Clipping, Luma, and Chroma resolution all checked out fine, as did 2:2 pulldown patterns. But it only marginally passed our 2:3 pulldown tests.—AG

SPECS

Dimensions (WxHxD, Inches): 36.5 x 8.75 x 19.5 • Weight (Pounds): 77 • Video Inputs: HDMI 2.0a (4) • Other: LAN (1), USB (1), RS-232C (1), trigger output (1), IR input (1)

during daytime viewing, like many HDR-enabled projectors, its light output capability is somewhat limited when it comes to viewing HDR content. Even so, when I dimmed the lights and compared Blu-ray and Ultra HD versions of the same movie, the image did look more dynamic when viewing the Ultra HD disc. For example, watching a scene that takes place in a seedy motel parking lot in Logan (the best Marvel comic characterdriven movie I’ve seen in years), the neon signs and streetlights had a distinctly punchier glow in the HDRenhanced UHD version. Colors in this scene also looked vivid, though given the Sony’s somewhat limited P3 color space coverage (I measured 90.4 percent), it’s possible the Sony wasn’t delivering the full spectrum of hues contained on the disc.

The Logan disc set I own contains color and black and white “noir” versions of the film on both regular and Ultra HD Blu-ray. Interestingly, the movie’s HDR effects were even more pronounced when viewed in black and white: Blacks looked deeper, and highlights in the parking lot scene and others popped off the screen in a striking manner. But watching black and white movies with the VZ1000ES also had the effect of revealing its below-average picture uniformity: Gray tones at the edges of the screen had a distinctly cooler tint compared with those at the center. Switching back to the color version of Logan, I didn’t notice the uniformity issue nearly as much as with the black and white disc, but it could still be seen.

Investigating further with test patterns, I measured about a 1,600K color shift toward blue from center to the outer edges of the image that I isolated to the projector by temporarily bringing in my reference matte white screen. Light output also dropped off somewhat from center to edge, by as much as 6 foot-lamberts from my calibrated 24.6 ft-L peak-white measurement.

However, these effects were much less visible when the projector was in its Bright Cinema and Bright TV modes and may not carry the same weight when the projector is set up for viewing in well-lit rooms. Another consolation for old black and white movie fans: Most old movies shot in black and white used the squarish 1.33 aspect ratio, so the left and right edges of the screen will be filled with vertical black bars.

A second VZ1000ES Sony sent me revealed similar uniformity issues, though they weren’t as pronounced as on the first review sample. Maximum color shift was limited to around 1,500 degrees, and light drop-off maxed out at 5.6 ft-L. Similar to the first projector, I noted the impact mostly when watching black and white movies like the noir version of Logan, or an all-white image of the northern wall in the Game of Thrones season 7 premiere.

3D Performance It might be fading from panel TVs, but 3D is still very much a feature in the projection world.

Each picture preset on the VZ1000ES can be independently adjusted

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Sony’s large remote offers a fully backlit keypad.

TEST REPORT

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Salamander Designs customized a version of its Chameleon cabinet just for use with the Sony VPL-VZ1000ES. It holds the projector in a top compartment and provides ventilation and storage for speakers and other A/V gear.

for 3D viewing, and the projector also supports 3D upconversion of 2D sources. Watching Hugo, one of my old standard 3D test discs, the film’s 3D depth effects looked very good, though I did note ghosting in some shots. Checking another 3D disc, Passengers, I didn’t see any ghosting, and the shots that displayed good 3D depth effects, such as the ones of the ship zipping through space, looked solid and had good contrast on the big screen.

Conclusion To put Sony’s VPL-VZ1000ES in perspective, it’s useful to compare it

with the company’s previous 4K ultra-short-throw model, the LSPX-W1S. As noted earlier, that projector was significantly larger and heavier than the VZ1000ES, and at $50,000, it cost twice as much. The company has clearly made strides with its new ultra-short throw, which offers features that its predecessor lacked, including compatibility with HDR sources and powered lens shift and zoom for more flexible setup.

Critically, the VPL-VZ1000ES also fulfills its promise as a big-screen alternative to a flat-panel TV for casual, everyday viewing: The big,

bright, crisp Ultra HD picture put out by the Sony projector and Screen Innovations Short Throw screen combination is easy to love, especially when viewed during daylight hours in a well-lit room. But it won’t be the best choice for all viewers. In particular, the picture uniformity issue I noted is the sort of thing that can get under the skin of a fussy video perfectionist. If that label applies to you, you’ll probably be better off using a traditional home

theater setup in a dark room with a ceiling-mounted projector. However, if you spend most of your time watching sports and Netflix comedy specials and are looking for an easy way to get a 100-inch-plus image in your living room at a comparatively affordable price to a like-size flatpanel TV, you’ll find plenty to get excited about with Sony’s new ultra-short-throw projector.

Light Bright Screen Innovations Short Throw (ST) Screen Given that ultra-short-throw projectors are being promoted now as a flat-screen alternative for rooms with high ambient light, Sound & Vision selected a relatively new screen material for my review that is intended to optimize the UST viewing experience. I used a 92-inch-diagonal Screen Innovations Short Throw (ST) screen mounted in the company’s 5 Series Zero Edge screen frame. The ST screen uses a proprietary optical design that only reflects light coming from beneath the screen while rejecting illumination— in other words, ambient light—from all other directions. With a gain of 0.6, its performance is similar to that of a standard matte white screen, with half-gain specified by Screen Innovations at 85 degrees.

What’s new with the 5 Series Zero Edge ST is that the screen is now available in a flexible format that allows it to be rolled up for shipment in a compact box. (Previously, the Short Throw screen material was only available in a rigid format and

arrived pre-mounted in the frame.) While the new, rollable form factor allows for safer shipping of screens to far-flung locations, you need to affix the ST screen material to the Zero Edge frame yourself by following instructions in a wordless, Ikea-style manual. While deciphering these was easy enough, straining to clamp the screen to its frame using the supplied rubber O-rings turned out to be zero fun—my hands were screaming for mercy! Ultra-tight tension is necessary for the ST material to work its magic. However, once the work was complete, I was impressed by how similar the finished product was to a standard rigid screen.

While I ran into uniformity issues with the Sony VPL-VZ1000ES after it was calibrated for reference viewing that prevented me from conducting our usual objective screen measurements, these proved to be less impactful when the projector was set up for high ambient light viewing using either the Bright Cinema or Bright TV presets. Under those conditions, the Zero Edge ST delivered a

strikingly bright image with good contrast.

Streaming the pilot episode of the U.S. version of The Office on Netflix, the crisp white shirts worn by the office staff had a consistent glow as they walked around the space, and contrast also remained consistent when viewing from far off-center seats. The screen’s impossibly thin and elegant 0.38-inch black frame gave the image the same floating, all-screen look that you get with the best flat-panel TVs. If you happened to walk into a room not knowing any better, you might even mistake it for a flat-panel set: The form factor is that convincing.

At $4,199 for my 92-inch model, the Zero Edge ST is pricey compared with other ALR screens, but it’s a specialty design meant for use only with bottom-mounted ultra-short-throw projectors like the Sony VPL-VZ1000ES. (Other manufacturers do offer less expensive alternatives, however, which we hope to have a look at in the coming months with a different reference projector.) According to Screen Innovations, 90 percent of its Zero Edge screens are sold with the company’s optional LED backlighting. This gets installed using an integrated track system on the frame’s back surface so you only see the light emanating out from behind the screen. It can be programmed for up to 256,000 color options—including white, of course.—AG

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Screen Innovations’ Zero Edge form factor could be mistaken for a flat-panel display.

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TEST REPORT

Old Faithful

Onkyo PR-RZ5100 Surround Processor Audio Performance Features Ergonomics Value

By Daniel Kumin

Onkyo PR-RZ5100 Surround Processor PRICE $2,399 THE A/V PREAMP/PROCESSORS from Onkyo (and sister brand Integra) have been through five or six generations over the years, and I think I’ve tested or at least used just about all of them. And for that decade-plus span, my overall reaction to them has remained pretty consistent: all the A/V-system quarterbacking any rational being needs at a fair price. Onkyo’s latest iteration, the PR-RZ5100 network A/V controller, seems unlikely to change that conclusion while updating the series to 11.2-channel, 4K/HDR status.

As has been the case with previous generations, the PR-RZ5100 is more or less Onkyo’s flagship A/V receiver—in this case, the $3,299 TX-RZ3100—with the power amp section deleted in favor of pro-style XLR balanced-line audio outputs for all 11.2 channels. But I intend no asperity in pointing this out; Brand O’s top A/V receivers have long been among the highest performance/ value options, and for those who prefer the flexibility and upgradeability of outboard amplification, the $900 savings likely seems eminently fair.

As with so many this-year’s-model A/V designs, the PR-RZ5100’s evolutions are mostly about two things: Dolby Atmos/DTS:X “objectbased” surround processing and 4K/ HDR video. For the former, Onkyo deploys dual Analog Devices SHARC processors wielding an almost unbelievable 6 giga-operations per second (plus discrete 32-bit DACs all around). Meanwhile, its HDR video compatibility and 4K-ness are manifested by 4K/60 HDMI facilities with baked-in HDCP 2.2 copyright

management, HDR passthrough (HDR10 now, Dolby Vision later with a promised firmware update), and BT.2020 and Deep Color support, all implemented by unnamed video processing. (Onkyo says 4K video and HDCP 2.2 are supported on only five of the eight HDMI 2.0a inputs and both the Main and Zone 2 HDMI outs; the remaining HDMI inputs are HDCP 1.4.) The pre/pro will scale 1080p (only) to 4K and will transcode analog composite video to component, but that’s about it for video processing.

(This seems to be the trend among A/V gear makers today, driven no doubt by the fact that any 4K display will, by definition, have its own 4K scaling on board. This makes perfect

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More controls reside neatly under a flip-down panel.

42 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

sense to me, and the incidental cost savings is welcome.)

Features-wise, the Onkyo loads everything you might expect, including onboard Wi-Fi, with Chromecast built in (Google’s new name for Google Cast) and Apple AirPlay networking, Bluetooth, and a good range of streaming apps, such as Pandora, Spotify, and Tidal. For the rest, I’ll refer you to Onkyo’s website; there’s far too much to list here.

Cosmetically, the new pre/pro is a bit taller, and thus a bit boxierlooking, than previous generations.

Its control arrangement of a single large knob and many small pushbuttons (with tiny on-key graphics) seems chosen more for appearances than for ergonomics,

AT A GLANCE

Plus Q Unimpeachable audio and basic video quality Q Generally good ergonomic design Q Eminently useful pop-up Quick Menu

Minus Q No aptX for Bluetooth Q Local-streaming audio doesn’t display file type/ sampling info Q Fairly downscaled remote

which is perfectly acceptable in a component whose interface, virtually always, will be via remote control and onscreen menus.

SURROUND PROCESSOR

THE VERDICT Onkyo’s latest A/V preamp/processor adds the Dolby Atmos/ DTS:X and 4K/HDR capabilities needed to bring the brand’s pre/pro current, while maintaining very solid value in the field.

ONKYO PR-RZ5100 SURROUND PROCESSOR PRICE: $2,399 Onkyo • onkyousa.com

Setup I installed the PR-RZ5100 in my long-term “B-chain,” comprising a 7 x 150-watt power amp and assorted-brand loudspeakers in a 5.1.4 Atmos configuration. (A compact 2 x 35-watt integrated amp drives my rear elevation channels, which works just fine in my room.)

The Onkyo’s main HDMI output went to my 55-inch Vizio M Series 4K display, with source material arriving primarily from my Oppo BDP-105 player and occasionally from an Xfinity X1 cable box, which is crashing only about once a week these days.

The actual installation was merely a matter of swapping cables—lots of them. While the PR-RZ5100 offers balanced XLR outputs on all 13 channels, my single-ended amps are RCA-in only, which is what I used. (As an aside, I don’t feel that a balancedline connection’s potential virtue of lessening induced noise, which is real, is called for in about 97 percent of consumer setups; I’ve certainly never found it necessary in mine.)

With the wiring complete, I ran Onkyo’s AccuEQ auto calibration and room-correction system. (Like several other manufacturers, Onkyo has dropped Audyssey EQ in favor of their own proprietary, non-licensed, and presumably less costly option.)

This required about 6 minutes of self-generated noise bursts and

clicks from all channels in sequence, and it returned crossover settings that were all just about spot on at 40 hertz L/R, 80 Hz center, and 90 Hz surrounds, as well as distance and level results that were very close to what I expected. Center level was about a decibel high on my meter, but it’s rare for any auto-cal system to agree perfectly with another measurement method. So in all, I have to give AccuEQ’s setup acumen high marks.

The Onkyo system’s room/ speaker-correction EQ can be applied to all channels, or to all minus the main front pair. With all channels corrected, I heard a very subtle sharpening of imaging and a tightening of lower midbass, such as typical pop/ rock bass lines. This seemed more consistent than otherwise with what other systems, including both toptier Audyssey and Dirac, have accomplished in my room and setup.

That said, it’s impossible for me to qualify the auto EQ here as better, worse, or the same without recourse to comparisons, which of course is impossible. Onkyo’s routine takes data from just one mic position, which would seem to be a limiting factor; but either way, results from one run on one system in one room have to be noted as interesting but absolutely not definitive. As is my custom, I did all of my serious listening with the auto EQ defeated on all channels.

Listening and Viewing Disappointingly, I have very little to say about the PR-RZ5100’s sound quality, except that my system sounded great on everything I played from it. (If you’re looking for judgments about how one particular, competently engineered line-level audio component sounds “more tuneful” or “tighter resolving of midfield image depth” than another, you’ve got the wrong guy.) The Onkyo decodes and plays DSD audio up to 11.2 megahertz, and my limited but growing library produced all the virtues I expected. For one example, a DSD download of an obscure but fascinating Villa-Lobos piece, the Concerto for Bassoon and Low Strings, had all the delicacy and detail required for highly persuasive naturalism. (And as a bassoonist in recovery, I should know.)

The pre/pro’s tenure in my system coincided with my birthday (no, I’m not telling) and thus receipt of the 50th-anniversary Super Deluxe Edition of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. So it seemed appropriate to first listen to the new 5.1 version on Blu-ray, mixed

by George Martin’s son, Giles, and Sam Okell—and you can count me a fan. My first big OMG moment came as early as the initial backing-vocal entrance on “With a Little Help from My Friends.” Here, the distinction between individual voices snapped

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Primary controls—a large knob and three rows of bu ons—adorn the right side of the faceplate.

soundandvision.com 43

TEST REPORT ON THE WEB

See soundandvision.com/ TestBench for full lab results and technical definitions.

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The PR-RZ5100 is a li le boxier than Onkyo’s previous generations.

Test Bench Onkyo PR-RZ5100 Surround Processor

AUDIO frequency response at preamp outputs of Dolby Digital decoder: Left (aqua) +0.00 dB @ 20 Hz, –0.13 dB @ 20 kHz. Center (green) –0.00 dB @ 20 Hz, –0.01 dB @ 20 kHz. Left surround (red) +0.00 dB @ 20 Hz, –0.01 dB @ 20 kHz. LFE (purple) Normalized to level @ 40 Hz: +0.12 dB @ 20 Hz, upper –3 dB @ 96 Hz, upper –6 dB @ 107 Hz. Analog frequency response in Pure Audio mode: –0.03 dB @ 10 Hz –0.00 dB @ 20 Hz –0.01 dB @ 20 kHz –0.03 dB @ 50 kHz Analog frequency response with signal processing: –0.10 dB @ 10 Hz –0.02 dB @ 20 Hz –0.20 dB @ 20 kHz –63.32 dB @ 50 kHz NO multichannel input to measure. The analog THD+N less than 0.008% @ 1 kHz w 100-mV input, volume control set to 78. Crosstalk w 100-mV input –98.47 dB left to right, –99.57 dB right to left. Signal-to-noise ratio w “A” weighting –131.08 dBrA.—MJP VIDEO The Onkyo passed our video clipping test.—DK

SPECS

Auto Setup/Room EQ: Proprietary Onkyo AccuEQ • Video Processing: 4K passthrough supporting HDCP 2.2, HDR (HDMI); scales 1080p to 4K • Dimensions (WxHxD, Inches): 17.2 x 7.9 x 17.6 • Weight (Pounds): 30 • Video Inputs: HDMI 2.0a (8, 1 front, 5 with HDCP 2.2, 3 with HDCP 1.4), component video (2), composite video (2) • Audio Inputs: Coaxial digital (2), optical digital (3), analog line-level stereo (6), phono • Additional: RJ-45 Ethernet, USB, RS-232, 12-volt trigger (1), IR in • Video Outputs: HDMI 2.0a (2, 1 second zone-capable) • Audio Outputs: 11.2-channel line single-ended (RCA), 11.2-channel line balanced (XLR), Zone 2 & 3 line-stereo, ¼-inch stereo headphone (front) • Wireless: Dualband Wi-Fi, Bluetooth (A2DP1.2); AirPlay, Chromecast, FireConnect

sharply into focus, bringing the poignant image of two flesh-andblood guys flanking a microphone, whereas before, there was just a homogenous “Beatles-backing” sound. And I had no complaints at all with the Onkyo’s presentation.

Both versions—DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD—sounded revelatory. One of my regular references, a Telarc disc of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, confirmed its multichannel-SACD prowess as well.

(SACD is, after all, just DSD on a disc.)

Film sound: Ditto.

I cued up the new DTS:X version of 3:10 to Yuma on Ultra HD Blu-ray and was rewarded with a big, sweeping soundfield that powerfully supported this understated but very finely drawn Western.

The mix’s height cues are relatively rare, but the Onkyo’s involving, wellportrayed surround bubble drew me all the way in just the same.

Ergonomics Onkyo’s electronics are so nearly ubiquitous that user-interface familiarity may have predisposed me to approval, but I found the PR-RZ5100 easy and generally quick

The PR-RZ5100 is highly functional, sounds great, and is easy to use.

44 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

to operate. The onscreen menus and displays are mostly simple text, and the majority of them pop up and down with reasonable alacrity. One exception is the main setup menu, which required my display to resync to 720p and then back again, engendering a pause of a couple of seconds in each direction, which would become annoying if the menu weren’t so infrequently used. (Onkyo says this has to do with how individual televisions sync their HDMI signals, and that some displays may not be subject to this at all.) The remote that Onkyo supplies is the same rather basic, nonilluminated, blackplastic handset that’s packed with the company’s receivers fairly far down the lineup, which is a bit of smack for a $2,400 flagship pre/pro.

But I understand the rationale, which doubtless is that a majority of buyers will be using a custom system controller or the app anyway, so why throw money away?

A couple of this-gen UI updates I particularly liked: First, each of the remote’s four listening-mode keys (Movie/TV, Music, Game, THX) step

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Onkyo’s included remote is a basic, non-illuminated model.

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TEST REPORT

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The 30-pound unit measures 7.9 inches tall, including the feet.

through the surround modes available to the current input signal, just as with earlier Onkyos, but the PR-RZ5100 pops up a two-line, lower-right-corner onscreen mini-menu that displays the inputsignal format above the surround mode as you step. Second, a remote info key (“i”) pops up full data on input signals and modes, both audio and video. Meanwhile, Onkyo has retained the Quick Menu, which pops up a mini-menu of contextsensitive items like center- and sub-channel level trims, tone, and EQ settings. Better still, all of the above are basic charactergenerated overlays, so there’s no delay or interruption whatsoever to video.

The pre/pro’s 1080p-to-4K video scaling worked as expected and introduced no overt artifacts I could detect, though I ended up fairly confident that it was at least no better than my Vizio display’s onboard processing. That said, I still fail to see the rationale for these 1080pto-4K scalers. If you’re viewing 4K, your screen (or projector) by definition includes its own 4K scaling, the quality of which you presumably factored into your purchase decision. Perhaps it’s just a fringe benefit to the 4K

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input/output processing necessary to any up-to-date HDMI design.

Streaming audio features include the usual suspects. Tidal, the only such service to which I subscribe (and not for much longer, I think), sounded and worked fine, as I imagine the others do. The Onkyo also includes a local-streaming mode, which I used as a client to my iMac-based TwonkyMedia DLNA server. This worked well and sounded superb, cheerfully streaming all my DSD and hi-res files without a hiccup. One gripe, though: Like a lot of these streamers, Onkyo’s puts onscreen a still of album art with track timing, album title, and artist name. But there’s no file type or codec info (and presumably because of the album image, invoking the Quick Menu now induces a two-second video blank in both directions as the menu comes and goes). I’d happily trade the picture for the data! In any event, Onkyo’s streaming client is one of the quicker and more positiveresponding examples.

Among the raft of other features, the two-zone multiroom functions seem worthy of note. One of these can be A/V, and the secondary HDMI output can serve as a singlecable, Zone 2 A/V feed. I confirmed Bluetooth, AirPlay, and Chromecast functionality, the Bluetooth being not the better-performing aptX codec, by the way—a fact that wasn’t immediately obvious and required arduous research to discover (see below). As noted, the PR-RZ5100 is stamped as capable of high dynamic range video; lacking both HDR source and display, I didn’t confirm this.

One small point of irritation: The PR-RZ5100 arrives packed only with Onkyo’s Basic Manual, essentially a glorified setup guide. The link marked “Full Manual, English” on the pre/pro’s webpage actually downloaded a PDF of the same basic

The Onkyo includes pro-style XLR balanced-line audio outputs for all 11.2 channels.

46 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

manual: Arrghh! I eventually found a link (and QR code) printed on the cover of the Basic Manual that led to an HTML, PDF-downloadable full manual, which included substantially more info (though a printed book would still be welcome, especially at this price). Only there, after diligent searching, did I learn (among other tidbits) that the PR-RZ5100 does not in fact support aptX. Beyond these quibbles, though, I have no bones to pick with Onkyo’s latest preamp/processor evolution. The PR-RZ5100 is highly functional, sounds great, looks fine video-wise, is easy and mostly quick to use, and (compared with many another pre/pro, especially the few more esoteric ones) is very sensibly priced. What more could we ask?

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TEST REPORT Samsung QN65Q9 LCD Ultra HDTV

Q and Me

Performance Features Ergonomics Value

By Thomas J. Norton

Samsung QN65Q9 LCD Ultra HDTV PRICE $6,000 NOW THAT WE’RE AWASH IN high dynamic range (HDR) material on Ultra HD Blu-ray, Samsung is determined to make the most of it with two new TVs, the 65-inch QN65Q9 reviewed here and the 75-inch QN75Q9 for buyers who prefer a bigger (and, at $10,000, pricier) set. Each has a screen that’s flat, not curved.

Samsung’s top sets this year have been dubbed QLED. If this looks awfully close to OLED in print, separated only by a tiny squiggle, it isn’t in practice. Samsung doesn’t market OLED sets and would be the first to emphasize the advantages of LCD TVs for Ultra HD, particularly for HDR. LCD sets can go significantly brighter than current OLED models, and there are major technical obstacles to OLED’s matching them in that respect—at least anytime soon. [Ed. Note: The OLED camp’s response, not surprisingly, is to point out OLED’s inevitably deeper blacks and therefore wider dynamic range, despite lower peak brightness; for now, the jury remains out on whether brighter highlights (in the absence of pure black) present any clearly discernible advantage for display of HDR.—RS] In this case, the Q is meant to stand for Samsung’s latest incarnation of quantum dot, an LCD backlight technology that uses nanocrystals, which, when exposed to blue LED light, can emit relatively pure red or green light required to fill out the traditional RGB primaries for full color composition. One advantage is said to be the ability to keep color consistent as the image gets brighter—also a desirable trait for HDR reproduction (and about which I’ll say more later). Some other manufacturers also use quantum dot film of their own or third-party design in

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The QN65Q9 boasts Samsung’s QLED quantum dot technology for bright images.

48 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

their LCD backlights. In an interesting turn, Samsung has even begun encouraging other manufacturers to use “QLED” to describe their own quantum dot sets in the hopes of creating a common marketing term and raising quantum dot’s profile (presumably as a competitor to OLED).

The Q9 has a simplistic but elegant design featuring an almost bezel-free framed screen and a pair of widely spaced cylindrical legs that accommodate wire management for a power cord and umbilical cable from the company’s low-profile One Connect box. As with all of Samsung’s premium models from recent years, all of the connections

AT A GLANCE

Plus Q Bright and punchy HDR Q Excellent resolution Q Stunning color

Minus Q No Dolby Vision Q Edge-lit instead of fullarray backlight dimming

for the TV (apart from power) are made to this box that sits separate from the display itself. In this new 2017 model, the box connects to the

screen through a thin, almost invisible, 5-meter (16.4 feet) fiber-optic cable. (A 15-meter/ 49.2-foot version is an option.) It’s paintable and so unobtrusive that Samsung even promotes the idea that it can hang exposed when the set is mounted on a wall; you don’t have to bury the cable inside the wall cavity. And speaking of wallmounting: The Q9 is the first of Samsung’s TVs to offer the ability to add an optional “no-gap wall mount” that fits into a recess behind the set to allow it to hang virtually flush against the wall. It’s a clever mount design that even integrates some modest tilt and the ability to perfectly level the set after mounting, reducing the precision required to hang the

ULTRA HDTV

THE VERDICT Samsung’s new top-of-the-line QLED flagship brings first-rate brightness, brilliant color, and crisp resolution to the Ultra HD party, but enthusiasts might notice its lack of a full-array, localdimming backlight.

wall plate. The combination of these two features, Samsung hopes, will encourage more consumers to perform a DIY wall-mount of their television.

The new Q9 sets support HDR10 only. They do not (as of this writing) support HLG (Hybrid Log-Gamma, a metadata-free form of HDR intended primarily for broadcasts and streaming), but Samsung has said that their

HDR models from 2016 and beyond will eventually be firmware-upgradeable for it. More critically, Samsung has no plans to add Dolby Vision, the primary (and more technically advanced, dynamic-metadataenabled) competition to HDR10. But that doesn’t mean you can’t watch a Dolby Vision-equipped Ultra HD Blu-ray on the QN65Q9. All such Blu-rays (there are, as of this writing, only a few) must use a core HDR10 layer; the dynamic metadata is sent to the display to convert this to Dolby Vision if a set is equipped for it. The Samsung will simply ignore this added metadata and show the source in HDR10.

Samsung also has recently announced its own dynamic version of HDR10, called HDR10+, but (as of midyear 2017) no one we are aware of has used it. Its main advantage over Dolby Vision is that, like HDR10, its use is free for any content provider, whereas Dolby charges a licensing fee for Dolby Vision.

Unlike recent top sets from Samsung in prior years, the Q9s don’t use full-array, local-dimming (FALD) backlights. Instead, they employ edge-lit local dimming at the left and right sides of the screen with three control options: Low, Standard, and High (there’s no “Off”). The QN65Q9 is

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Samsung’s Q9 line also offers a pricier 75-inch model.

SAMSUNG QN65Q9 LCD ULTRA HDTV PRICE: $6,000 Samsung • (800) 726-7864 • samsung.com

said to offer class-challenging brightness, particularly in HDR, together with a 10-bit color depth and expanded color. While no consumer TV can yet fully reproduce the widest specified UHD color gamut (BT.2020), Samsung states that this set will do all of P3—a slightly smaller color gamut used in digital cinema and, to our knowledge, the gamut found on all or most of the Ultra HD Blu-rays currently on the market. Samsung also claims that, thanks to its QLED quantum dot technology, the TV will maintain full color saturation up to the highest brightness levels, arguing that the competition (i.e., OLED) can’t. The company has even assisted the development of test clips to help demonstrate this capability of more fully realized “color volume.” That’s a phrase you’re likely to see more of in our reviews, particularly as our tools become more sophisticated at measuring color volume along with the location points of the color primaries traditionally used to define the boundaries of color gamut.

There are four selectable picture modes. I used Movie for all of my SDR (standard dynamic range) and HDR viewing. You can dial in separate settings for HDR and SDR for any of the modes, and the set will switch between them automatically in response to the input signal type.

The QN65Q9 provides 2- and 20-point White Balance

controls, a Custom Color Space (full color-management system, or CMS) selection, and multiple gamma settings. Samsung’s motion-smoothing Auto Motion Plus includes a Custom option with separate adjustments for Blur and Judder. An HDR+ feature simulates HDR with SDR sources. Its algorithm derives a string of dynamic, frame-by-frame HDR metadata based on the SDR content. Some might find its picture compelling, but to me it looked punched up and artificial. As with Auto Motion Plus, I didn’t use it after simply checking it out.

A feature called HDMI UHD Color must be engaged separately, and manually, for each HDMI input you plan to use for Ultra HD. Without it, that input will display only 8-bit color. This control is, unfortunately, easy to miss; it’s hidden under External Device Manager in the General menu.

Samsung’s non-backlit OneRemote is a small metal wand that’s been designed with minimal buttons to encourage use of the set’s onscreen Q Smart interface. It was, at first, a nuisance. The major offender was the Home button, located just below the down navigation control. I lost count of the number of times I pushed the wrong one. The remote is also

•

The widely spaced legs offer wire management.

soundandvision.com 49

TEST REPORT

•

Test Bench Samsung QN65Q9 LCD Ultra HDTV BEFORE Calibration

AFTER Calibration

FOR the picture settings used in this review and more detailed Test Bench notes, go to soundandvision.com.

1080P/SDR FULL-ON/FULL-OFF Contrast Ratio: Unmeasurable IN the Movie Picture mode, with the Backlight control on 5, Brightness on 0, Contrast on 86, and BT.1886 gamma adjusted to +3, the measured peak white level was 46 ft-L or 158 nits (rounded to the nearest nit/ft-L). With a full black screen, with or without a white pause bug displayed in the corner of the screen, the center screen measured 0.00 ft-L, for an effectively unmeasurable contrast ratio.

IN the Warm 2 Color Tone setting and a peak white level of 46 ft-L, the precalibration grayscale Delta E from 20% to 100% varied from a low of 1.44 at 80% to a high of 5.2 at 30%. Post-calibration, using only the 2-point grayscale controls, the 20% to 100% Delta Es improved to 0.843 at 30% to a high of 2.25 at 100%.

The pre-cal color Delta Es ranged from a low of 2.69 in yellow to a high of 7.9 in green. Adjustments to the CMS improved this to a minimum of 0.62 in red to a high of 2.52 in blue, though I ultimately reverted to the set’s Auto setting for reasons described in the review.

(DELTA E is a figure of merit indicating how close the color comes to the D65 HD standard at each point in the brightness range. Values below 3— some experts allow for 4—are generally considered visually indistinguishable from ideal.)

WITH the BT.1886 gamma left in its default setting, the pre-calibration gamma measured far too high— averaging over 2.7 for most of its range.

Post-calibration, with the gamma control set to +3, the gamma was 2.49 at 20%, decreasing to 2.22 at 70% and 1.87 at 90%. While this was not ideal, resulting in slightly crushed dark details (the

higher the gamma number, the darker the mid tones in the image), it was the best option available.

UHD/HDR AS with SDR, the QN65Q9’s LED lighting shuts down fully when we attempt to measure black level, resulting in an unmeasurable contrast ratio. But the reality with real-world sources will be different and highly dependent on the specific scene being watched, as discussed in the review.

IN the default Cinema Home HDR settings, the pre-calibration grayscale Delta E from 20% to 100% varied from a minimum of 0.24 at 20% to 8.6 at 80%.

Post-calibration, using only the 2-point grayscale controls and just the 70% level of the 20-point controls (the rest of the 20-point controls appeared to be ineffective in HDR), the grayscale Delta Es ranged from 0.2 at 20% to 12.2 at 80%.

Note that the Delta E values for HDR include not only the position of the measured white point but also its luminance. And that luminance includes deviations from the PQ curve (gamma for HDR). While 12.2 sounds alarming, it occurs at the knee of the PQ curve, where it will have little effect on the visible result. The next highest value, 6.1, occurs at a point where the 20point White Balance adjustment was ineffective in correcting it. Omitting the luminance contribution to the Delta Es, the knee of the PQ curve, and the area between 50% and 60%, the white point x/y coordinates were respectable after calibration. Most of the limited number of HDR sets we’ve tested to date have performed similarly.

THE color Delta Es, post-calibration in the Auto setting of the Custom Color Space, measured a high of 3.2 for yellow and a low of 1.4 for red.

HDR peak white output at 100% brightness in a 2% window, simulating a small bright object on a black background, was 845 nits. In a 10% window, it increased to 1,377 nits; in a 25% window, 1,149 nits, and in a 100% window, 613 nits. The drop-off with increasing screen white coverage above 10% should be expected even for an LCD. We’re talking about a huge increase in brightness capability over that found in most nonHDR sets from just a couple of years ago, and maintaining the 10% level of brightness as the screen coverage increases would put huge stress on a set’s power supply. But the drop-off here was less, by percentage, than what we’ve seen so far from OLED displays, which typically produce much less brightness to begin with.—TJN

The small OneRemote handset offers voice control and minimal bu ons.

very thin and consistently sought the comfort of the warm recesses between seat cushions.

The remote’s voice recognition feature made up for this. If you hold down the voice recognition button and speak into the remote with a brief request such as “Gamma,” the set shows the current setting of that control at the bottom of the screen or goes directly to that feature in the menu. It can even make simple adjustments by voice, such as “Menu Off,” “Contrast nine five,” or “Brightness to two.” The more cryptic your verbal request, the better. The feature responded to the word “Brightness” by showing the control setting but was puzzled by the words “Brightness control.” It also turned ornery on occasion—as when, several times in succession, it thought it heard me say “camera” when I said “Gamma.” Or when, after I responded, “Yes” to its query, it brought up four links to dresses.

It did recognize my voice without difficulty, though the results might be interesting if you speak with a heavy accent like Brad Pitt’s character in Snatch.

The only downside to this feature may be that it supposedly requires you to register for a Samsung account (though it worked for me immediately, and I didn’t think I had an account).

More ominously for the paranoid owner, the onscreen manual states, “To use the voice text input function and smart search function, you must consent to

provisions allowing third parties to collect and use your voice data.”

The Samsung’s Q Smart platform and graphic interface does just about everything expected of a smart TV. This latest version allows both source inputs and apps for streaming services to be integrated in the same horizontal scroll of most-used functions to speed your access. And like prior versions, it’ll recognize many source components by their HDMI con= nection and be able to automatically control them through the Samsung remote via HDMI-CEC or infrared blaster as needed; this includes your cable or satellite set-top box. It can mirror your computer, smartphone, or tablet screen. I had no problem getting the hub to wirelessly stream material from sites like YouTube and Netflix.

The set can also interact with SmartThings, Samsung’s “smart device–based home monitoring system that gives you centralized control of everything from outlets to locks to speakers.” This requires “the SmartThings Extend USB Adapter, a dongle that lets you control your entire home from your Samsung smart TV.” Smart home automation buffs may recognize this as a derivative of the technology that Samsung acquired when the company bought out the makers of the SmartThings automation platform in 2014. But its testing is beyond the scope of this review.

The TV’s sound wasn’t anything special to begin with, and

Probably the best edge-lighting I’ve seen to date.

SPECS

Dimensions (WxHxD, Inches): 56.8 x 32.8 x 1 (without stand or One Connect box); 56.8 x 36 x 14.4 (with stand) • Weight (Pounds): 62.2 (without stand); 69 (with stand) • Video Inputs: HDMI 2.0a (4), RF (antenna) • Other: EX-Link, LAN, USB 2.0 (3), Audio Return Channel on HDMI 2 (with compatible AVR) • Audio Outputs: Toslink optical digital

soon after I began my testing, it started to distort in the left channel.

This continued throughout the review and was clearly a sample failure. Fortunately, the QN65Q9 passes a full 5.1 DTS or Dolby Digital signal presented at its HDMI inputs to its Toslink optical output, to better feed multichannel soundbars or other outboard systems.

While the picture quality on most LCD TVs starts to deteriorate when you sit more than 20 to 25 degrees off center, the QN65Q9 can do a bit better, up to an estimated 40 degrees. The critical viewer, however, will still want to grab the center seat.

Samsung, along with the other major flat-panel TV makers, has now dropped 3D from this and other Ultra HDTVs. Sorry, 3D fans.

HD/SDR The QN65Q9 performed well on most of our standard HD video tests.

It failed the 3:2 SD test, flickering on the test pattern I use for this, but there were no similar or related artifacts visible on regular 3:2 SD material. The set also clipped below-black signals, which means that it filters out any information in the signal below digital level 16. This is rarely visible on normal program sources but can make it more difficult to properly set the Brightness (black level) control. Abovewhite clipping, which the Q9 does not suffer from, may sometimes filter out white-area details occasionally found in some content.

Optimized with a calibrated image, the TV displayed blacks and shadow details that were very good relative to

what I’ve seen in the universe of LCD/ LED sets, but they were inferior to the best I’ve seen from other pricey, flagship LCD/LED designs. The most prominent TVs in the LCD competition (including Samsung’s own best model from last year) use full-array, local-dimming backlights, which, when well executed, can provide higher precision and require less compromise than even the most advanced edge-lit backlights. In a fully darkened room, on scenes with bright highlights against a pure black background, the QN65Q9 either changed the black area of the screen to a medium gray or, at best, produced subtle, puffy, white-gray “cloudiness” in the black areas. The blacks behind starfields, for example, leaned more toward dark gray, and there was noticeable haloing around bright objects located in front of a dark or black background.

That said, this TV’s local dimming is arguably the best edge lighting I’ve yet seen. There were none of the worst flaws I’ve seen in the past from edge lighting, such as flashlighting (think of tiny gnomes hiding behind the set’s frame, wielding teeny flashlights). In mixed light and dark scenes, the subjective contrast was often very good, and when the source went totally black (such as in fades between scenes), the screen went fully black as well. But the latter is true of LED backlighting or edge lighting in general, since LEDs can be turned off and then on again almost instantaneously, and many sets do shut them fully down with a black signal.

At first, I also noticed vertical streaks in the picture in both SDR and

(more prominently) HDR, clearly visible on full-screen gray or color test patterns but also hard to miss in a few scenes from real-world sources.

Samsung must have seen them, too, because a downloaded firmware update during my evaluation period reduced them dramatically. Afterward, they could still be seen on test patterns and showed up on the occasional scene that featured large areas of solid white, gray, or color— particularly in medium-brightness scenes with a horizontal camera pan.

But their incidence became so rare that I no longer considered them a concern. Those who already own this TV should make sure they have their firmware current. The 65Q9, helped by the side placement of its edge lighting (rather than on top and bottom), does do a great job keeping black bars on letterboxed films totally black.

Putting aside any nits to pick with the black level performance, I must say that the Samsung has plenty of

ammunition on the plus side of its ledger. Starting with its huge potential light output: Before performing a full SDR calibration, I had to dramatically reduce the Backlight control, which in its default setting of 17 (maximum 20) produced a peak brightness of more than 150 foot-lamberts! Even a Backlight setting of 6 produced a more than adequate SDR peak output of roughly 50 ft-L—more than enough for some very punchy (if not too-bright) dark-room viewing.

Following a full calibration, which didn’t produce a dramatic change in the set’s out-of-box picture (that insane peak brightness excluded!), the Samsung excelled. Life of Pi, in 1080p/SDR, might lack for the rich color depth and snap of Ultra HD, but nothing I saw from it made me feel like I was missing anything. From the vividly colored scenes in India to the surprisingly extensive palette of Pi’s time at sea with a Bengal tiger, the movie looked as good as I’ve ever seen it. Even the dark scene in chapter 17, where Pi stirs the ocean full of phosphorescent fish before a whale breaches near his raft, had a lot more impressive contrast than I expected.

It’s been a long time since I pulled out my Blu-ray of The Mummy—no,

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All of the Samsung’s connections are located on the low-profile, outboard One Connect box, which now connects to the display via a thin fiber-optic cable.

soundandvision.com 51

TEST REPORT

• not the new Tom Cruise version but the 1999 film with Brendan Fraser. It was always an excellent transfer, and the Samsung didn’t disappoint. The bright, sunlit desert scenes and the dark scenes in the underground caverns of a lost city were equally well handled.

I did find, however, that my efforts at using the Custom setting of the Custom Color Space controls resulted in an image that was too warm (despite measuring respectably well), with particularly rosy fleshtones. I therefore turned it to Auto (the default setting) for the above comments and for the rest of the review. I set it to Auto for UHD/ HDR material as well.

Ultra HD/HDR The Samsung’s SDR strengths and shortcomings carried over into HDR. The vertical stripes in the image were occasionally visible in HDR, but after the update mentioned above, they were infrequent and easy to ignore. Still, the lack of full-array local dimming often resulted in the inability of black backgrounds behind titles or other small bright highlights to remain totally black, or at least as black as I’ve seen with full-array local dimming.

Those problems aside, the TV frequently looked superb on 4K/HDR material. Trolls is one of the most vivid Ultra HD Blu-rays in my collection. Its colors popped on the Samsung, and the silver flecks in the Trolls title logo glistened. The emperor’s golden robes in The Great Wall also looked incredible, and Passengers was crisply detailed as well, with bright and punchy highlights.

Still, the set’s performance can perhaps be described best by comparing it with that of a chief competitor.

Samsung Versus Sony With the Sony XBR-65A1E OLED simultaneously in house for evaluation (review pending), I

52 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

The Q9’s tiny bezel the display achieve an all-screen look.

couldn’t avoid putting it side by side with the Samsung. Such comparisons can reveal more than the simple viewing of a set by itself, but they’re not at all straightforward to pull off.

The key issue is this: If you take two sets and calibrate them as accurately as possible, you’ll often find that while they look rather different when positioned side by side, a few tweaks to the controls of one or the other (or both) can make them look virtually identical in important ways.

Sony recently informed me (after my evaluation of their set was completed!) that the X-tended Dynamic Range control, when turned on, adds a bit of pseudo HDR to SDR material.

This control is in Low by default in the Cinema pro mode I used for HD/SDR, so I included it in my HD/SDR viewing and measurements for that review.

But the Low setting of this control for SDR proved useful as long as I left it in Low and set the Gamma control no higher than zero (even better at –2 or –3). It was certainly more convincing than Samsung’s HDR simulation mode, HDR+, which offers only a single, and too aggressive, setting.

After I completed the UHD/HDR calibration with the QN65Q9’s ST.2084 gamma control adjustment at zero, I discovered (using a Samsung-produced test disc not available commercially) that this adjustment control—which lets the user tweak the gamma from –3 to +3—progressively clips bright HDR highlights when advanced from zero (best) to +3 (hard white clipping).

But much of the HDR material I watched looked best at a gamma adjustment of +1 or even +2. (In spot checks, the set didn’t calibrate as well on those higher settings, so I left the calibration, performed with this control on zero, unchanged apart from the gamma tweak.) Still, this clipping wasn’t visible on any of the commercial discs I tried. So I went with a higher gamma adjustment whenever the source, and the comparison with the Sony, needed it.

As noted earlier, I found that the Samsung, post-calibration in SDR, looked too warm, particularly in fleshtones.

When I put it up against

the Sony, it was clear that the Sony’s fleshtones looked more natural. When I changed the Samsung’s Custom Color Space control from Custom to Auto, it then closely matched the Sony’s fleshtones.

That was only a concern for SDR; for HDR, I used the Auto position of the Samsung’s Custom Color Space from the beginning.

With the controls now set for the best match, there was little to separate the two sets in their HD/ SDR performance, apart from peak white output (which I’ll get to in a moment), black level, and shadow detail. Did they look absolutely identical in resolution and color?

No. I felt that the Sony was a hair sharper, but this was almost subliminal. And while the color match varied from level to level and source to source, both sets consistently offered believable and properly weighted color.

As set up for the SDR comparison, the controls on the Sony that regulate image brightness had to be dialed up to nearly their peak levels (including the Low position on that X-tended Dynamic Range control) just to get the same subjective brightness level that the Samsung achieved with Backlight settings of 5 to 6 (maximum 20). The Samsung’s extra SDR overhead might be useful in a brightly lit room.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Samsung continued to exhibit the SDR and HDR edge-lighting weakesses mentioned earlier, while the Sony—with its emissive OLED display of self-emanating pixels— largely avoided these problems. The Samsung continued to surprise me, however, with its ability to convincingly render dark scenes without washing them out.

Furthermore, the Samsung definitely offered more HDR pop than the Sony. Specular highlights were brighter, though not dramatically so except on scenes with a high overall peak brightness. And while I can’t say I found much source material to substantiate the Samsung’s color volume claims of higher saturation at

high luminance levels, I did look closely at the super-bright fireballs that destroy New York, Washington, and Los Angeles in the original Independence Day. They did appear to be brighter, with a deeper red, on the QN65Q9. Ditto for the fireballs slung over The Great Wall at the swarming horde of toothy monsters.

That said, staring at video fireballs in HDR is uncomfortable; normally, I would have been concentrating on the other action in those scenes and might have missed seeing the Samsung’s advantage. But to the extent that we perceive these fleeting superbright highlights in running content, the QN65Q9 can serve then up.

Conclusions Samsung’s premier models over the past few years have featured full-array local dimming backlights.

But not for 2017. And while the company’s designers have achieved much with the edge-lighting on the QN65Q9—probably the best edge-lighting I’ve seen to date— we’ve yet to find any edge-lit set that can deliver the kind of consistent deep black performance and screen uniformity a well-executed full-array, local dimming backlight or emissive display can provide. I need to balance this: The 65Q9 is a superb set in many ways and deserves a good rating. Among its other positive attributes, its ability to put out an immensely bright image and punchy highlights could be a welcome if not critical advantage in a sun-drenched room. But its limitations in black level and shadow detail, particularly when viewed in a dark or dimly lit environment, puts it below its head-to-head competition despite its significant strengths.

The Samsung Q9 can put out an immensely bright image and punchy highlights.

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TEST REPORT

Fascia of the Future

By Mark Fleischmann

Denon HEOS AVR A/V Receiver PRICE $999 AT A GLANCE HAVING SUCCESSFULLY developed their own wireless ecosystem under the HEOS brand, Denon is using it to reinvent the audio/video receiver. What the company calls the HEOS AVR departs from the black-box norm by offering suave dove-gray aluminum as an optional alternative to the usual black. It isn’t a box, either, or at least not a pure rectangular solid, thanks to a diagonally split, convex front panel. Whereas other A/V receivers wear lots of buttons or conceal them behind a flip-down door, the HEOS AVR has a front panel that’s pointedly devoid of any controls except a large metal volume dial. And in lieu of a front-panel display, it has only a large horizontal LED stripe in the HEOS style for volume and status. This isn’t just another receiver. It’s a deliberate provocation.

The madness to this method, Denon says, is its attempt to create a modern-day alternative to the complex (and sales-stagnant) traditional AVR that has been losing ground to the convenience and simplicity of soundbars. It’s hoped that a next-generation AVR, offering both wired and wireless setup flexibility (more on that later) and less complexity of operation, can bridge the gap while delivering a true 5.1channel surround experience and more robust sound quality. As you’ll see, in trying to do so, the HEOS AVR eschews both the aesthetic and much of the feature-load of

Plus Q App-driven HEOS ecosystem Q Up to 5.1 channels Q Wireless HEOS surround and sub options

Minus Q Nearly no front-panel controls Q No low-volume mode Q No Dolby Atmos or DTS:X

traditional A/V receivers. But that’s all in the plan.

Just Enough Jacks Back-panel connectivity is rigorously limited. There are just enough speaker terminals to support the five amplifier channels—no back surrounds, no height channels, no biamping. A/V sources enter by HDMI or not at all—no composite or other legacy video jacks. The policy for audio sources is slightly less draconian, with two digital and two analog. The sole line-audio output is the sub out, though if you use the wireless HEOS Subwoofer, you won’t need it. (See our dedicated review in the sidebar on page 56.) There are no AM/FM tuners (no need on a streaming AVR, Denon says), nor is there a headphone jack. The IR input jack

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Denon flouts the traditional black-box aesthetic with the HEOS AVR’s dove gray finish.

54 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

is the only concession to custom installation.

Like most other A/V receivers, this one can be set up in 5.1, 3.1, 2.1, or 2.0 modes. It doesn’t support 7.1 (with back surrounds) or the new Dolby Atmos and DTS:X height-enhanced modes. However, it does support lossless DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD, as well as highresolution audio in FLAC or WAV up to 192/24 and ALAC up to 96/24.

Listening modes include much of what you’d expect in a receiver, such as the Dolby Pro Logic II Music and Movie modes and the DTS Neo:6 music and cinema modes, as well as direct, stereo, multichannel stereo, and generic virtual surround (but none of the commonly found lowvolume listening modes). Video processing supports 4K passthrough (but no scaling of any kind), HDR10 high dynamic range, 4:4:4 color subsampling, and BT.2020 color gamut; Dolby Vision HDR passthrough will be added via firmware update later this year.

Eighteen different music options are available through the HEOS App. Eleven of them are music services: Spotify, Tidal, Amazon Music, Pandora, Deezer, Napster, Rhapsody, SiriusXM, and SoundCloud, along with iHeartRadio, which aggregates more than 800 U.S. radio stations, and TuneIn, which aggregates net radio stations from around the world. You can also select

music from This Phone (the phone or tablet running the app), Music Servers (computers and other DLNA networked devices), USB Music (drives, not computers), Playlists, History, Favorites, or Inputs (any of the receiver’s HDMI or other inputs as well as inputs on any HEOSconnected device). I could file this under Call Me Picky, but I would have liked the USB jacks to accept direct input from a PC; if you’re designing the receiver of the future, go there. Certain readers among us who own six different pressings of “The White Album” might also want a phono input.

On its own terms, the HEOS AVR does an amazing amount, but in some ways, it may confound the expectations of an A/V receiver veteran.

There’s no auto setup—though the app’s setup assistant substitutes for much of that—and no room correction. But if you need to tweak, basic bass and treble controls are just a step away from the play menus. The small remote handles power, input, volume, mute, and basic transport controls—that’s all. You can’t access a TV-screen interface from the remote.

And remember: If you lose the remote, there are no front-panel buttons to fall back on; you’ll be totally dependent on the app.

You can’t pick listening modes directly from the remote, though you can access six Quick Select presets that combine input and listening mode for the HDMI and optical inputs, and you can edit the settings.

You can’t access advanced settings when your mobile device has run down, but you can install the HEOS App on an extra device, as I did.

A/V RECEIVER

THE VERDICT Denon HEOS AVR A/V Receiver Audio Performance Features Ergonomics Value

As of September, around the time you might read this, Denon will also add via a firmware update native support for the new Alexa Smart Home Entertainment skill set.

Assuming an Amazon Dot, Echo, or other Alexa-enabled device somewhere in your network to provide for voice access, this will allow the use of speaking commands to control some basic operations.

The exact command set was not settled at press time but was expected to include such things as volume up/down, mute, transport control, and input switching.

For this review of the HEOS AVR, we assembled a 5.1-channel system that included the HEOS Subwoofer and a pair of the previously reviewed HEOS 1 active wireless speakers (June 2016 issue and soundandvision.com) in the surround positions.

All are packaged with showmanship, featuring sturdy, colorful boxes and heavy packing material; the HEOS Subwoofer even has the HEOS name and logo die-cut into a protective corrugated cardboard panel. If the unpacking experience is important to you, you’ll be favorably impressed.

App-Driven Setup When I set up a conventional A/V receiver with passive speakers and an active sub, I connect all speakers and components, run the auto setup, manually tweak a few settings in the TV-screen interface, make a wired or wireless network connection, and start listening.

Setting up the HEOS AVR is different.

Its central organizing principle is the HEOS App. Setup does require a dive into a graphic user interface— but on your tablet or phone, not your TV screen.

The Denon HEOS AVR reimagines the black-box receiver as a sleek, shapely, appdriven beauty that leverages the home network to provide wireless sub and surrounds.

The first order of business was to connect the AVR, sub, and surrounds to the network. My initial crack at the AVR was unsuccessful, even after system resets, possibly because I had confused it by plugging it in and letting it twist in the wind for 24 hours. I unplugged it and turned my attention to the HEOS Subwoofer and the HEOS 1 pair. After connecting an Android tablet’s headphone jack to each of their aux inputs— which provides a data (not analog audio) connection—I followed the app’s prompts, typed in the network password, and named them Sub, Left Surround, and Right Surround (though their system assignments came later). The app mercifully remembered the network password after the first go-round. It offered “optimized” settings for the sub and surround that covered crossover, gain, and volume curve in an undisclosed proprietary manner.

Its default crossover for the three front speakers was 80 hertz, a good choice for my Paradigms.

DENON HEOS AVR A/V RECEIVER PRICE: $999 Denon • (201) 762-6665 • usa.denon.com

With the sub and surrounds connected and their software updated, I returned to the AVR— which, after its coffee break, was amenable to receiving the network connection and software update. (I learned later from Denon that the AVR goes into deep sleep to save energy when it can’t find a network and would have woken up and accepted connection with any button press on the remote. The company is said to be working on a new setup routine due later this year, in any event.) Once the AVR was recognized on the app’s device list, along with the sub and surrounds, I was able to use the set-up assistant to assign the HEOS Subwoofer as sub and the HEOS 1 pair as surrounds. The setup assistant might also have stepped me through the TV and input connections, but as an old-fashioned receiver guy, I had already done them—and they worked.

I’d wondered how the app would let me access the things I’d normally tinker with in a receiver interface. The answer lay in the My Devices/HEOS AVR menu, where a Speakers submenu allowed access to crossovers, sub phase, levels, distances, and impedance compatibility settings.

One problem: Although I pecked away to trigger the test tone and set levels, the app barely responded.

The Android tablet had never had touch-sensitivity issues with other software, so the unresponsiveness must have been a bug in the Android app and its interaction with the

network and system. On an iPad, the submenu was more functional, albeit slow, as settings wormed through the network. But I finally had a shiny new HEOS system ripe for listening.

Associated equipment included three to five Paradigm Reference Studio 20 v.4 speakers and a Paradigm Seismic 110 subwoofer, along with an Oppo BDP-83SE universal disc player and both Android and iOS tablets: 2016 Samsung Galaxy Tab A 10.1 and 2013 iPad mini. All movie demos were on Blu-ray with DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks. Some of my listening focused on comparing the HEOS 1 speakers with the Paradigms in the surround channels. I also compared the HEOS Subwoofer with the Paradigm Seismic 110. (I’ll say a little about that below and more in the sidebar.)

The Energy-Efficient AVR The HEOS AVR uses an advanced Class D switching amplifier rated at 50 watts per channel. Class D is more energy-efficient than Class A/B and with performance advances in recent years is slowly taking over the stodgy receiver world, notable already in the Pioneer line. It's even showing up now in audiophile separates. In this case, Denon incorporates feedback and other refinements said to lower noise and distortion and improve the amp’s ability to drive a wide range of loads. Its voicing worked for me, with a crisp top end and enough power to keep my average-sensitivity speakers happy

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A diagonally split, convex front panel and complete lack of control buttons contribute to the designer flair.

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TEST REPORT

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at moderate volumes. If your speakers need a warm-voiced amp, this isn’t it, but neutrally voiced speakers will likely get along fine.

Solace features Anthony Hopkins as a clairvoyant who assists in homicide investigations. In its dramatic supernatural moments, it goes from abrupt silence to sucker-punch effects, and the HEOS AVR handled these transient peaks

The streamlined back panel does away with all legacy video connections in favor of HDMI.

well, along with the more prosaic (but crucial) job of making dialogue sound both intelligible and realistic.

The crisp top end helped there. The timbre match between the HEOS 1 surrounds and the three Paradigms in the front channels was better than I’d expected. With the system’s pink-noise test tones, they were close. However, in a scene with rainfall—my all-time favorite surround

effect—the HEOS 1 speakers did seem to detach slightly. A small level cut might have finessed the minor mismatch, but I wanted to see if it recurred with other content.

(Keep in mind that there will always be some mismatch, potentially even a big one, between the wireless surrounds and the front three speakers with the HEOS AVR because there is no

Denon HEOS Subwoofer DENON’S HEOS SUBWOOFER stays true to the HEOS ethos both cosmetically and functionally. This is a sub without a wired analog input, connecting exclusively through the network, either Ethernet or Wi-Fi. It can be used to add bass support to any HEOS wireless speakers, including the HEOS Bar soundbar, and can be used with the HEOS Amp and Link modules as well as with the HEOS AVR. The sub is the size and shape of a desktop PC and can be placed vertically or horizontally. Behind a fabric-covered grille is a pair of 5.25-inch drivers; there’s also a port on the cabinet’s back panel. Aside from the HEOS-style volume and

mute buttons on top, the LED stripe at bottom, and the necessary connect and reset buttons on back, it takes its crossover and systemvolume settings from the HEOS App. It doesn’t have a line or LFE input—just Ethernet and the

Denon HEOS Subwoofer Performance Features Ergonomics Value

setup-related aux jack. It does have a USB jack, and it’s not just for manual firmware updates. As with other HEOS speakers, it also feeds the entire HEOS ecosystem (not just the sub) with music from a USB drive.

I auditioned the HEOS Subwoofer along with the HEOS AVR. I also created a special drumcentric playlist to compare it with my reference sub, the Paradigm Seismic 110. The tracks were Led Zeppelin’s “Moby Dick” from Led Zeppelin II, a vehicle for John Bonham’s drum solo; The Who’s medley of “My Generation” and various Tommy excerpts on Live at Leeds, with Keith Moon in his prime; the Dave Brubeck Quartet’s “Take Five” from Time Out, with Joe Morello’s memorable solo; and (you guessed it) the Beatles’ “The End” from Abbey Road, with Ringo Starr’s perfect blend of taste and power. Zep and Brubeck were FLAC 96/24 files, while the others were ALAC ripped from CD. The HEOS AVR accessed the playlist on the PC

through the network.

Let me state up front that it was never a fair fight. The HEOS Subwoofer’s two 5.25-inch drivers were outclassed by the Paradigm’s 10-inch beastie. The Paradigm is $1,650 worth of sub; the Denon is $599.

And the Paradigm is my reference sub and everyday companion, so it’s my definition of normal. Inevitably, it woofed lower and cleaner, with deeper thuds for Bonham’s mighty bass drum and toms, as well as a more natural decay for Morello’s.

The switch to the HEOS Subwoofer was either a step down or a step sideways, depending on the selection. It offered enough weight and discipline to make Ringo sound right. In the Who track— ripped from a CD with drums and bass a little understated—it extracted enough low-frequency action to suggest the dynamism of rock’s most volcanic rhythm section.

In the Brubeck, it did a good job of delivering the often muted string bass, though the echoes of the

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option for using voice-matched wireless speakers for the left, right, and center channels. The only way to avoid this is to use wired and fully voice-matched speakers in all locations; see my comments on that below. Of course, Denon’s target customer for this may be more concerned with not having to run wires to the rear of the house than with any perceived

bass-drum hits shortened noticeably. And in the Zep, Denon’s network sub turned the aggressively recorded drums to mud, lagging way behind the nimbler, and almost certainly lower-latency, hardwired Paradigm.

The question, however, is not whether you want to buy a $1,650 Paradigm sub to go with the $999 Denon HEOS AVR. The question is whether the HEOS Subwoofer mates well with the kind of compact speakers you’re likely to use with the HEOS AVR. And the answer is that it’s a good sub, but—compared with other $600-and-under subs in our Top Picks—not a great one. My experience suggests you’ll do be er with a well-reviewed wired sub (perhaps with a wireless kit option) at that price or even below; budget models from reliable brands like HSU Research, SVS, and RSL come to mind. Still, the HEOS Subwoofer is the only sub that mates wirelessly with a HEOS system, which may include a HEOS AVR, or perhaps a pair of mated HEOS standalone speakers that require real bass reinforcement. And for that application, good may be good enough.—MF

The HEOS Sub takes its crossover and volume se ings from the HEOS App.

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The networkconnected HEOS 1 speakers linked to the system reliably.

differences in timbre between the front and rear speakers.)

In Life on the Line, John Travolta dramatizes the life of the lineman, that everyday hero whose work on the power grid keeps your home theater going. This movie steps up the rain effects with an aggressive spattering that made me feel like I was really caught in the storm. On this test, the HEOS 1 surrounds did seem to detach a little more.

Sleepless stars Jamie Foxx as a Vegas undercover narcotics cop caught in an endless fistfight. Several scenes with disco-level dance music gave the system a chance to throb, which it did with good grace.

The front-channel Paradigms and rear-channel HEOS 1s united to produce a convincing soundfield.

With fisticuffs, gunshots, and car crashes abounding, this movie might have been bestowed with better dynamics from a muscle amp and sidestepped the blurring and fatigue that came at the highest volumes.

At the other extreme, a low-volume listening mode would have come in handy.

The link between the HEOS 1 and the rest of the system was solid and reliable. I couldn’t detect any obvious issues with latency, though any differences here between the wireless surrounds and wired front speakers could have also contributed to whatever I heard with the surround bubble. More critically, there were no audible glitches or dropouts.

However, when I plugged the Paradigms into the system, there was no question that switching to identical speakers all around generated a more seamless soundfield and, unexpectedly, a larger one. It was most obvious in the natural effects (inasmuch as anything is natural in a movie): Rain was more enveloping, thunder more realistic.

The network-connected HEOS 1 was a good-sounding surround speaker, but the hardwired, voicematched Studio 20 was a better one.

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Switching from the HEOS Subwoofer to the much more expensive Paradigm sub also helped thunder effects by making them deeper and more forceful. Synth pulses and resounding drums in action-movie soundtracks were meatier and more hypnotic.

When I first streamed music, I was nonplussed to find that the default mode for streaming sources was five-channel stereo. I couldn’t change the mode in Quick Settings because there are no Quick Settings for streaming services. But the AVR’s Speakers menu did offer what became my work-around: Turn off music playback in the surrounds.

Doing so did not affect movie or other surround-encoded material.

It just ensured that CDs, streams, and other stereo sources played in 2.1 or stereo direct. Denon would do well to introduce a dedicated button for stereo playback in the app.

Setting the Table The AVR originally broke in with Telemann’s Tafelmusik as performed

by Frans Brüggen and Concerto Amsterdam. Das Alte Werk’s fourCD set offered an instructive lesson on the necessity of break-in and warm-up. With disc one, the AVR sounded grainy and incoherent. By disc two, it sounded better. By discs three and four, it sounded like a completely different animal, more fine-grained and listenable, if not relaxed. The best way to hear Telemann’s “table music” is on original 1965 black-and-gold-label Telefunken vinyl. But the recently remastered CD set did give the AVR a chance to show how confidently musical it could be, as the suites veered from full ensemble to intimate trios and quartets that showed off Brüggen’s recorder and other soloists.

Continuing serendipitously, I accessed one of the Beatles

The small remote offers basic control, but the HEOS App does most of the heavy lifting.

Due to the requirement for a network connection, we were unable to perform our usual Test Bench measurements on the Denon HEOS AVR and HEOS Subwoofer.

SPECS

Power Output: 5 x 50 watts (8 ohms, 2 channels driven) • Auto Setup/Room EQ: None • Video Processing: 4K passthrough (no scaling), HDR10, 4:4:4 color subsampling, BT.2020 color gamut • Dimensions (WxHxD, Inches): 17.13 x 3.63 x 11 • Weight (Pounds): 13.23 • Video Inputs: HDMI 2.0b (4) • Audio Inputs: Coaxial digital (1), optical digital (1), stereo analog RCA (1), stereo analog 3.5mm minijack (1) • Video Outputs: HDMI 2.0b (1) • Audio Outputs: Sub (1) • Additional: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet (1), USB (1, storage devices and update), IR in (1)

albums I’ve upgraded from MP3 to ALAC on a Windows 10 desktop PC. The HEOS AVR got along perfectly with Let It Be...Naked, the project that Paul McCartney initiated to expunge Phil Spector’s gooey choirs and orchestrations. It delivered the beloved voices with loads of definition. The overall vibe was relaxed and warm. The strong but amorphous bass that softened Macca’s bass lines was flattering to Ringo Starr’s drums. Experimentations with the bass and sub-level controls revealed that these characteristics were a question of quality of bass, not quantity of bass.

Les Liaisons Dangereuses 1960 is the recently released Thelonious Monk soundtrack for the French film by Roger Vadim. Monk’s piano was extremely well imaged; even side-to-side head movements barely budged it. The AVR also handled Art Taylor’s distant-miked cymbals quite well, capturing both their ongoing hiss and the extra-hard taps they occasionally got for emphasis.

Like many other A/V receivers, this one accepts music from a USB storage device, so I plugged in one of the hard drives that store my library. It took several minutes for the system to access the full list of artist and album metadata for this enormous library— I don’t blame it!—and even longer to populate the albumcover thumbnails.

However, I could browse to anything via folder right away. The system could play DSD, FLAC 192/24, FLAC 96/24, ALAC, and MP3 files (among others).

While fumbling around with this giant library on two tablets and a phone, I finally managed to crash the system for

the first and only time. I reconnected the AVR and Subwoofer and apologized meekly. They forgave me.

I asked Denon’s Paul Belanger for tips on how to manage a large library, and I got an answer worth quoting: “I have a large NAS drive with all my family’s content, which is accessed under Music Servers. Because this library is so large, it can be cumbersome browsing, so I also have my personal collection and my wife’s collection (which are smaller and more manageable than the large NAS) on separate USB drives—each plugged into a different speaker. That speaker serves each drive up on the network for all other HEOS devices to access.” Belanger also recommends having separate HEOS accounts for each family member if multiple people are using their own streaming services.

Denon’s HEOS AVR is a largely successful effort to transform the A/V receiver from a cumbersome Swiss Army knife to a sleek appdriven entertainer. While a forwardthinking design process demands hacking away at legacy features to emphasize today’s essentials, the AVR might benefit from the addition of a low-volume listening mode for action-movie buffs. I also would have liked the ability to select listening modes from the remote.

Adding mode selection to the app’s much-used Music screen would also help. And please, let us plug our computers into the USB jacks.

But for a first-generation product that attempts to reinvent the wheel, this one rolls along nicely. And it might get even better.

Audio Editor Mark Fleischmann is the author of Practical Home Theater: A Guide to Video and Audio Systems, now available in both print and Kindle editions.

Denon’s forward-thinking design emphasizes the essentials. soundandvision.com 57

TEST REPORT

Sophistication From Above

Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen BOC106 In-Ceiling Speaker Performance Build Quality Value

By Darryl Wilkinson

Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen BOC106 In-Ceiling Speaker PRICE $1,595/each ($7,975 as reviewed) ALTHOUGH THE STORY OF ITS beginning may sound like it, Bang & Olufsen isn’t one of those up-andcoming startups that briefly create a lot of noise and then are never heard from again. B&O’s is a classic tale, though. Two engineers, Peter Bang and Svend Olufsen, tinkering in the Olufsen family’s attic (not garage) in Struer, Denmark, start building and selling radios. They didn’t do a Kickstarter campaign because, well, it was 1925, and Kickstarter hadn’t been kickstarted yet. The fledgling company’s first “commercially viable” product was the ominous-sounding B&O Eliminator, a device that allowed a radio to run off of AC (alternating current) from a wall outlet instead of DC (direct current) from expensive batteries. This early innovation set the tone for Bang & Olufsen ever since: be innovative, use quality materials, and above all (some would argue), do things your own (e.g., the Bang & Olufsen) way.

For a variety of reasons, Bang & Olufsen hasn’t been much of a force in custom-installation and wholehome audio—in North America, anyway. They’ve definitely made some cool built-in-able stuff, like the to-drool-for BeoLab 15 motorized in-wall speaker that tilted out of the wall whenever audio was playing, but the multiroom applications were usually limited. As a result, had I not been given an early heads-up, I’d have been seriously befuddled when five Bang & Olufsen Celestial BOC106 in-ceiling speakers arrived at my door. The fact that the boxes had Bang & Olufsen and Origin Acoustics

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logos on them would have made the situation even more of a headscratcher. Under normal circumstances, I also would have been totally bamboozled as to where I’d find enough pristine ceiling space in my theater room to saw five more holes. But normal isn’t what it used to be anymore.

The Originals B&O, it seems, is getting serious about American-style custom installation and architectural speakers. To begin with, the company is introducing the Celestial range of in-ceiling speakers. After that will come the Palatial range of in-wall speakers. For both lines, Bang & Olufsen chose to partner with a relatively new company in the architectural speaker industry: Origin Acoustics. If you’ve read my highly entertaining November 2015 review of a 5.0.4 all-in-ceiling Dolby Atmos system (whose f’ing crazy idea was that?) with nine Origin Acoustics Director D108 10-inch in-ceiling speakers, you’ll catch the joke in saying Origin Acoustics a “relatively new” company. The old fogies behind Origin Acoustics are the very same dudes (young fogies, then) who helped create and develop the architectural speaker industry starting in the late 1970s and continuing to the current day. Combined, these guys can arguably claim to have introduced “the first flush-mount high-fidelity

in-ceiling speakers” in 1978, the first in-wall speaker in 1982, and the first in-wall subwoofer system in 1986. Eight years later, they formed the highly successful company, SpeakerCraft—and blah, blah, blah, blah. If you’re interested in the backstory, read my Origin Acoustics Director D108 review—you’ll get a better understanding of why the company is such a good fit with Bang & Olufsen for architectural speakers.

Gotta’ Keep ’Em Perforated Instead of rebadging an assortment of existing Origin Acoustics speakers, the two companies rejiggered and re-tweaked much of

The BOC106’s 10-inch woofer, 4-inch midrange, and 1-inch tweeter are arranged concentrically in a TriLinear Configuration.

58 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

AT A GLANCE

Plus Q Zip-Cliq mount for easy install Q IPX6 rated for use in highmoisture locations Q 10-inch woofer Q Optional billet aluminum Advanced Grille

Minus Q Expensive

the basic designs to produce speakers that are somewhat similar to but also, importantly, somewhat different from what Origin Acoustics currently offers in its own line.

Neither company is shy about admitting this partnership, either.

Not only are the boxes co-branded, but the Celestial speakers themselves have both companies’ logos embossed along the outer rim of the

IN-CEILING SPEAKER

THE VERDICT The overhead fruit of Bang & Olufsen’s partnership with Origin Acoustics combines superior, finessed sound quality with remarkably refined looks for any ceiling.

speaker assembly—although the unassuming, circular, perforatedmetal grille that ships with each speaker conceals the logos (and the rest of the hardware). Both companies will be concurrently marketing these co-branded products—Origin through its worldwide distribution to independent dealers, and B&O through its worldwide network of retail showrooms.

Critically, the Celestial speakers utilize Origin Acoustics’ patented “tool-less” installation mounting system, called Zip-Cliq. It’s one of the easiest and cleverest mounting systems I’ve ever worked with; and, fortunately for me, the Celestial BOC106 speakers fit precisely in the Origin Acoustics mounting rings that were still installed in the ceiling from my Director D108 review. All I did was twist and pull the D108s from their mounts, and then push and twist the Celestial BOC106 speakers back into the same ring. The Celestial BOC106 models have magnets buried in the plastic of the bayonet ring that align and hold the grilles in place. “Burying” the magnets in plastic is part of Origin Acoustics’ “proprietary Weather-X coating process” that includes the use of stainless steel hardware and a coating on the grilles. The result is a speaker that can function under extreme moisture conditions (all of the Bang & Olufsen Celestial speakers are IPX6 rated) and, according to Origin Acoustics, “prevent rust for over 10 years.” The speakers aren’t designed for outdoor use per se, but they can definitely be

ORIGIN ACOUSTICS/BANG & OLUFSEN CELESTIAL BOC106 IN-CEILING SPEAKER PRICE: $1,595/ea Origin Acoustics • originacoustics.com Bang & Olufsen • (847) 590-4927 • bang-olufsen.com

installed in bathrooms, saunas, indoor pools, sweat lodges, yachts, cruise ships, dinghies, and other unusually wet locations.

If that unassuming, round white grille (with an outer ring of aluminum trim to discreetly dress it up) that comes with each BOC106 doesn’t float your boat, there’s an optional stillunassuming, square, perforated-metal, white grille to use instead. On the other hand, if circular is fine but unassuming is most definitely not fine with you, the Celestial range’s Advanced Grille (the standard grille is confusingly called the Premium Grille) is pure Bang & Olufsen in terms of style, design, fit, and finish.

In fact, these Advanced Grilles are all made in B&O’s impressive production facility in Struer, Denmark, where they are milled out of a solid block of billet aluminum, precision CNC-machined, and anodized. (B&O didn’t invent aluminum, but they are known for their work with this material across their product lines.)

Rather than being perforated, the Advanced Grille has a series of curvaceous slots that begin at the top of the grille with a single dot and gradually radiate outward, expanding like ripples in a pond, then gracefully flattening out towards the bottom.

Unlike the Premium Grille, the Advanced Grille has the B&O logo embossed across a solid section at the bottom of the grille.

I showed an early sample of an Advanced Grille to everyone I know (man, woman, child, even the ghost who inhabits the upstairs of my house), and all thought it was gorgeous, extremely classy, and—surprisingly to me—totally worth the $395/each price. (“Each” in the price is not a typo.) I must admit that I was skeptical about someone spending what amounts to an additional 25 percent of the cost of the speaker for a grille that will be mostly unnoticed, but I began to appreciate its special beauty.

Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen’s BOC106 speakers are for aficionados of the sublime.

mounting space above the ceiling.

Unfortunately, not every ceiling has that kind of room above it to work with.

Along with a 10-inch woofer, the Celestial BOC106 inherited Cutting Hertz the 10.375-inch cutout requirement from the Origin D108. But during the Regardless of which grille is on the design phase of the BOC106, B&O front, the three-way Celestial BOC106 in-ceiling speaker includes and Origin decided to cut down on a 10-inch glass-fiber cone woofer, a the depth of the speaker so it could be used in more situations. In this 4-inch glass-fiber inverted-dome case, getting rid of more than an midrange, and a 1-inch silk dome inch of required mounting depth tweeter in what Origin Acoustics (the BOC106 only needs 6.22 calls a “TriLinear Configuration”— inches) cost about 3 hertz of claimed essentially a tweeter/midrange/ bass extension. As a result, the woofer shish-kebab (without the Celestial BOC106 is rated down to skewer). The midrange/tweeter 28 Hz, whereas Origin Acoustics pod can independently pivot up to says the D108 goes to 25 Hz. (Of 18 degrees off axis, allowing the installer to “aim” the most directional course, your installation specifics range of the speaker’s sound toward will impact the actual bass response the listening position, a feature that’s you achieve.) very beneficial for a home theater setup or serious stereo listening.

Greekiness There are also three-position bass Euclid, the Greek mathematician, and treble adjustment switches on never recommended using inthe speakers for additional tweaking ceiling speakers for anything other of the sound. The tweeter assembly than playing soul-destroying has a tiny bar, cheekily called a background music or paging “tonearm” here, spanning halfway systems. (“Will the person who left across the front of the dome, pinning a Valyrian steel sword at the TSA it at the center. According to Origin checkpoint, please return to claim Acoustics, this increases the stability it…”) For starters, he lived around of the dome so it can play louder 300 BC, and no company was with smoother dispersion. The manufacturing in-ceiling speakers company also says that the “X-Wave in Greece at that time (or today, as Woofer Surround” on the 10-inch far as I can tell). More importantly, driver is not only a suspension Euclid knew that the geometry of element that helps maintain the placing speakers above your head optimal linear excursion of the in the ceiling isn’t the same as woofer, but also helps terminate placing speakers in front of you. It’s unwanted frequencies that reflect up not that the ceiling is an inherently and down along the cone. bad location for loudspeakers. The problem is that humans are really One of the aspects I really liked good at determining the direction about the Origin Acoustics D108 in-ceiling speaker that preceded this sounds are coming from, and it’s difficult (but not impossible) to was that, despite incorporating trick a listener’s ears into thinking a 10-inch woofer, the mounting a sound is barreling straight at him assembly only required a 10.375-i or her from the front rather than nch mounting hole—a cutout size that’s traditionally been required angling down from the ceiling. for in-ceiling speakers When installed in a ceiling (as with smaller, 8-inch it’s primarily designed to be), the woofers. The D108, however, is unusually deep, requiring a minimum of 7.38 inches of That being said, its benefit is aesthetic, not acoustic, so it’s a statement of style and luxury rather than a necessary performance accessory.

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Decorator Bang & Olufsen–branded Advanced Grilles (right) are available as an accessory.

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TEST REPORT

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The midrange/tweeter pod can pivot up to 18 degrees off axis, allowing an installer to aim the sound.

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Origin Acoustic’s tool-less Zip-Cliq system for installing and mounting the speakers.

BOC106 is subject to the same geometric/acoustic travails as any other in-ceiling speaker. The pivoting tweeter and midrange in the Celestial BOC106 allows an installer to “aim” the frequencies we’re most directionally sensitive to into the listening area in order to help mitigate the less-than-ideal speaker placement.

Mitigate, though, doesn’t mean eliminate. It means “make less severe”; and how much less severe it can make the problem is, perhaps, the most important aspect of any serious in-ceiling speaker.

How well does the BOC106 do at not sounding like it’s installed in the ceiling? The answer depended upon what I was listening to…

Colliding With the Beast I decided to listen to the five Celestial BOC106 speakers au naturel (without a sub) as well as with the bottom-end duties covered by the JL Audio IWS-SYS-1 in-wall subwoofer I reviewed earlier this year (Sound & Vision, April 2017 and soundandvision.com). For the former configuration, I ran the BOC106 speakers full range. For the latter 5.1-channel setup, the BOC106s were crossed over at 80 Hz, as was the sub. Considering the JL Audio IWS-SYS-1 in-wall sub reaches 20 Hz with poise and aplomb, it’s not surprising that the BOC106 speakers on their own didn’t have the kind of impact they did when paired with the sub. I’ve already reviewed the JL Audio sub, so I won’t go into its performance here other than to say that the IWS-SYS-1 was a perfect match for the BOC106 speakers. The

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transition from mid to low bass was so smooth that at times—other than when the source material made it overwhelmingly obvious—I had to double-check the settings to see whether the sub was on or off.

With or without the sub, airy and unfettered are two of the qualities I noticed immediately when I listened to the BOC106—especially, but not exclusively, when it came to dialogue.

In the movie Collide, for example, when the doctor is telling Juliette (Felicity Jones) that she’s going to need dialysis and, eventually a kidney transplant, the dialogue is extremely intelligible and clear with very little sense that it was coming from anywhere other than the screen. Later, when Casey (Nicholas Hoult) is being held in a warehouse and about to be tortured, all five speakers contributed to the subtle sense of spaciousness when Hagen Kahl (Anthony Hopkins) suddenly yells at Casey. The music that played in Casey’s imaginary interludes was sweet and beautiful— again, without seeming to come from the ceiling. Perhaps because all the speakers were in the ceiling, surround effects moving from front to rear were exceptionally smooth and seamless, such as when during one of the many car chases when a car flew across the room. Interestingly, later on when Casey shoots at Wolfgang, the sound of the bullet casing hitting the ground did seem to come from the floor.

Likewise, at the racetrack, when a bullet misses its target (Casey, again) and hits the lower part of a wall, the impact sounded down low in the front, too.

Unlike in Collide, there’s not a lot of obvious surround effects in Split, which—as you might expect with a movie about someone with 23 different personalities—relies heavily on dialogue. Throughout the movie, the BOC106 speakers showed off their clarity and neutrality. I don’t remember if Kevin (James McAvoy) expressed all 23 of his personalities, but the wonderful intelligibility of the speakers clearly brought out all the small but important changes in nuance and tone in the personalities that did stand in “the light.” Other small sounds were crystal clear, such as when Dennis (one of Kevin’s identities) taps a mayonnaise jar

when making a sandwich for his therapist and, later, the piano music that plays under the kidnapped girl’s conversation with Hedwig/Kevin.

Amazingly, I can’t remember any point in time when these soundtracks called attention to the fact that the speakers were in the ceiling rather than in front of me.

Watching Disney’s recent live-action feature Beauty and the Beast confirmed for me that the BOC106 speakers are absolutely wonderful for home theater use.

Although I wasn’t all that interested in watching the movie at first, it didn’t take long for the unrestrained and open characteristics of the BOC106 system to draw me in. The music and vocals were natural and engaging, and the surround effects were spot on where they should have been located. The horse flinging mud across the room, for instance, hitting the young ladies as they swoon over Gaston, was extremely well represented. Although I rarely noticed the lack of a subwoofer during the previously mentioned movies, it was a totally different story with Beauty and the Beast. In my room, the BOC106 system dropped off dramatically below what sounded like about 30 Hz—and there’s a lot of Beast that lives and breathes in that below-30-Hz range. On the other hand, running full range, the speakers never showed any signs of stress or breakup during those heavy-bass scenes.

Skewed Up but Not Screwed Up I listened to the front left and right speakers running full range for two-channel music. Everything I’d noticed about the five-channel configuration’s performance was also apparent with the two-channel setup—with one exception. For example, the just-released Les Liaisons Dangereuses 1960 (a two-CD set made from the original studio tapes of the music the Thelonious Monk Quintet recorded in 1959 for the French movie of the same name) contains a version of “Light Blue” that’s beautiful for its fidelity. The snap of the drums was succinct and light, and I could

The BOC106 speakers mount flush in the ceiling and come with standard white circular grilles.

60 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

clearly hear the rattle of the drum membranes as they were hit. Monk’s piano was mellow, with a nice sense of decay on the low notes and a pointed plink belonging to the highest keys. The saxophone was smooth and smoky, exactly the way I’ve always imagined a saxophone in a packed jazz club in the 1950s would have sounded. In short, truthfulness and natural timbre are not a problem for the BOC106.

The imaging was mostly impressive, too, to the point that I could hear the placement of individual drums in the set. The physical arrangement of the instruments—the saxophone on the left, piano in the middle, and drums on the right—was also perfectly rendered. Everything sounded just the way it should have, except for the plane of the soundstage. Sound didn’t seem to come from directly in front of me as it did when I watched movies. Instead, with no visual cues coming from a low-down screen, the soundstage now seemed raised up several feet—or, more accurately, the room itself seemed acoustically tilted. The piano remained in the center but sounded like it was a foot or two above ear level. The saxophone player, however, sounded more like he was 8 or 9 feet above the stage. The drummer was equally elevated.

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The speaker measures 11.26 inches in diameter and weighs 7.5 pounds.

If you like music featuring marimba and clarinet (and who doesn’t, nowadays?), the newly released CD from husband-wife duo Richard and Mika Stoltzman (on clarinet and marimba, respectively), Duo Cantando, will be just the thing for you. “Concerto #1, Part III” (composed by Chick Corea) is an orchestral piece that prominently features Mika on the marimba.

The smooth and neutral characteristics of the BOC106 let the nuanced, ringing tones of the marimba—from the heavier and hollower-sounding low bars to the softer, shorter clinks of the higher ones—come through effortlessly. The BOC106s were spectacularly smooth and open with the violins and the rest of the string section, as well as displaying an equal neutrality with the clarinet and remaining woodwinds. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the lowest notes of the marimba on this track, along with the bottom end coming from the drums and percussion, were some of

SPECS

10 in glass fiber cone woofer (1) • 4 in glass fiber dome midrange (1) • 1 in silk dome tweeter (1) • Dimensions (Inches): Speaker: 11.26 (diameter), 6.22 (mounting depth); Grille: 11.75 (diameter); Cutout: 10.375 (diameter) • Weight (Pounds): 7.5

the few musical elements that did benefit slightly from the deep-bass output added by the JL Audio IWS-SYS-1.

Hardcore punk isn’t the most likely style of music for playback over in-ceiling speakers, but the dynamic, hard-hitting bass on one of The White Noise’s lighter, more melodic tracks, like “I Lost My Mind (In California)” (from AM/PM), gave a good indication of how coolly and smoothly the Celestial BOC106s could handle the transient assault. Since that disc’s screaming vocals left a little to be desired in terms of judging the speakers’ performance, I also gave a listen to Michael Kiwanuka’s Love & Hate disc, with a short detour through an old favorite, Come Away With Me, by Norah Jones. Kiwanuka’s “Cold Little Heart” contains a long instrumental intro with a soundstage that was astonishingly wide; and, interestingly enough, the outer edges of the soundstage appeared to loop back down following the tilt of the listening plane. Later, Kiwanuka’s

soulful voice had a clear and solid heft. Higher and lighter, Jones’s voice came through naturally and without constriction.

Conclusion Two years ago, when I reviewed the Origin Acoustics Director D108 in-ceiling speakers, I said that the D108 speakers were “the best overall performing in-ceiling speakers I [had] ever heard” and were “without reservation my top recommendation for in-ceiling speakers.” My opinion still stands on the D108s, but the BOC106 speakers rank as a very close second—primarily because they don’t have quite as much lowbass output as the D108 speakers do. You could get by without a dedicated subwoofer for movies using five or more of the D108s and not feel cheated, though the BOC106 speakers really ought to have a sub in order to do justice to many effect-laden movie soundtracks. On the other hand, the BOC106 brings a level of sophistication

that ups the ante. To simplify, the Origin Acoustics D108 speakers are for fans of the spectacle, whereas the BOC106 speakers are for aficionados of the sublime. The refined look of the BOC106’s included Premium Grilles also adds a subtlety to the speaker’s in-ceiling visuals—while the stunning, slotted Advanced Grilles offer an even more refined look without the understatement.

Try as they might, the Origin Acoustics/Bang & Olufsen BOC106 in-ceiling speakers can’t totally overcome the elevated soundstage that is an inherent problem with ceiling-mounted speakers, especially for two-channel music. But, in fairness, these and other highperformance in-ceilings likely find primary use in stealth home theaters for movie watching, and only secondarily for critical music listening. For those who prefer to seek their sonic answers from above, the BOC106 a fabulous-sounding, sleek-looking in-ceiling solution.

TEST REPORT

Photon Menace

Stewart Filmscreen Phantom HALR Ambient Light Reject Performance Setup Value

By Michael P. Hamilton

Stewart Filmscreen Phantom HALR Ambient Light Rejecting Screen

AT A GLANCE

PRICE $4,132 as reviewed TWO YEARS AGO, SOUND & Vision contemplated how pairing sub-$2K projectors with innovative ALR (ambient light rejecting) screens might compete as similarly priced replacements for large flat panels in multipurpose environments. Compelling, immersive, life-size projected images for the same currency swap as a diminutive, backlit, uh…TV? We celebrated our certainty at pinpointing every red, green, and blue-blooded home theater enthusiast’s eureka! moment.

Back then, mainstream TV size effectively peaked at about 80 inches.

Now, flat panels again are staking out ever-increasing amounts of naked wall space—as evidenced recently

by Sony’s 100-inch XBR-100Z9D, which shamelessly persuades the well-enough heeled that it’s a better use of electricity than the Tesla Model 3 they’d been fancying.

We also reviewed two artful approaches to ALR screens, Elite Prime Vision’s DarkStar 9 (November 2015 and soundandvision.com) and Seymour-Screen Excellence’s Ambient-Visionaire Black 1.2 (April 2016 and our website), both of which earned Top Pick status.

At CEDIA 2016, Stewart Filmscreen unleashed their assault on unrestrained photons, introducing the Phantom HALR (High Ambient Light Rejecting) screen, a greatly anticipated antidote to contrasthampered viewing conditions.

Was this a case of last-minute bidding by a 70-year industry stalwart, casting their “We can, too” product into an already crowded ALR arena?

A peek at screen history reveals quite the opposite—and Stewart, it turns out, is well rehearsed in

•

Two reflective layers combine for a peak gain of 1.0.

62 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

the role of battling the wandering light.

Screen Wars: Episode 1 A decade before the emergence of current ALR screen designs—a few boasting exotic build materials suspected to be taken from Area 51—Stewart’s optical alchemists purposely brewed reflective formulations to aid projectors needing a little help against unfettered light. GrayHawk RS debuted in 2001, designed to provide necessary assistance in picture areas displaying dark content for then nascent digital projectors deficient in black level. The FireHawk

G1 followed a year later with a unique approach inhibiting entry of nonprojected light into the viewing area.

Most of today’s ALR efforts feature variations on a solid, semirigid, Mylar-like theme. Ingenious manufacturing techniques deposit layers of nearly atom-sized mystery particles onto these surfaces that direct, reflect, and reject unwelcome light from sources other than a projector.

Stewart retained flexible vinyl, also used in their iconic StudioTek screens, for the Phantom’s substrate backbone. Vinyl empowers Stewart with such advantages as enabling

Plus Q Excellent off-axis light rejection Q Wide viewing angle maintains color saturation Q Very good calibration accuracy

Minus Q Cloudy artifacts with camera pans on bright scenes Q High price the Phantom to remain seamless to a massive 90 x 40 feet. And whether the screen is flat-hanging, cine-curved, or electrified to be a

SCREEN

THE VERDICT A paradoxical hybrid that blends excellent contrast management for challenging viewing environments with a frustrating callousness about pristine image fidelity.

STEWART FILMSCREEN PHANTOM HALR AMBIENT LIGHT REJECTING SCREEN PRICE: $4,132 Stewart Filmscreen • (800) 762-4999 • stewartfilmscreen.com

stowaway, Stewart’s two perforatedscreen options—Microperf X² THX Ultra and Cinemaperf—hide speakers from view, providing a flexibility that the quasi-rigid ALR competition can’t claim.

The Phantom’s heavy lifting results from two distinct layers applied to the vinyl body, combining for a peak gain of 1.0, with half gain breached passing 30 degrees each direction away from center. The outer layer is a two-way diffusion coating, allowing projector light to pass through and be returned back into the viewing area, but only when the lens is perpendicular to the screen. This suggests that projector placement must, as always, be mechanically precise, with no reliance on digital correction. Lens shift is, by definition, mechanical; vertical lens shift should be minimally used as required. Aside from slight touch-up, the need to use horizontal lens shift (and then overuse it) indicates misplacement of the projector or screen—move something. Menu-executed digital

the scent eventually subsided. But it took a while.

Many thanks to Epson for extending the loan of their PowerLite Home Cinema 3500 (May 2015 and our website), which allows for projector consistency in our reviews of ALR screens.

geometry adjustments, however minor, correct for the presence of skew. This can introduce interplay with the screen’s diffusion layer, treating light entering angularly as astray and not emanating from the lens.

The second layer on the vinyl body is a sub-layer composed of a highly reflective optical coating. It’s designed to return only light entering perpendicularly back through the transmission layer.

Slotted into the Stewart lineup as a black screen (actually, dark gray), the Phantom was conceived to provide greater ambient light rejection than four other Stewart screen materials categorized as “gray.”

Initial setup of my Phantom sample went smoothly. Stewart’s timeless design—with quick-snap fastening of the screen material to the easily assembled frame—required a mere 15 unassisted minutes to take the screen from shipping box to viewingready. To make it easier to move the screen between two theater rooms, I had requested optional “T” floor stands; this meant I didn’t have to remove existing screens, and it afforded rapid comparisons. A design feature provided easy elevation adjustment of the 96 x 54-inch, 16:9 screen. Plan on tacking 6.5 inches onto the screen’s horizontal and vertical viewingsurface dimensions for the robust, tension-retaining frame, whose beveled sections are shrouded in Stewart’s contrastenhancing, light-absorbing VeLux appliqué.

The screen material initially exhibited an acute odor (imagine newly applied varnish), which persisted for weeks. When I contacted Stewart, an engineer responded that this was normal. Given that Stewart manufactures to strict California environmental regulations, I felt no additional concern, and

Let There Be Light Prior to critical viewing and color calibration, I sampled memories for other screen materials that I had saved in the Epson. I was curious to see whether the Phantom favored a particular setting—including one I thought might be very close, the setting for the FireHawk G3 screen I own. That memory wasn’t as appealing as one for my Labsphere reflection target (a color-neutral reference material that reflects light equally from any angle).

This similarity was encouraging, suggesting that the Phantom’s goal for color accuracy and uniformity may have been accomplished, which I suitably confirmed after calibration.

A Seymour-Screen Excellence Ambient-Visionaire Black 1.2 resides as my reference ALR screen for my overly windowed Theater Two. I find that it delivers plausible late-afternoon images when so tasked and excellent fidelity from dusk into nightfall; meanwhile, it’s seemingly impervious to judiciously placed localized lighting. The proof is in the pudding, so to speak: In tandem with the Epson projector, this screen works quite nicely as a “TV” and has forced the relocation of my Panasonic plasma to a movable cart—though it retains visitation privileges.

Stewart cites the Phantom’s minimum throw distance as 1.8 times image width to avoid hotspotting (where the screen middle appears noticeably brighter than perimeter areas). I positioned my sample at the screen wall, standing on the floor in front of an equipment rack, leaving scant room for deviation. The Epson rested atop a tallish cabinet against the back wall, ideally situating the lens at screen center, 14.5 feet away.

With this scenario in place, it was time to test the Phantom’s mettle.

Impressed by the BBC’s Planet Earth II on OLED displays, I placed disc one into my Oppo UDP-203, navigating to the “Mountains” episode, with which I have some familiarity. Although the picture was displayed at the Epson’s native 1080p, fine detail was pristine. I got accustomed to the screen with it handling a moderate but not improbable degree of ambient light, and in these conditions I felt it was equal to my Seymour-Screen Excellence; it effortlessly ignored the seeping radiance of a late-afternoon desert sky coming in through my windows. The chapter depicting Nubian ibex descending from their cliff home in search of water cast little doubt that the screen would resolve higher pixel counts, as each tuft of fur blazoned with identity.

Turning to Rocky Mountain Express, a treat that tells the story of the late-19th-century construction of the Canadian Pacific rail route, I sought out scenes I knew to be difficult. The black-and-white opening segment challenges many systems to correctly render the myriad creases, folds, and weighty, broad-shouldered aggregation of iron of a restored locomotive.

Following that is a colorfully opulent, isolated journey sculpted through Canada’s western provinces. Here again, the Phantom revealed no weaknesses. My notes praised how, at even a radical angle (full disclosure: viewed from the kitchen!), colors steadfastly maintained intensity and saturation: “A lot like OLED!,” I jotted.

As ol’ Canadian Pacific 2816 slithered on the rails through wintry terrain, I did detect an anomaly I hadn’t previously seen with this disc.

In a telescopic aerial shot with the locomotive in the foreground, gliding past an immense expanse of freshly minted snow, my attention locked onto a subtle, shaded hue within the white area on the screen, seemingly exacerbated by motion. In a manner similar to the way some backlit flat panels can appear splotchy with test patterns designed to check for white-field uniformity, a sensation of cloudiness was evident.

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A flexible vinyl substrate allows the Phantom to be rolled and remain seamless even at large screen sizes.

soundandvision.com 63

TEST REPORT

Test Bench

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Stewart’s quick-snap mechanism helped Michael perform his one-man setup in just 15 minutes.

Stewart Filmscreen Phantom HALR Ambient Light Rejecting Screen Screen Target Point

Color Temp (K)

Luminance ( -L)

Center (L&R, 2° Avg.)

6,488

20.4

Center Le Side

6,610

7.78

Center Right Side

6,574

8.56

Center Top

6,389

10.53

Le Top

6,522

7.87

Right Top

6,356

7.44

Center Bo om

6,449

11.02

Le Bo om

6,598

6.43

Right Bo om

6,441

7.02

Center Le (Center as Target from 30° Le )

6,487

9.78

Center Right (Center as Target from 30° Right)

6,479

9.28

CALIBRATIONS were facilitated using the ISF Workflow in Portrait Display’s CalMAN 2016 software, controlling a Murideo Fresco Six-G pattern generator. Measurements were taken with a Minolta CS-200 colorimeter.

THE Epson PowerLite Home Cinema 3500 projector was recalibrated using a Labsphere NIST-certified reflection target and saved into memory.

Many screen manufacturers use Labsphere targets as a baseline parameter for a color-neutral, Lambertian reference with 99% reflectance at any measureable angle.

MEASUREMENTS taken from the screen were compared with the reference memory. Space prohibits full documentation, but the Phantom HALR tracked very close to the reference memory at the center point. (The Labsphere target is 2 x 2 inches, limiting measurement comparisons to the center position only.)

FOR Test Bench measurements, a 100-IRE Full Field White pattern was displayed after target locations were mapped using an overscan pattern.

ALL measurements were taken at a distance of 10 feet from the 96-inchwide screen surface in a totally dark room, perpendicular to the measurement point. This required the Minolta to be mounted on a telescoping light stand capable of elevating the meter to the required height for a direct-on perpendicular reading. The 30-degree-from-center measurement was taken at precisely 30 degrees (accurate using a Bosch electronic carpenter’s angle finder).—MPH

SPECS

Viewing Surface (WxH, Inches): 96 x 54 • With Frame (WxH, Inches): 102.5 x 60.5 • Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 • Gain: 1.0

Outside my Theater Two, night had fallen; inside, the room was dark.

So this issue was unrelated to light rejection. After I slid the Phantom to the side, refocused the Epson onto the Seymour, and selected its calibration memory. I replayed Rocky Mountain Express and was unable to locate this aberration. It seemed to have been screen dependent.

With the Phantom back in position, I quickly identified this smudginess using a scene of a bobcat seeking food in the midst of the punishing Rocky Mountain winter, probing desperately under the snow.

When this type of uniformity issue appears on a flat-panel TV, some reviewers refer to it as “dirty window syndrome.”

For round two, I moved the Phantom into Theater One, home of my FireHawk G3. This is a substantially larger room, at 26 feet long. I was concerned that projector positioning at the forward side of the 1.8 throw would induce the shadowy phenomenon. Optimally situated as in Theater Two, the Epson was now at the far side of the throw distance.

From the “Mountains” episode of Planet Earth II, I used the chapter of the famished mother grizzly, groggy

from hibernation, gingerly leading her cubs on a trek down an avalancheprone mountain. The shadow effect repeated itself during the vertical pan trained on the bears’ descent against the snow backdrop. Once again, I confirmed the Phantom’s contribution by pivoting it out of the way and refocusing the Epson on the FireHawk G3 while calling up that calibration memory. To no degree did I see what was plainly visible on the Phantom.

A nose-to-screen comparison of the Phantom and FireHawk surfaces revealed a startling difference, despite the screens being more similar than not. The Phantom appeared textured, while the FireHawk—though somewhat speckled with a micro-metallic sheen—looked glass-smooth.

Curious, I questioned whether the contouring on the Phantom’s surface—minute as it is—might create a shadowy texture to a certain object as it moved across the screen.

To find out, I called up a test pattern on Murideo’s Fresco Six-G video pattern generator that I was certain would confirm what I was seeing. In this pattern, a white circle moves in a V from top right to middle bottom to top left against a black background, then traces back. Sure enough, the shadowy effect was clearly visible on the Phantom. For a useful analogy, call to mind any horror film that shows off the quintessential harvest moon pasted onto an inky night sky as the obligatory storm approaches. This was similar to the effect of those wind-wisped clouds passing before the orb in shadow form, caricature-like. I had made a vow to my editor to deliver a review free of sports references, but regrettably, I must break it: When I switched on the NHL playoffs, the camera pans pursuing the play against the static ice background distinctly dramatized this issue.

There was, perhaps, one more variable to pursue. The Phantom’s unveiling at CEDIA 2016 saw a larger version of the screen basking in

16,000 light-cannon lumens from a large-venue DPI projector. To the side, a 6,000-lumen DPI machine was pointed at a screen identical to my review sample. Did the Phantom simply favor or require more light output to avoid this odd anomaly?

Unsure whether the 2,500-lumen Epson PowerLite Home Cinema 3500 lacked sufficient horsepower and was contributing to the issue, I brought in heavy artillery: a 6,000lumen Epson Pro L1100U largevenue projector. When the pro unit’s lasers hit cruising speed, the Phantom admittedly took on a new persona. The white areas remained smudged as already described; however, the effect was somewhat diminished with nearly threefold lumens pummeling the screen.

Conclusions There is one compelling reason why I can’t declare this mostly excellent screen a Top Pick: The puzzling artifact I’ve described prevents my full recommendation. This is not to imply that this screen should be overlooked for applications where its strong elements work best—quite the contrary. The Phantom is one of a wide variety of Stewart screen surfaces that exist as problemsolving tools. For situations where off-axis light striking the screen is anticipated and will possibly remain as a constant, the Phantom HALR provides an engineered option to effectively repel light. It is as capable with ambient light rejection as any competitive screen—and it’s superior, colorimetry-wise, to many.

Ultimately, commercial applications may have the highest potential use for the Phantom, and deservedly so.

For residential use, however, we’ve discovered that some ALR screens can still be used in rooms devoid of light with superb results. So unless the Phantom is intended strictly for high ambient light environments, another Stewart ALR material somewhat more adept with darker rooms may be preferred. As always, custom integrators or consumers would be wise to carefully consider the type of content to be viewed, the screen size and projector output, and the variables of light conditions before making their choice.

The Phantom provides an engineered option to effectively repel ambient light.

64 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

Introducing the new 700 Series

See the full range at www.bowers-wilkins.com/700series

UHD BLU-RAY

PICTURE 3D-NESS SOUND EXTRAS

Escape Claws

dusty darkness show little to no banding. The actors are unafraid to show their years and more, with wrinkled, veiny, liver-spotted visages on display, their imperfections inspiring deeper sympathy. HDR is particularly effective in the harsh desert sun and in the subtle lighting of the many dawn and dusk scenes.

Also included is the black-and-white alternative, Logan Noir, which has its own visual charm thanks to the painstaking cinematography underlying the full-color theatrical version.

Noir especially highlights the deep, organic-looking blacks.

Despite the lack of floating cities and exploding spaceships, the Dolby Atmos soundtrack finds plenty of ways to impress. (My comments are based upon the Dolby TrueHD 7.1 core.) Marco Beltrami has crafted a non-traditional action movie score, often intimate, sometimes barely noticeable but always enhancing the mood as it floats through this fine mix. Automated trucks whiz by on the highway, from speaker to speaker, and there’s a pleasing low end amid the angry crack of gunfire. The distinctive metallic squeak and bloody squish of a claw attack is frequent and clear, but it’s when Charles unleashes the full might of his psychic powers that the room truly comes alive, with an ominous seismic rumble.

The four-disc set includes Logan and Logan Noir on both 4K and high-definition Blu-rays, the latter two featuring DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1. Director James Mangold’s commentary appears on all four discs, the sort of track that adds genuine perspective to what we’re seeing. All of the other extras are located on the theatrical HD Blu-ray: half-a-dozen deleted/extended/alternate scenes and a feature-length making-of.

We’re going to miss you, bub.

There have certainly been terrific comic book movies, but Logan is a terrific movie that just so happens to be inspired by comic books. The proper balance of story, character, and juicy action set pieces is an elusive one.

(Think back to the disappointing first two solo Wolverine flicks.) But in his ninth and reportedly final portrayal of Logan, charismatic star Hugh Jackman— in the role that will surely define his career—is at the center of a remarkably original, powerful film.

The year is 2029. Mutants, once misunderstood and widely feared, are almost extinct and largely irrelevant. Once the deadly-yet-noble X-Man known as Wolverine, Logan is now an Uber driver living a sullen existence on the U.S./Mexico border. Well past his prime, and not just due BLU-RAY STUDIO: Fox, 2017 to his advanced age, he struggles through ASPECT RATIO: 2.39:1 each day, tending to his even more decrepit AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos / father figure, Professor Charles Xavier TrueHD 7.1 core (Patrick Stewart). Everything is about to LENGTH: 137 mins.

MPAA RATING: R change when he learns of a top-secret DIRECTOR: James Mangold experiment known as X-23 (Dafne Keen, STARRING: Hugh Jackman, Patrick a real treasure), a curious young girl with Stewart, Dafne Keen

soundandvision.com 66 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

Fox

Logan

a shocking history and in need of his help. In short order, Logan will be forced to confront his greatest fear as well as his mortality, making the most difficult choices of his long life for the sake of what’s right.

Logan is quite different from the flashier, more blockbuster-y superhero fare. It dares to take its time, with long, dialoguedriven scenes. It also carries a well-earned R rating, with an alarming number of F-bombs and plenty of graphic violence as the mutant with the adamantium claws is finally allowed to cut loose on camera. Bonus: Now there’s no need for a subsequent “unrated” director’s cut.

The 4K presentation effortlessly delivers wondrous detail in just about every 2.39:1 shot. Even shafts of light cutting through

O Chris Chiarella

You still have time.”

Reference

Excellent

Good

Fair

RATINGS

Poor

Entertainment Reviews in High Definition

UHD BLU-RAY

UNFORGIVEN SHOW ME THE MUNNY

Warner

Unforgiven marked another turning point for Clint Eastwood and the Western genre. The deconstructed Western stars Eastwood as aged outlaw Bill Munny, who, after years of living a reformed life, is dragged back into his old ways. His wife has passed, and his pig farm is struggling, so an offer to avenge a brutalized prostitute is too much to pass up. He enlists his old running mate, Ned (Morgan Freeman), and they set off with the young “Schofield Kid” to collect the bounty. But in the town of Big Whisky, they run into a hard-as-nails sheriff (Gene Hackman) who decides to make an example of one of them, which causes Munny to—as my U.K. relatives would say—throw a wobbler.

The film blurs the lines between good and bad, helped to bring the Western back into the mainstream lexicon for the ’90s, and won several Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director (Eastwood), and Best Supporting Actor (Hackman).

This new 4K transfer of Unforgiven, encoded in HEVC 2160p with HDR10 and framed at 2.40:1, looks brilliant given its vintage. It’s always been a gritty-looking film, so that grain is retained and is crisper here.

The wide color gamut and HDR effect are well applied. The HDR’s been mastered to a maximum luminance of 4,000 nits (though no current consumer display can remotely approach that) and minimum of 0.005 nits. I had the chance to compare the HDR10 on the disc to the Dolby Vision via the included UltraViolet copy on Vudu, and the Dolby Vision version had more nuanced shadow detail and more natural pop in the highlights. Colors were equally vibrant, but the Dolby edges out color on the disc in darker scenes where the disc crushes a bit. One of the best scenes to illustrate this comes when Munny and Ned first set out and are camping by an open fire, then again when they are together with The Schofield Kid sitting around a campfire.

Unforgiven gets a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that is subtle but works for this slow-burning Western. Scenes with a rainstorm or gunplay bring the surround channels to life, and a scene on the railroad wakes up the subwoofer, but mostly it’s a quiet mix, front-heavy and dialogue-driven.

There isn’t anything new included with this UHD version of Unforgiven. The ondisc extras consist of SD port-overs of four BLU-RAY nearly half-hour-long making-of docuSTUDIO: Warner, 1992 mentaries. One special treat is the classic ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 episode “Duel at Sundown” from the TV AUDIO FORMAT: DTS-HD Master series Maverick, featuring a dashing young Audio 5.1 LENGTH: 132 mins.

Eastwood. A Blu-ray and the aforemenRATING: R tioned UltraViolet Digital Copy round out MPAA DIRECTOR: Clint Eastwood the package. O Brandon A. DuHamel STARRING: Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman

JOHN WICK – CHAPTER 2 NEVER STAB THE DEVIL IN THE BACK

Lionsgate

When we last saw John Wick, he’d come out of retirement to take out the Russian mobsters who were responsible for stealing his prized muscle car and killing his puppy. In this well-made sequel, we are greeted by an angry Wick who’s still on the hunt for his Mustang Mach 1, which he finds in a local chop shop. Needless to say, Wick dispenses some brutal street justice on the thugs—and he does recover his car.

Wick is ready to ride back into retirement, but his plans are hijacked when an Italian mobster calls in a marker that can’t be ignored. When Wick initially refuses, the mobster decides to “motivate” our dark hero into returning to what he’s best at—kicking tail and taking names.

I’m generally not a fan of violent movies, but it’s hard not to like this film. John Wick resurrected Keanu Reeves’ career in 2014, and I’m positive that this isn’t the last we’ve seen of this character. The story isn’t groundbreaking by any stretch, but the action and fight scenes are extremely entertaining. Furthermore, we get to see exactly how Wick uses a pencil as a deadly weapon—something the previous film referred to.

Shot with Arri Alexa 2.8K cameras and finished in 2K for its theatrical release, this 4K version is another upconversion on UHD. Both look phenomenal, although there’s certainly an uptick in detail on the 4K. Furthermore, the UHD has richer colors and better-resolved shadow detail, which may be enough to warrant the price premium for the cutting-edge format.

The Dolby Atmos track, which is on both the Blu-ray and UHD, befits the genre and is to die for. From the opening montage, you’ll know you’re in for a treat as Wick chases a motorcycle through the streets of New York. Panning effects zoom throughout the room, and the LFE is deep and hard hitting, just as it should be.

The plethora of supplements includes an audio commentary from Reeves and director Chad Stahelski, deleted scenes, ten behind-the-scenes featurettes, a threeminute recap of all of Wick’s kills in the movie (over 100 and loaded with spoilers), a faux trailer, theatrical trailer, and UltraViolet Digital Copy.

As long as you don’t think too much BLU-RAY about the story, this one is a fun ride filled STUDIO: Lionsgate, 2017 with plenty of action and the right mix of ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 dry humor. Definitely check it out.

AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos / TrueHD 7.1 core LENGTH: 122 mins.

MPAA RATING: R DIRECTOR: Chad Stahelski STARRING: Keanu Reeves, Riccardo Scamarcio, Ian McShane

O David Vaughn

soundandvision.com 67

UHD BLU-RAY

RESIDENT EVIL: THE FINAL CHAPTER ALL THINGS COME TO AN END...

OR DO THEY?

Sony

In 2002, Sony Entertainment kicked off the Resident Evil film series based on the popular zombie apocalypse video game of the same name. Fifteen years and five sequels later, the beleaguered franchise comes to a close… sort of. Resident Evil: The Final Chapter is technically the last installment in the long-running series, but plans are already afoot to reboot the entire franchise and start over again from square one. The expression “beating a dead horse” springs to mind, but I digress.

The Final Chapter follows the original Resident Evil and its respective sequels (Apocalypse, Extinction, Afterlife, and Retribution), chronicling its long and convoluted story line involving the evil Umbrella Corporation, its secret base of operations called The Hive, the dreaded virus that killed seven billion people, the zombie apocalypse that followed, the depraved mastermind behind it all, an artificial intelligence known as The Red Queen, a rag-tag band of human resistance fighters, and the fetching, kick-ass heroine, Alice. The particulars of these core elements and how they all coalesce are not really important; suffice it to say that there’s plenty of action and carnage to feast your senses on, and that’s what it’s all about.

4K resolution typically works best in a real-world environment, and while Final Chapter seems to rely more on practical special effects and less on CGI, the overall color scheme is washed out and flat, which gives the 4K resolution very little to enhance. This is a dark film both thematically and design wise, and the 4K only makes it darker. Textures and background detail take only a marginal jump from the counterpart HD version. The companion 1080p HD has some minimal strobing issues in sequences of rapid movement but offers a brighter and oftentimes clearer color scheme.

The 4K is rendered for a thoroughly immersive Dolby Atmos surround mix, while the standard HD sports a DTS-HD 7.1 Master Audio track. Both mixes are outstanding, but the Atmos gets the edge with the wider field of ambience. Screeching zombies, mutated beasts, explosions, gunfire, and all other manner of chaos will thunder through your surround speakers with full force and superb directionality from all sides.

BLU-RAY Extras are featured on the HD BluSTUDIO: Sony, 2016 ray and include a picture-in-picture, ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 behind-the-scenes commentary with Paul AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos (4K), Anderson and Milla Jovovich that runs DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 (HD) LENGTH: 106 mins. concurrently with the film, three short MPAA RATING: R featurettes, and more. Digital Copy DIRECTOR: Paul W.S. Anderson included. O Corey Gunnestad STARRING: Milla Jovovich, Iain Glen, Ali Larter

soundandvision.com 68 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

THE LEGO BATMAN MOVIE BUILDING THE PERFECT BAT

Warner

Chief among Lego Batman’s extraordinary feats is its ability to remain true to the dark essence of its enduring hero while weaving a family-friendly and wildly funny animated adventure. The backgrounds are littered with inside jokes and subtle bits of Batmania culled from the past eight decades. Of course, as anyone who’s seen the original Lego Movie recalls, Will Arnett’s version of the Caped Crusader is defined by his out-of-control ego, so this new story wisely begins with an over-the-top action sequence that removes all doubt as to why he’s so beloved. But a disgruntled Joker, a new police commissioner, and a recently adopted youngster named Dick Grayson are about to turn The Bat’s world upside down, and he’ll never be the same. And as with all things Lego, plenty of cheeky surprises are in store.

Lego Batman frequently seeks to overwhelm viewers with its incredible scale, from the bustling streets of Gotham City to the immeasurable expanse of the Batcave. The illusion is sold all the more effectively for the insane amount of detail throughout the 2160p, 2.4:1 frame, with exquisite layers of focus further conveying magnificent depth. (The 3D version, sold separately, is similarly breathtaking and well worth a gander.) The dynamic camerawork takes us between skyscrapers, under bridges, and past explosions at breakneck speed, and if some of the busier scenes become a tad pixellated, the eye mostly forgives this in the midst of this fundamentally blocky opus. The HDR colors in this toy-inspired universe are in a class by themselves, with some very deliberate schemes utilized, notably the triumphant Joker’s garish palette in Act Three.

For all of its visual glory, Lego Batman’s Dolby soundtrack (Atmos, its TrueHD 7.1 core reviewed here) is somewhat reserved. Despite the many attacks, chases, and wanton destruction, the speakers don’t receive much of a workout. There’s some very effective phasing of voices across the soundfield and pleasing bass in Lorne Balfe’s unexpectedly epic musical score, but the surrounds are too often relegated to simple, uninspiring fill.

Director Chris McKay and a bunch of his crew provide a spirited audio commentary, the only bonus to be found on the 4K BLU-RAY disc. On the bundled HD Blu-ray are an STUDIO: Warner, 2017 assortment of mixed-bag featurettes. The ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 Digital Copy also supports the WB Movies AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos / All Access app, for additional content TrueHD 7.1 core LENGTHL: 104 mins. served up while you watch on compatible MPAA RATING: PG Android and iOS devices. O Chris Chiarella DIRECTOR: Chris McKay STARRING: Will Arnett, Michael Cera, Rosario Dawson

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UHD BLU-RAY

XXX: RETURN OF XANDER CAGE THERE ARE NO MORE PATRIOTS

ENTERTAINMENT MOVIES

Paramount

It’s been several years since Xander Cage has been on the scene, but he’s brought back into the fold when a device called Pandora’s Box falls into the wrong hands. It has the ability to bring down any satellite and turn it into a weapon of mass destruction as it crashes down on the planet. One of his conditions for coming back to the CIA was that of recruiting his own team so he can ensure their absolute trust and his own personal safety.

I personally didn’t think the first XXX film was all that great, but I do like Diesel’s style in these types of roles—although I doubt he’ll ever win an Oscar (just sayin’). The script doesn’t have much meat to it, and the acting leaves a lot to be desired from the entire cast, but I like how director Rob Cohen didn’t take the film too seriously and let the actors have fun with their roles. As expected, the stunts are over the top, and one thing’s for certain: Real-world physics has no place in a Hollywood blockbuster! Although, if you like to see things blow up and can handle the nonstop action, then you’ll probably enjoy the ride—just check your brain at the door.

Invariably, there will be comparisons between this UHD and the Blu-ray, and the differences aren’t huge. The source material was shot at 3.4K and finished in 2K, which means this is most likely an upconversion. Colors are a tad crisper in 4K versus 1080p, and there’s more detail in the image, especially on medium and long shots. Shadow delineation is also improved versus 1080p, most likely due to the HDR grading, which not only works with highlights but in shades of gray as well.

Both the Blu-ray and UHD feature an excellent Dolby Atmos (TrueHD 7.1 core) soundtrack that features plenty of bass response, seamless pans, and a plethora of gunshots that will have you ducking for cover. As Atmos tracks have matured on home video, the overhead effects have been seeing more activity, and that’s certainly the case here with helicopter flyovers, falling debris, and even some crashing waves.

The modest supplement package is all housed on the Blu-ray and includes four featurettes. The first deals with Diesel’s return to the franchise, the second on BLU-RAY assembling the ensemble cast, the third STUDIO: Paramount, 2017 looks at the sets and filming locations, and ASPECT RATIO: 2.39:1 rounding things out is a behind-the-scenes AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos / look at the various stunts employed. Finally TrueHD 7.1 core there’s a gag reel and an UltraViolet Digital LENGTH: 107 mins.

MPAA RATING: PG-13 Copy. O David Vaughn DIRECTOR: Rob Cohen STARRING: Vin Diesel, Donnie Yen, Samuel L. Jackson

soundandvision.com 70 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER DIRECTOR’S CUT THE NEW YORK TIMES EFFECT ON MAN, REVISITED

Paramount

Much as 1955’s Rebel Without a Cause and 1969’s Easy Rider defined the youth-culture zeitgeist of their respective decades, 1977’s Saturday Night Fever deftly captured the me-decade essence of the 1970s, instantly catapulting John Travolta to the A-list in the process.

Director John Badham’s stark look at life in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn retains its signature natural-light and at-night grit in this 40th anniversary Director’s Cut (a mere 4 minutes longer than the theatrical version, also provided). The 4K restoration, presented here at 1080p, is clearly sharper than discs past but no less honest to its origins. Badham’s innovative Steadicam technique brings a vergingon-vérité sensibility to the film’s genre-defining dance-floor moments at the 2001 Odyssey club, especially during Travolta’s star-making solo disco-calisthenics sequence and the more artistic tango-inspired ballet he and simpatico partner Stephanie Mangano (Karen Lynn Gorney) perform together for the climactic dance contest.

The film’s multiplatinum soundtrack helmed by the Bee Gees defined the disco era, or rather, revitalized it, for disco was already on the downswing when SNF hit theaters. Could there have been a more perfect marriage of disco sounds and Bay Ridge visions than Travolta strutting in step to the pulsating 4/4 looped beat of “Stayin’ Alive” with paint can in hand during the film’s iconic opening sequence?

While all the much clearer movie dialogue is properly centered, the music itself truly breathes in TrueHD 5.1 via the more prominent, decidedly of-era wah-wah guitar on “Night Fever.”

Travolta fully deserved his Oscar nomination portraying the somewhat naïve but clearly driven Tony Manero. His subtle character choices reveal themselves upon multiple viewings, such as how he properly handles a 12-inch Tavares LP by cupping his thumb on the edge and placing his fingers on the center red label as he carries it from one dance studio record player to another. And though screenwriter Norman Wexler’s pull-nopunches racist/ethnic/sexist dialogue may shock some P.C.-era viewers—not to mention make them gasp at the physical and verbal abuse Travolta continually endures from (and occasionally gives BLU-RAY back to) his extended family at the dinner STUDIO: Paramount, 1977 table—it was an accurate sign of those ASPECT RATIO: 1.85:1 AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby TrueHD 5.1 you-should-be-dancing (yeah!) times.

LENGTH: 122 mins. (Director’s Cut); Forty years on, Saturday Night Fever nearly 118 mins. (Theatrical Cut) rivals the New York Times with its ongoing MPAA RATING: R effect on man—and his boogie shoes.

DIRECTOR: John Badham STARRING: John Travolta, Karen Lynn Gorney, Barry Miller

O Mike Me ler

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST BE OUR GUEST

Disney

Director Bill Condon brings his experience adapting the Broadway smash Dreamgirls to this lavish, live-action reimagining of Disney’s 1991 Golden Globe–winning (Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical) animated film Beauty and the Beast. The CGI-laden visual spectacle stars the lovely Emma Watson as the titular beauty Belle who is imprisoned in a castle by an irascible prince cursed by a witch for his failure to aid her on a stormy night and forced to live life out as the Beast (Dan Stevens).

Belle finds the place filled with a living teapot, teacup, candelabra, clock, harpsichord, and wardrobe that are eager to help her and their master find true love, which will break the witch’s spell and free them and the Beast from their shared affliction. The visuals, musical performances, and story stay close to the animated film but are executed with a splendor and grace perhaps unachievable in the 2D animated realm.

Watson is absolutely delightful as Belle and has truly shed any youthful typecasting from her days as Harry Potter’s Hermione.

The film was shot on Arri Alexa XT Plus at 3.4K and 2.8K, and a 2K DI was utilized in the processing/color coding stage. The film was also mastered in Dolby Vision HDR, but, alas, we only get a Blu-ray (for now), encoded in a gorgeous 1080p AVC framed at 2.40:1. The video presentation here is everything one would expect from a contemporary Disney fantasy. It’s crisp, colorful, organic, and highly nuanced in the shadows, with no issues concerning compression noise.

Beauty and the Beast gets a DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 mix that is beautifully balanced, airy, and musically minded in that it doesn’t pump up the volume or blow up the subwoofer. If you enjoy classical or Broadway, then you’ll know what that means. The low end probably could have been a little bulkier for some of the sound effects, but ultimately it’s a pleasing mix given the material, with clear dialogue and vocals and very natural dynamics.

Disney doesn’t hold back with the special features. They provide an optional threeminute musical overture to the film and a sing-along mode. There are also a slew of featurettes, including a half-hour makingof with director/cast interviews that charts the adaptation of the film from the Disney animated classic and the subsequent Broadway musical. Excerpts from the table BLU-RAY STUDIO: Disney, 2017 read are also included, along with lots of ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 other vignettes, deleted scenes, and Disney AUDIO FORMAT: DTS-HD Master Movies Anywhere, which lets you play your Audio 7.1 LENGTH: 129 mins.

Digital Copy on practically any device.

O Brandon A. DuHamel

MPAA RATING: PG DIRECTOR: Bill Condon STARRING: Emma Watson, Dan Stevens, Luke Evans

HEAT BURNING SENSATION

Fox

Michael Mann is a thief—a damned good one. In telling this bigger-than-life tale of a career-criminal takedown crew and their nemesis, the writer-director robs from the best, especially for his brilliant set pieces. He steals heavily from crime-caper master, Jean-Pierre Melville; the overnight break-in on a precious metals storage facility has all the precision and intense silences of Le Cercle Rouge, and the wham-bam bank holdup takes the look and military precision of Un Flic. Mann’s grand, operatic airfield finale is snatched straight from the end of Bullitt, while others scenes echo The Godfather or Goodfellas, and he even jacks himself by reworking Thief.

Visually, Heat is divided into two. The narrow-focused first half has sun-filled days and warm, intimate evening interiors. Nighttime scenes show dark, wet streets streaked with neon reflections and blue tinting in typical Melville/Mann manner. Blacks—Al Pacino’s shirt, suit, and tie or his wife’s slinky outfits—are deepest deep. Whites of eyes are exceedingly bright. The second half is much sharper, with far greater detail so that crow’s feet and hair strands are revealed. Focus becomes wider, making in-depth compositions more interesting and beautiful. Faces and figures are extremely rounded and dimensional. Throughout, this new restoration transfer, overseen by Mann, has a very film-like quality.

The head-on, hoo-ah! soundtrack becomes very loud and bassy in high-octane sequences filled with convincing pans of trains, trucks, and cars. Automatic gunfire pounds powerfully, shotguns resonate, and even pistols sound like cannons. A wide dynamic range makes both booming armored-car explosion and tinkling windshield glass come across clearly, with no distortion. A mainly electronic score pumps tension, with drums, organ, wailing electric guitars, and assorted jaggedy noises separated into each channel. Although two quiet scenes have hiss, dialogue is always clear and vibrant, which is particularly important when Pacino goes from whisper to yelling or ad-libbed singing in a heartbeat or when the two actor alpha dogs face off, expressing their clashing creeds, each trying to out-understate the other with lowered tones, long pauses, and hard stares.

Mann’s commentary is a writer’s one, amiable and informative without much on the shoot or analysis of style. That’s covered BLU-RAY in a revealing panel with Pacino, Robert De STUDIO: Fox, 1995 Niro, and Mann, intelligently moderated by ASPECT RATIO: 2.40:1 Christopher Nolan. A piece on locations, AUDIO: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 LENGTH: 170 mins. fascinating in-depth featurettes on the MPAA RATING: R production, and deleted scenes expand on DIRECTOR: Michael Mann this superior samurai film. O Josef Krebs STARRING: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Val Kilmer

soundandvision.com soundandvision.com 71

ENTERTAINMENT MUSIC

FULL TANK: THE COMPLETE ALBUM COLLECTION MIDNIGHT OIL

It was one of the most galvanizing live experiences of my life. The instant WNEW-FM announced Midnight Oil would be performing live on a flatbed truck on Sixth Avenue in the heart of New York City in front of the Exxon Building around noontime on May 30, 1990 to protest the mishandling of the March 1989 Exxon Valdez oil-spill disaster in Prince William Sound, Alaska, three colleagues and I sprinted the entire length of the two long city blocks from the Stereo Review and Audio offices at 50th and Broadway to get as close as we could. Success! Each of us wound up standing no more than 10 people deep from the flatbed’s perch upon our out-of-breath Sixth Avenue arrival.

As this semi-guerrilla Midnight Oil performance took place during the pre–cell phone/digital camera era, the thousands of New Yorkers on hand with us were wholly invested—sans any techie-gear distractions— in what our collective eyes, ears, and hearts took in that supercharged afternoon in Midtown Manhattan: namely, one of the most blisteringly intense half-hours of live music from one of the best live bands ever.

What that singularly electrifying afternoon reinforced for and in me at the time (as it continues to do even now, over a quarter-century later) was the power and the passion of a quintessential Australian band that has never made any bones about putting forth staunch political views while concurrently making sure their listeners don’t (and can’t) sit still while listening to their principle-driven soundscapes. Unlike many of their contemporaries, Midnight Oil never failed at finding the precise sonic blend between message and music, both live and in studio. Or, as one of their most apropos band slogans puts it, “And Midnight Oil makes you dance. And Midnight Oil also makes you think.”

And now, Midnight Oil has also recently returned to the live stage following an almost-15-year hiatus. I can report the band is as strong

and as relevant as ever after seeing them polarize a packed Webster Hall in downtown New York this past May 13. I can also confirm the proof is very much in the Oils’ recorded pudding. In fact, the timing couldn’t be more right for the bulk of the band’s studio output to appear in fine remastered form on Full Tank, a careerspanning collection housed in, yes, a metal cylinder meant to replicate the water tanks that have adorned many a Midnight Oil live stage over the years. Thirteen CDs comprising 11 albums and 2 EPs tell the band’s in-studio tale from 1978–2002, accompanied by the 40,000 Watt RSL DVD with 27 videos, encompassing the iconic clips for signature songs like “Read About It,” “Beds Are Burning,” “Blue Sky Mine,” and “Truganini.”

As the Oils progressed as a band, their sound evolved from of-era unhinged punk—fist-pumping sneerfests like “Powderworks” (1978), “Cold Cold Change” (1979), and “Lucky Country” (1981)—into sharply observational alt-rock powder kegs. The true beginning of where band idealism met its aural match occurs in “Power and the Passion,” from 1982’s Nick Launay–helmed countdown to impending Armageddon, 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1. Here, ever-imposing vocalist Peter Garrett seethes through lines like “What do you believe is true?” and “Sometimes you’ve got to take the hardest line”—lyrics that, incidentally, seem even more resonant in the present day—while buttressed by mind-melded guitar foils Jim Moginie and Martin Rotsey. “Passion” is perfectly punctuated by powerhouse drummer Rob Hirst, whose furious, 53-second percussive break starting at 2:33 also serves as a top-shelf wide-panning stereo demo sequence.

From there, perpetually higher-ratcheting benchmarks follow at virtually every turn. A brief sampling of the Oils’ ongoing in-studio ascendance includes 1984’s follow-or-else ultimatum “When the Generals Talk,” 1985’s cruelly ironic barnburner “Progress,” 1987’s career-apex sing-along-cum-call-to-arms “Beds Are Burning,” 1990’s slow-build to explosive unification dirge “One Country,” 1998’s frenzied pit-bull punker “Redneck Wonderland,” and 2002’s acoustically hopeful field guide, “Luritja Way.” And if the 11 hours of Full Tank material merely serves to whet your Oils whistle and you’re craving more, I suggest you also seek out the companion Overflow Tank, which contains CD & DVD four CDs of demos, outtakes, rarities, LABEL: Sprint/Legacy/Sony Music and live cuts (highlights: the gutbucket AUDIO FORMATS: 44.1-kHz/ enthusiasm of “Spirit of the Age,” and a 16-bit PCM Stereo (CD & DVD), 44.1-kHz/24-bit PCM Stereo pseudo-trippy cover of The Grateful Dead’s (download) “Wharf Rat”), as well as eight DVDs with NUMBER OF TRACKS: 153 on jaw-dropping live and documentary 14 discs (126 on 13 CDs, 27 on footage (1990’s Black Rain Falls, which 1 DVD) LENGTH: 10:44:04 (8:50:05 on 13 chronicles the aforementioned Exxon CDs, 1:53:59 on 1 DVD) Building event, and 1993’s mesmerizing PRODUCERS: Jim Moginie, Arlene MTV Unplugged among them).

Brookes (Full Tank content); No matter which way you choose Midnight Oil, Keith Walker, Leszek Karski, Glyn Johns, Nick Launay, to listen to and/or watch this eternally Francois Kevorkian, Warne Livesey, captivating band, you’ll find no dead hearts, Malcolm Burn, Magoo (original stationary feet, tin legs, and/or quiet minds albums) to ever be in sight. Rather, Midnight Oil’s ENGINEERS: Steve Smart, Bob Ludwig (2017 remastering); Keith supremely fulfilling Full Tank ensures your Walker, Peter J. Walker, Ross sonic reservoir will never be left empty.

Cockle, Sean Fullen, Nick Launay, David Price, Guy Gray, David Nicholas, Brent Clark, Malcolm Burn, Grant Pudig, Magoo, Evan McHugh (original albums)

soundandvision.com 72 OCTOBER 2017 soundandvision.com

O Mike Me ler

INSTANT INFORMATION FOR OUR READERS...

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PREMIERE DESIGN

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Steinway Lyngdorf S-15 Speaker System

Steimway Lyngdorf • (212) 588-9330 • steinwaylyngdorf.com

It’s not new but Steinway Lyngdorf ’s S-15 remains stunning in its aesthetic and technical design. Visually, this tiny treasure has little in common with your garden-variety box speaker— nor should it, considering its pedigree.

For starters, it’s 10 inches tall, 8 inches wide, and only 3 inches thick—or about a half-inch wider and an inch thicker than the 1997 Webster’s New World College Dictionary collecting dust on a shelf in my office.

Most striking is the lack of side panels. In a perfect example of form meets function, a dozen perfectly aligned “piano strings” on either side (they’re actually made of rubber) allow the system’s secret weapon—a high-performance dipole tweeter— to disperse “spacious and live” sound throughout the room.

About that tweeter: It’s the same sweet Air Motion Transfer (AMT) ribbon design used in the company’s $228,000 flagship masterpiece—the towering Model D, a fullrange floorstanding dipole speaker that’s as tall as LeBron James (6’ 8”).

Close inspection of the space behind those stringed “panels” reveals a gold-colored plate occupying the bottom half of the cabinet. This is the side of the machined-aluminum

enclosure housing the system’s 5.25-inch woofer, which hands serious bass duties off to an external subwoofer. The structure is bolted to solid aluminum front and back panels to form a 10-pound cabinet built to withstand extremely high sound-pressure levels (SPLs). How high? The little S-15 is rated to achieve a max SPL of 114 decibels (measured at a distance of 1 meter). The overall design is simple, elegant, sturdy, and very effective.

Whether you use the S-15 as a freestanding speaker or mount it on the wall, it needs to be teamed with a subwoofer, preferably one of the company’s three “boundary woofers”—the cube-shaped S-210 or LS-R210 (both rated down to 25 hertz) or the LS-R212 (rated to 20 Hz). The R210 and R212 have a smaller, rectangular footprint and stackable design for those who want to really get down with multiple subs.

Prices start at $2,700 for the S-15 speaker in matte black, satin silver, gloss black, or gloss white. Pricing for a complete 2.2 stereo system with the SP-1 stereo processor—featuring SL’s RoomPerfect audio calibration system—A2 digital amplifier, and two S-210 or two LS-R210 woofers starts at $24,000. Pricing with two LS-R212 woofers starts at $28,000.—Bob Ankosko

Sound & Vision (ISSN 1537-5838) (USPS 504-850) October 2017, Vol. 82, No. 8. COPYRIGHT 2017 BY TEN: The Enthusiast Network Magazines, LLC. All rights reserved. Published 10 times a year (January, February/March, April, May, June, July/August, September, October, November, December) by TEN: The Enthusiast Network, LLC., 261 Madison Avenue, 6th Floor, New York, NY 10016-2303. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing offices. Single copy price is $5.99. Subscriptions: U.S., APO, FPO, and U.S. Possessions $23.94 for 10 issues. Canadian orders add $10.00 per year and international orders add $20.00 per year (for surface mail postage). Payment in advance, U.S. funds only. POSTMASTER: Send all UAA to CFS. (See DMM 707.4.12.5); NON-POSTAL AND MILITARY FACILITIES: send address corrections to Sound & Vision, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235. Mailing Lists: Occasionally, our subscriber list is made available to reputable firms offering goods and services we believe would be of interest to our readers. If you prefer to be excluded, please send your current address label and a note requesting to be excluded from these promotions to TEN: The Enthusiast Network, LLC., 831 S. Douglas St., El Segundo, CA 90245, A n: Privacy Coordinator. Subscription Service: Should you wish to change your address or order new subscriptions, you can e-mail soundandvision@emailcustomerservice.com, call (800) 264-9872 (international calls: 386-447-6383), or write to: Sound & Vision, P.O. Box 420235, Palm Coast, FL 32142-0235.

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