Sony put a Bluetooth speaker in an LED light bulb (ro) si/and (eng)

   Sony a lansat în Japonia unul dintre cele mai ciudate produse ale sale de până acum: LED Light Bulb Speaker. Este vorba despre un bec bazat pe tehnologie LED cu un difuzor audio integrat, care oferă  conectivitate wireless la dispozitive. Întregul bec poate fi controlat cu ajutorul unei telecomenzi şi oferă atât lumină, cât şi sunet ambiental în oricare loc din casă. Ideea nu este nouă, însă este primul astfel de dispozitiv realizat de către compania japoneză.

   Becul oferă o luminozitate de 360 de lumeni, iar intensitatea sa poate fi setată de la distanţă folosind telecomanda sau o aplicaţia dedicată pentru smartphone. Având în vedere valoarea măsurată în lumeni, becul nu este printre cele mai luminoase de pe piaţă, oferind performanţă limitată, fiind potrivit mai degrabă într-o veioză sau lampă decât pe tavanul unei camere.

   Conectarea la telecomandă se face prin intermediu tehnologiei NFC, în timp ce redarea de sunet se face printr-o conexiune Bluetooth. Existenţa acestui bec este justificată de Sony cu argumente care susţin că astfel poţi reda muzică în locuri în care era greu să instalezi un sistem audio. Deşi acest lucru poate fi adevărat, faptul că becul este lansat în acest moment doar în Japonia dezvăluie şi alte motive.

   În Japonia, spaţiile de locuit sunt foarte mici, iar ocuparea acestora cu difuzoare şi alte echipamente voluminoase este evitată. Prin integrarea difuzorului într-un corp de iluminat, poţi rezolva două probleme dintr-o dată, fără să fie necesară instalarea de fire sau boxe prin toată casa.

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   LED Light Bulb Speaker ajunge în magazinele nipone pe data de 23 mai şi este listat pe site-ul oficial al companiei la preţul de 23.880 yeni japonezi, echivalentul a 200 de dolari. Cu un asemenea preţ, este greu de crezut că va avea un succes prea mare în alte regiuni, mai ales în condiţiile în care becurile LED non-smart devin din ce în ce mai accesibile.

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Sony put a Bluetooth speaker in an LED light bulb

   Lights and music are a time-tested combination, and now Sony finally offers them in one product. Sony has just announced the    LED Light Bulb Speaker in Japan, a Bluetooth speaker that screws into a light fitting to give your living space the gift of simultaneous sight and sound.

   You can control the 360-lumen bulb with a smartphone app, of course, allowing for fine control of volume and brightness, and there's also a dedicated remote that can be paired over NFC. In a press release, Sony touts the speaker's compact, attractive design — which personally reminds me of the Harman Kardon SoundSticks subwoofer, though this is presumably somewhat quieter — and says that it lets you play music in places where it's been difficult to put audio equipment before.

   In case you can't quite imagine how this might slot into your life, here are some promo images of people enjoying the light bulb speaker.

   There is a light fitting just above my kitchen sink with this thing's name on it.

   The LED Light Bulb Speaker is out in Japan on May 23rd, and Sony's online store lists it for ¥23,880, or about $199.

sursa: go4it.ro  si theverge.com

Panasonic Viera TV range for 2015: 4K, Netflix, and Firefox OS (eng)

New 4K range features plenty of smarts and Netflix convenience

Panasonic's TV range for 2015 includes 11 4K models and lots of love for Netflix.

Panasonic's 2015 range of LED LCD televisions features over 20 new models that span across eight different series, but four of those series, and indeed 60 per cent of the entire range (11 models), comprises 4K, Ultra High Definition models.

The focus on 4K is not surprising given that the trend in the Australian market is towards bigger TV screens, but the dearth of content in the current climate means that the main selling point of these new TVs is still in the 'smarts'.

Panasonic has used the Firefox OS interface for its new TVs in a bid to make them as easy to use as possible, in particular for the average user who wants to take advantage of online streaming services and multitudes of attached devices.

This interface incorporates what Panasonic calls its 'My Home Screen 2.0', which is the main 'portal' to the TV's graphical interface. It allows for customisations to be made so that the user can put all of their favourite services and inputs in one convenient location. All of these features can be pulled from the different 'decks' in the interface, which are basically different areas of the menu that feature various aspects of the TV's services, such as Live TV, Apps, and Devices.

Firefox OS organises the smart TV's different features in decks. This is the Apps deck.

Favourite features (such as the YouTube app) can be added to the My Home Screen 2.0 for easier access.

The main aim is to let the user switch between any type of content source, be it free-to-air, YouTube, a hard drive, or any other type of input, all from one main screen that contains all of these sources as shortcuts. It ensures that minimal time is spent looking for things in a menu once a user's favourites have been added.

Also immediately noticeable on the new range of 4K TVs is the inclusion of a Netflix button directly on the remote control. This one-button operation to bring up the Netflix app in the swiftest manner possible speaks volumes about the penetration of this service with TV manufacturers and their understanding of the changing viewing habits of most users. Panasonic claims that 72 per cent of viewers are now active viewers who binge watch TV shows.

Netflix can be lauched at the press of a button, directly from the remote control. All of Panasonic's 2015 Viera TVs have this feature on the remote control, except for the C400 series TVs.

That said, free-to-air TV is still a main course for many Aussies, and Panasonic has included versatility to the way it can be watched. Not only can free-to-air TV be streamed to a second device in the home while another channel is being watched, users also don't have to miss out on any live events while they travel.

sursa: pcworld.idg.com.au

Atmos Musings and Shelf Life (eng)

   A bit of an eclectic mix this time around with two topics, the first somewhat controversial, the second a useful (I hope) tip.

   Elsewhere on this site, and in our June Q&A column, we recommended using the same amplifier power for the front, surround and height speakers in an Atmos setup. I don’t entirely agree, though my personal experience with Atmos is limited so far to trade demos and theatrical presentations. Most Atmos-ready AVRs will, of course, have matched power—that’s just the nature of the beasts. But if you have a pre-pro and, say, 200Wpc amps driving the front speakers, do you really need 200Wpc on the other six (for 5.1.4 Atmos) “full range” surround and height channels?

   One consideration here is the sensitivity of the surround and height speakers. If they’re half as sensitive as the fronts (that is, 3dB lower in rated sensitivity) they’ll need twice the power—assuming they’re being driven to the same level. If they’re twice as sensitive (+3dB) they’ll need only half the power. The former is more likely; many (not all) smaller drivers of the sort used for the upward-firing element(s) of Atmos-enabled speakers tend to be quite low in sensitivity. I have yet to see the sensitivity of the upward facing drivers specified separately in such speakers, but if you own Atmos-enabled speakers you can check for this. When you calibrate the channel levels, simply note the difference in settings for the front and upward-facing speakers, assuming the level indicator on your AVR or pre-pro is in decibels rather than some generic number.

   But will you normally drive Atmos’ surround and height speakers as hard as the three fronts? Even if you’ve calibrated them to the same level, as you should, this is unlikely with most program material. Have you ever turned off the main speakers in your home theater and listened to the contribution of the surrounds alone? On films, at least, it’s astonishing how little they contribute, compared to their subjective impact with the entire system operating. Yes, occasionally they’ll speak out more aggressively, but that’s rare.

   It’s a safe bet that the same will apply to the Atmos height channels. Their contribution will be similar in level to the output of the main surround channels. One notable exception could be surround music, where the extra channels are used to put the listener in the middle of the performers, rather than merely providing ambience with the main music-making taking place in front as it would be in a live performance. But even then, if you’re considering Atmos-enabled speakers rather than discrete ceiling speakers, the small, upward firing drivers in these designs are generally bass managed very aggressively, sometimes rolling off as high as 180Hz. With so little bass to handle, this will further reduce the power needed to drive them effectively without clipping the amplifiers.

The power needed for other than the front channels will, therefore, depend on a number of factors. Do you plan on using Atmos-enabled speakers or discrete ceiling speakers? Do you have an AVR with its own amps or a pre-pro with separate amplifiers? And do you plan to listen to lot of surround music with the musicians placed all around you (though I don’t think many sound mixers will position a discrete musician or vocalist on the ceiling, unless the latter has god-complex!)?

   If you already have an Atmos-ready AVR with preamp outputs, and want to increase the power to the front channels, a 5- or 7-channel external amp might be just the ticket to drive the main speakers and surrounds. You could continue to use the AVRs internal amps to drive just the (typically, for home Atmos) four ceiling channels, whether Atmos-enabled or discrete. You could even go with a 3-channel external amp (though these are less common) for the fronts and use the AVR’s amps for both the conventional surrounds and the Atmos height speakers. If you already have a smaller external amp and a surround pre-pro rather than an AVR, you could move that amp to drive the Atmos channels and add a new, more powerful amplifier for the main speakers.

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New Use for a 2x4
   When I lived in California I was five minutes from the nearest IKEA and purchased five IKEA bookcases to hold not only books but also most of my collection of CDs and videos. I disassembled them for the move, and reassembled them in my new home. That’s not an exercise I’d recommend to anyone, but it did save a bundle on new bookcases, not to mention that the nearest IKEA is now hundreds of miles away. Now they’re filled mostly with videos, with only a few shelves dedicated to CDs and books. (More bookcases will be needed to house the rest of my collection!)

   The only issue with this is that video and CD cases are relatively shallow and the bookcases are 9-inches deep. This isn’t an issue at eye-level, but the deep setback makes searching the lower shelves a nuisance. My solution was to cut 2x4s to the width of the shelves. I bought ten such 2x4s; my friendly neighborhood Home Depot did the cutting. That gave me forty 22-inch wide 2x4s. So for an investment of just under $40 I can use them behind the videos, CDs, and books in a number of ways, moving the contents either 1.5-inches or 3.5-inches closer to the front of the shelf. By using two of the spacers, one flat, the other on its side, I can also move the contents almost flush to the front of the bookcase for a far better view of the titles on those low shelves.

If those measurements puzzle you, it's because modern 2x4s are actually 1.5 x 3.5-inches. I bought premium ones that cost an extra buck or so each; you can’t see them, but you’ll know they’re there and you can tell your audio friends that they sound better!!!

   An additional possible benefit to this arrangement is that varying the depth on different shelves might offer some useful diffusion on the wall behind the seating position where the bookshelves are located. I haven’t yet evaluated this, however, and an AB test will be impossible. (Listen, remove contents of shelves, change spacers, reload, listen again!)

sursa: soundandvision.com