Last year Spotify finally debuted in the United States, terrifying iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, and all the rest with its any-song-for-free listening model. However, the free Spotify version is riddled with huge ads, lower bit rates, and extreme time limits, so comparing it to, say, Rhapsody isn’t apples-to-apples. To create a proper battle, I pitted the unlimited-music, ad-free Spotify Premium ($9.99/month) against Rhapsody Premier ($9.99/month).

Song Selections

Both streaming music services offer 13 million-plus songs, so you’ll never run out of stuff to play (as long as that stuff doesn’t include live-streaming holdouts Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, or Metallica). To compare artist/album/song selection, I began by searching for artists on Spotify that I already had on Rhapsody, starting alphabetically. Disappointment didn’t take long. Hip-hop supergroup 213 (Snoop Dogg, Warren G, Nate Dogg): Not on Spotify. Same with downtempo electronica group 60 Channels. Okay, not fair to compare the services with obscure groups? How about Adele’s 21, one of the best-selling albums of 2011? Rhapsody, yes. Spotify, no.

Spotify offers 2 million more songs than Rhapsody, so what gives? Look up the Rolling Stones on Spotify, and you’ll be greeted with scads of albums you’ve never heard of, usually U.K.-only releases populated with the same old songs. So if you want every obscure version of “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” available, go with Spotify. If you want this year’s number-one album, go with Rhapsody.

Music Selection Winner: Rhapsody.

Desktop Player Interface

Rhapsody was once owned by RealNetworks, which tortured innocent music lovers with the bloated, virus-like RealPlayer music player. Rhapsody, now independent, still emanates a faint RealPlayer stench, with its bright background, stale 2003-erainterface, and blue and gray accents. Unlike RealPlayer, however, Rhapsody is intuitive to navigate, play music, store songs, and create playlists. It works like a typical computer app, so there’s no learning curve. Find a song or album you like? One click plays the song or whole album. One click saves the song or album to your library. Creating playlists is much like iTunes.

All Rhapsody interface panels (Now Playing Mixer, Play-lists, Artist, Album, etc.) are resizable, and the user controls the metadata panels they see in their library (genre, bit rate, time, composer, beats per minute, and 19 more).

Spotify, on the other hand, tries way too hard to be cute and novel, at the expense of usability. The top and left-side panels will be familiar to iTunes users, which is cool. Not so cool: Spotify went for that dark-gray, squint-to-read Adobe Air look that couldn’t be more aggravating for anything longer than a few seconds’ viewing. Users have no control over metadata. Spotify gives you only the four basics: artist, album, track, and time—plus it adds one more, popularity, that you’ll likely file under Who Gives a Damn. But before you do, there is one great use for popularity. Spotify streams at “up to” 320kbps quality. This highbit rate is reserved for the most popular songs. So, if there’s more than one version of “Isn’t She Lovely” by Stevie Wonder, go for the most popular version. It’s more likely to be streamed at the better-sounding 320k bit rate.

Both apps sport microscopic text throughout their interfaces, and you don’t get to resize it. You’ll (not) read it and you’ll like it, dammit!

It ain’t pretty but, in every conceivable way, Rhapsody provides a far more intuitive user experience.

Interface Winner: Rhapsody

Building a Music Collection

Both services sport a library, a place to hold every song/album you save. Their libraries can also scan your computer for your own music files, and put those in the library as well. Rhapsody has a metadata panel that tells you which is which, including the bit rates of the various music files you’ve ripped or purchased.

While both services are streaming-first, they both allow you to download tracks to your computer’s hard drive as well, ideal for travelers.

To add a song or a whole album to your computer’s personal Rhapsody library, just didc the ADD TO LIBRARY button next to the song/ album. Done.

Adding songs/albums isn’t so easy with Spotify. You need to “star” the song. Click a yellow star next to the song, and it’s added to your library. It’s also inexplicably added to a “starred” group directly below the library. You don’t get to “star” a whole album with a click. You have to individually click stars for each song, or CTRL-A the album to select all songs, then right-click, then “star” them. As I considered populating Spotify with the 15,996 tracks I had saved in my Rhapsody library, the task loomed before me as a monumental pain in the ass. I quickly gave up on that idea, but managing even the most modest library in Spotify was a maddening, head-scratching exercise.

Music Library Winner: Rhapsody

Queue/Now Playing

With both services, you can add songs you want to play right now to the queue (their name for a Now Playing list) by dragging and dropping songs you’ve found, or songs from your library. With Rhapsody, you can also click the PLAY NOW button next to each song or album. In Rhapsody’s Preferences, you can decide whether the PLAY NOW button immediately plays the song/album, or simply puts it into the queue for you to play at your convenience.

Spotify doesn’t feature a PLAY NOW button. You have to right-click a song, then click ADD TO QUEUE. For an album, you CTRL-A to select all the songs, then right-click, then click ADD TO QUEUE. What a hassle. Inexplicably, when you find a song during a search, Spotify adds every version of that song to your queue, whether you want it or not. Soon, your queue is cluttered with all kinds of stuff you don’t want, and there’s no way to get the unwanted songs out. The only way to clear Spotify’s queue is to close and reopen the app. The queue always opens empty.

With Rhapsody, the only songs in your queue are songs you want there. And to clear the queue, you simply did the CLEAR button. You can delete any song from the queue with your keyboard’s DELETE key. And songs in the queue stay there if you close and reopen Rhapsody, so all your desired music of the moment is ready until you say otherwise.

Queue/Now Playing Winner: Rhapsody

Radio Stations

Both services feature “artist radio.” If you like an artist, select artist radio to hear more songs by that artist, plus songs by similar artists. Think of it as a poor man’s Pandora, somewhere in the neighborhood conceptually, but nowhere near as good.

For true commercial-free genre radio stations, Rhapsody is king. If you’re in the mood for some rock, blues, soul, Latin, country, jazz, or 13 other genres, click the RADIO tab and go. Each of the 19 genres reveals an average of around a dozen subgenres, giving Rhapsody a total of more than 200 stations. If that’s not enough segmentation and personalization for you, you can didc CREATE CUSTOM CHANNEL, enter up to 10 artist names to give Rhapsody an idea of where you’re going, and let it play. Regardless of what type of Rhapsody radio station you’re listening to, a mini-bio about the current artist scrolls at the top right of your screen, helping you to learn more about your favorite artists—or new artists.

In contrast to Rhapsody’s 200-plus stations, Spotify Radio sports 27 genre/ subgenre radio stations, including the curiously titled “black metal.” No worries, though—hardcore, death metal, and heavy metal are also represented, leaving a full 23 non-metal radio station types to choose from. Remarkably, Spotify, a far more global brand than Rhapsody, offers no world music station, whereas Rhapsody allows you to choose from 11 different regional stations under their world music banner.

Either service’s radio feature is a great way to discover new artists in your favorite genres. Best of all, if you don’t like the current song, click the FORWARD button to play another. It’s radio with choices.

Radio Station Winner: Rhapsody

Sound Quality

First off, don’t compare these Internet-based services to Internet radio, which is decidedly lo-fi and usually riddled with commercials and DJ patter. Rhapsody and Spotify both sound great, suitable for at least casual listening on home and car systems. Secondly, higher bit rates mean better sound. But neither service is helpful at identifying bit rates. Rhapsody is all over the map: You’ll find claims of 128k (various forums) and 160k (CNET). Some claim it’s MP3; others say AAC. Rhapsody’s mobile and Sonos apps get 192k streams. Downloads to your computer are also 192k.

Spotify’s Premium service improves streams “up to 320k” over its lower-priced services. The disclaimer states that “not all tracks will be available in 320k,” but there’s no way to tell which are which. We’ll just have to listen, won’t we?

For the sound comparison, I used the potentially more compromised PC players, not the Sonos or mobile apps. I listened through the stellar Asus Xonar DX audiophile sound card, with a 96/24 digital output to a Yamaha receiver feeding JBL nearfield monitors and a Monitor Audio sub. First, I queued up Donald Fagen’s “On the Dunes,” from Kamakiriad. The song, while mellow, features some extraordinary drum and cymbal work, and has tremendous top-end air. MP3-type audio compromises are easy to hear with this track. After the Donald Fagen track, I stepped through several musical genres and repeated the listening comparison.

Spotify sounded better. But I had to go back and forth a lot to hear it. And true to Spotify’s disclaimer, not every song sounded like a 320k stream, and those songs were no better than on Rhapsody. The CD versions sounded predictably better than both services. While even tiny improvements in sound quality hold paramount importance to me, we should also consider how we use the apps. These are computer players. They’ll be hooked up to an office system or PC speakers. They’ll play in the background while we multitask. Consequently, the (sometimes) slight difference in quality may not be enough to switch to Spotify. For me, it wasn’t, especially considering that the playing field is leveled considerably through the more critical Sonos and mobile device apps.

Sound Quality Winner: Spotify

Mobile Devices

Both services offer free Apple iOS and Android apps to play music on the go. You can stream live if your mobile device is Internet-connected. You can also download songs to the device for listening offline.

Rhapsody Premier allows only one mobile device for the $9.99/month fee. For $14.99/month, you get up to three mobile devices. Spotify Premium gives you three mobile devices for its $9.99/month fee.

Mobile Devices Winner: Spotify

Who emerged victorious? The audiophile in me didn’t make the choice easy, considering Spotify’s certain (on some songs) but barely discernible sound quality advantage over Rhapsody. I attempted to jump on the Spotify bandwagon mere moments after its U.S. release. A day later, I jumped right back off. The reason: I use my PC music player daily; it’s the soundtrack to my workday. Rhapsody’s relevant music selection, its simple learning curve, its superior control and personalization, its enormous variety of commercial-free radio, its miles-ahead lead in ease-of-use and intuitive-ness —all make collecting and listening to music as I work ajoy and abreeze. The phenomenal Sonos Rhapsody app is icing on the cake. Someday, maybe Rhapsody will add to this a prettier, easier-to-read, more modern PC interface — and one for the Mac, too. Until then, I have all those awesome jams. So I have that going for me.”

Charles Thompson, via his company Sell-Through Solutions, creates retail training programs for several consumer electronics manufacturers, including Sony, Yamaha and DirecTV. He began his career in high-end audio, working in retail and management for 10 years at Home Entertainment Inc. in Houston, Texas.

Related: Charles Thompson, Desktop Player Interface, DirecTV, Home Entertainment Inc, Mobile Devices, music, PC, Radio Stations, Song Selections, Sound Quality, Spotify, Yamaha spotify commercials

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http://hdliving.com/home-technology/2012/02/06/battle-streaming-music-services

Sounds like a recipe for success, right? Wrong. Market realities being what they were (and are), Pioneer failed to maintain its juggernaut, and the Kuro line slipped back into the darkness whence it came.

Cut to the present: Sharp Electronics, a Pioneer shareholder, is making a play to invoke the spirit of Kuro (if not the name itself) in its Elite-branded LCD TVs. Like their forebears, the new sets are priced well out of scale with the rest of the flat-panel TV market: $5,499 and $8,000, respectively, for the 60- and 70-inch models. Gulp!

Anyone paying that much for a TV in 2012 will undoubtedly have high expectations, and Sharp has loaded its Elite line with high-end perks: a full-array LED backlight with local dimming (and a process that Sharp calls Intelligent Variable Contrast, which enhances the brightness of the backlight in different picture zones based on the onscreen content); 3D display via active-shutter glasses; THX certification, with THX 2D and 3D picture modes; Day and Night ISF calibration modes; and a display panel that adds a yellow sub-pixel to the red/green/blue triad — something that Sharp claims brings smoother diagonal lines and color transitions, along with a more vivid reproduction of bright colors and objects.

As with other Elite-branded gear, the PRO-60X5FD has a classy, understated look. Its bezel has a black, brushed aluminum surface, and the rest of the façade is uninterrupted aside from a gold Elite logo. A few control buttons are located out of sight on the set’s bottom-left side. The included stand can’t be swiveled, though I imagine this won’t be a deal-breaker for most folks.

Inputs include a generous five HDMI jacks, including one with audio-return channel to route audio from the TV back to an external receiver. There’s built-in Wi-Fi, which you can use to stream content from your computer via DLNA, or to tap the set’s app selection, which includes Netflix, Vudu, Blockbuster, YouTube, Skype, and Napster. This menu kinda pales when compared with other TVs, some of which include Amazon Instant Video and Hulu Plus, but then again, media streaming isn’t the main draw for this TV.

Sharp’s remote control is large, with a fully backlit keypad and well-spaced buttons. I found it mostly easy to use in a dim room. A 3D button located near the central cursor calls up a 3D-specific adjustment menu, and other nearby buttons take you straight to the Netflix interface or to the Apps menu. A trio of Favorite buttons near the bottom can also be configured to call up a specific app when pressed.

http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/article/test-report-sharp-elite-pro-60x5fd-3d-lcd-hdtv

A LOT HAS CHANGED over the past few years in the world of home audio. We’ve gotten to the point where we expect more from our listening experience. We want more choice than the 100 or so CDs crammed in our entertainment cabinets, we want better quality than those old earbuds can produce and we want the music to evoke a cool attitude. Thankfully, there is a host of new technologies primed to take our home audio to the next level. In no particular order, here are the Top 10 technologies shaping the way we listen to music at home.

1. Music Apps and Internet Radio

Pandora, Rhapsody, Spotify, Last.fm, Napster, iheartradio, Stitcher SmartRadio, AUPEO!, MOG, Rdio, Slacker… and the list goes on. Anyone using a “smart TV,” connected Blu-ray Disc player, or one of the many whole-house audio solutions on the market today has undoubtedly seen the rapid rise in the number of competing online music applications. While some music purists may scoff at the sound quality afforded by these Internet radio and streaming music services, it’s hard to argue with this newfound plethora of options for discovering new music in line with your distinct tastes.

2. Apple AirPlay

Designed to facilitate the streaming of music around your home, Apple’s AirPlay technology has started to make its way into various A/V receivers, stereo systems, and speaker dock/table radio devices from the likes of Denon, Marantz, BW, Pioneer, iHome, JBL and others. By way of an example, an AirPlay-enabled receiver can quickly and easily be targeted as your destination speaker from the iPhone in your pocket or a wireless laptop running iTunes on your home network.

3. Goodbye, CD (Maybe)

It’s true: You may need to buy the White Album again. Recent rumblings from the music industry indicate that several major labels are planning to dump the compact disc (CD) format by the end of 2012, opting instead to focus on digital downloads and streaming options. For many consumers, this probably won’t come as a shock; however, there will undoubtedly be many folks who are less than thrilled with this new develop ment. In other words, don’t start sending your CDs to the morgue just yet. While it’s true that digital music downloads now account for roughly one-third of total music sales, and CD sales are on the decline, it seems highly unlikely that CDs will exit the scene as quickly as some are suggesting.

4. Vinyl Lives

The compact disc may be preparing for departure, but au-diophiles can take solace in the continuing renaissance that vinyl is enjoying. As most diehard music lovers will tell you, nothingbeats the full, rich sound of a good-condition LPbeing spun on a quality turntable. And because many bands feel strongly that vinyl is still one of the best ways to experience the full range of their sound, there’s a surprising number of new albums being released on vinyl alongside their CD and MP3 counterparts. Don’t believe it? Just visit the “Vinyl Store” on Amazon’s massive online marketplace. If you’ve built yourself a top-notch audio system, either for music or home theater, know that you may be missing out on its true potential if you’re not spinning those Long Play records.

5. Bluetooth

Manufacturers continue to find new and innovative ways to incorporate Bluetooth into home audio components and peripherals. Whether it’s wireless streaming of music from your iPhone to a nearby table radio, wireless communication between a soundbar and its matching subwoofer, or having your handheld remote control your HDTV, Bluetooth continues to evolve and make its way into more and more home audio/ video hardware. For a directory of new products featuring integrated Bluetooth, including those classified as “Bluetooth Smart” and “Bluetooth Smart Ready,” visit www. bluetooth. com.

6. Room Correction/Auto Calibration

Before you can expect to hear optimal results from your surround-sound system, a critical first step is calibrating your equipment to conf orm acoustically to the unique characteristics of the room. Thankfully, automated calibration and room correction technologies, such as Audyssey’s MultEQ platform, have greatly simplified the process.

7. App-Based Control

More and more manufacturers are now giving you the option of controlling your hardware by using a downloadable app on your Apple iOS or Android mobile device. With the appropriate app, many receivers will now allow you to tweak configuration settings, change inputs, and adjust the volume from the convenience of your cell phone, which is probably in your pocket anyway. And the best part? Most of these control apps are free.

8. 3D

Blu-ray 3D and 3D TVs have become popular upgrades for consumers looking to move beyond two dimensions. The thing to note here is that, in many cases, your preamplifier/processor or receiver is standing between your Blu-ray 3D player and your 3D TV. If you’re planning to output that high-definition 3D video signal to your display via high-speed HDMI, your receiver will need tobe 3D-compliant unless your Blu-ray player offers dual HDMI outputs.

9. Audio Return Channel (ARC)

Along with 3D video support, many consumers are now finding a use for another new feature present in the latest HDMI specification the Audio Return Channel (ARC). ARC involves the return of audio information from an end point display device (like your HDTV) to an upstream audio component (like your A/V receiver). This allows the transmission of audio information back to a receiver using just the one HDMI cable. This means that any audio originating at the display, whether it be from a built-in tuner, a built-in optical disc player, or integrated apps such as Netflix or Pandora, can leverage your A/V receiver’s decoding capabilities without the need for an auxiliary optical cable. As an ever-increasing number of HDTVs come equipped with integrated media apps, ARC has become a handy feature for anyone using a surround-sound receiver or soundbar.

10. Soundbars

Although a full-blown home theater complete with a 5.1 or 7.1 surround-sound system is sonic Valhalla for movie and music lovers, single-housing soundbar speaker products continue tobe an attractive alternative for many consumers; and it’s easy to see why. Whether it’s for a secondary system in a bedroom or family room, or if you’re simply looking to improve the volume and intelligibility of a soundtrack’s dialogue, many of today’s soundbar systems offer greatly improved audio performance compared to the thin, underpowered speakers on the average display —and they do it with far fewer wires and setup than a typical audio/ video receiver requires.

Related: 3D, 3D video, ARC, audio, CD, HDMI, HDTV, Internet Radio, music, planning, receiver, Vinyl Lives

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Onkyo is cranking up its 2012 receivers with cloud storage. The company just announced plans to partner with MP3tunes.com, meaning that Onkyo owners can access the service’s cloud-based Locker.

That Locker provides up to 2GB of music storage absolutely free. Once your music is in the cloud, it can be streamed directly to any of the company’s 2012 network-capable receivers.

That 2GB should hold about 400 of your favorite songs. If that type of storage isn’t going to cut it, there are fee-based accounts, which start at $39.95 per year for 50GB.

According to Onkyo, they are the first brand to add MP3tunes into the receiver mix.

“MP3tunes Locker is an easy and secure means to maintain this data, while providing easy access through an Onkyo receiver, computer, smartphone, or any of the many network capable devices that support MP3tunes,” says Paul Wasek, Onkyo’s national marketing and product planning manager.

Onkyo plans to add MP3Tunes capabilities as a standard feature on new Onkyo network-capable receivers starting in the first quarter of 2012.

Related: Cloud, music, Onkyo, Rachel Cericola, receiver, receivers

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http://hdliving.com/home-technology/2012/01/10/onkyo-partners-mp3tunes

 Sony plans to do just that by selling you mobile devices, including the new Tablet P, PlayStation Vita, Xperia LTE Smartphone, and Wi-Fi-enabled, Android-powered Z-series Walkman. And it will continue to expand offerings on its Sony Entertainment Network (SEN), which encompasses services like Music Unlimited and Video Unlimited, along with the PlayStation Network. 

Digging through the mass of announcements with an eye towards A/V, two things that stand out are the NSZ-GP9 Blu-ray Disc Player and SZ-GS7 Network Media Player. Both of these devices powered by Google TV and come with a remote that incorporates a backlit (yes!) QWERTY keyboard. Sony also offers iOS and Android remote control apps that let you operate them with your choice of portable. Another notable new product is the BDP-S790, a player that’s capable of upscaling images to 4K resolution. You know, ‘cause you’re going to need that when you buy your expensive new 4K TV.

On the TV front, Sony is streamlining its offerings into 3 series: BX, EX, and HX. The flagship HX850 models, which arrive “first quarter” in 47- and 55-inch screen sizes,appear to have similar specs to last year’s HX-929 line, including a local-dimming LED backlight. Sony is also coming out with new Superlight active 3D glasses to make the 3D viewing experience more comfortable (and fashionable). Interestingly, whereas Samsung and LG are throwing their respective hats into the large-screen OLED ring, Sony has an entirely different prototype display tech at this show. Its 55-inch Crystal LED Display uses self-emitting tech, with tiny red, green, and blue LED triads mounted on the front of the display. No projected release date, but Sony promises to“work conscientiously” to bring Crystal LED Display to market.

Last, but not least, there are portable audio announcements. Sony has a bunch of new balanced armature in-ear headphones, along with a few speaker docks. Brent Butterworth managed to get an early hands-on with both, so keep an eye out on this site for his related post.

http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/blog/2012/01/10/ces-2012-press-day-sony

How many Wi-Fi connected devices are in your house? I did a mental survey of my house and came up with 12, including iPods, tablets, media streamers, etc. I’ve probably forgotten a few. All of those devices are fed by a single wireless router, and some days that’s a real challenge. How can you get better reception for all of your connected devices?

• Place your wireless router in the center of the house so all of your devices have relatively equal access to it.
• Use a wired connection for your most mediaheavy devices. My router is in my living room with the majority of my A/V gear, so I use an Ethernet connection for the smart TV and cloud-based media server.
• Keep the router off the floor and away from metal surfaces.
• If you have to place your router against an outside wall, try replacing the omnidirectional antenna with a high-gain directional antenna so you’re not sending half your signal outside.
• Add a wireless repeater halfway between your router and your furthest device.
• Upgrade to a high-bandwidth router designed for media.
• Use powerline adapters instead of wireless for some devices. A powerline adapter uses your home’s existing electrical wiring for the network. You simply connect an Ethernet cable from your router to a powerline adapter that’s plugged into an outlet, then use another adapter near the device you want to network and run an Ethernet cable from that to the device.

Related: Connected Home, Grant Clauser, Router, Wi Fi, WiFi, Wireless Network

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We will be open Monday from 9:30am until 6:00pm and can still deliver you a TV! (You just have to ask!) More importantly, all of you want to watch the game on your HDTV sets, and we know sometimes things just happen. If you have a problem with your equipment please call the store at (318) 797-8045 or e-mail us by clicking here

We can handle most problems easily over the phone. We will have technicians available Monday for emergency service runs. Please don’t wait until 5:00 to discover a problem, as we can only handle these runs on a first come first served basis.

#1 Service Problem -
If you find you have a picture, but no sound on your DirectTV/Dish Network/Comcast/Suddenlink box, here is what you need to do. Unplug the box’s power cord only from the wall or surge protector (don’t unplug anything else). Wait 5 minutes. Plug it back in. This performs a hard reset, and it will reload channels, fix the sound, as well as, 99% of the most common service issues.

Let’s GEAUX TIGERS!

The XTR-SSA3 is the latest in a line of speakers that I thought were too skinny to work. Definitive Technology designed the ultra-thin Mythos XTR models to hang next to today’s ultra-thin TVs, and this soundbar is just a little more than 1.5 inches thick — so slim that it sticks out less than a typical inch-thick TV and its mount. The XTR speakers are so thin, it seems impossible that they could sound any better than a $49 iPod dock. But they do.

The new soundbar picks up where the XTR-50 left/center/right speaker (read the review here) left off. It combines left, center, and right speakers into one enclosure. Each channel gets two 3.5-inch woofer/midrange drivers and a 1-inch tweeter. Unusually, the midwoofs use tweeter-like dome-shaped diaphragms rather than cones.

Mount the XTR-SSA3 under your TV, add a couple of surround speakers and a subwoofer, and you’ve got a full 5.1 home theater. You’ll need an A/V receiver to power the system; unlike many other soundbars, the XTR-SSA3 has no built-in amplification.

At just 43 inches wide, the XTR-SSA3 easily fits under flat-panel TVs with 46-inch-diagonal and larger screen sizes. This places the tweeters for the left and right speakers 32 inches apart, nowhere near enough distance to get a decent stereo image. To help the sound break free of the little bar, Definitive employed its Spatial Array technology. Spatial Array uses interaural crosstalk cancellation: It sends a filtered, phase-inverted signal from the left channel into the right and the right into the left. In essence, it prevents your left ear from hearing the direct sound from the right speaker and vice versa, so you get a broader stereo soundstage.

Definitive has also created a new surround speaker for the Mythos line. The XTR-20BP is a bipolar model with two of the same 3.5-inch midwoofers found in the XTR-SSA3, but they’re pointed at angles to spread the sound out more. It’s got the same tweeter, too.

I knew the XTR-SSA3 wouldn’t give me any bass, so I was happy to see that Definitive sent along its new SuperCube 4000 subwoofer. The latest SuperCubes look a lot like the old ones, but they have a new feature: a digital signal processor. Definitive uses the DSP to smooth the SuperCube’s response, and also to offer four special EQ modes. The internal crossover can be adjusted from 40 to 150 Hz. All this is controlled through a tiny remote, and you can monitor your adjustments on a bright red alphanumeric display that’s visible through the grille.

http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/article/review-definitive-technology-mythos-xtr-ssa3-soundbar-xtr-20bp-surround-speaker-and-supercub

Sony Bravia 3D HDTV
No Interest if Paid in full within 36 months

On select Sony® Internet TVs and BRAVIA® 3D HDTVs with your Sony Financial Services card made between November 14th to Feb 5th, 2012. Interest will be charged to your account from the purchase date if the promotional balance, including optional charges, is not paid in full within 36 months or if you make a late payment. Equal Monthly Payments Required.** Sony 36 Months

No Interest if Paid in Full within 12 Months

On select non-Sony Home Entertainment products over $399 with your Sony Financial Services card made between Sept 1st to Feb 5, 2012. Interest will be charged to your account from the purchase date if the promotional balance, including optional charges, is not paid in full within 12 months or if you make a late payment. Minimum Monthly Payments Required*. Sony 12 Months

6, 12, 24 months *Valid on select Sony BRAVIA® HDTVs, Internet TVs and other Home Entertainment product purchases made between Nov 14th, 2011 to Feb 5th, 2012 on your Sony Financial Services account. On promo purchase balance, monthly payments required, but no Finance Charges will be assessed if (1) promo purchase balance paid in full in 6, 12, 18, or 24 months and (2) any minimum monthly payments on account paid when due. Otherwise, promo may be terminated and treated as a non-promo balance. Finance Charges accrued at the Purchase APR will be assessed from purchase date. Regular rates apply to non-promo balances, including optional charges. Promo purchases on existing accounts may not receive full benefit of promo terms, including reduced APR if applicable, if account is subject to Penalty APR. Payments over the minimum will be applied as required by applicable law. As of July 1, 2010 and after APR 29.99%, and on all accounts in default, Penalty APR 29.99%. Minimum Finance Charge $2.00. Subject to approval by GE Money Bank.

36 months **Valid on Sony Internet TV and BRAVIA 3D HDTV purchases made between Nov 14tj, 2011 to Feb 5th, 2012 on your Sony Financial Services account. On promo purchase balance, monthly payments equal to the promo purchase divided equally by the number of months in the promotional period are required until expiration or termination of promotion, but no Finance Charges will be assessed if (1) promo purchase balance paid in full in 36 months, and (2) all minimum monthly payments on account paid when due. Otherwise, promo may be terminated and treated as a non-promo balance. Finance Charges accrued at the Purchase APR will be assessed from purchase date. Regular rates apply to non-promo balances, including optional charges. Promo purchases on existing accounts may not receive full benefit of promo terms, including reduced APR if applicable, if account is subject to Penalty APR. Payments over the minimum will be applied as required by applicable law. As of July 1, 2010 and after APR 29.99%, and on all accounts in default, Penalty APR 29.99%. Minimum Finance Charge $2.00. Subject to approval by GE Money Bank.