audio

LAS VEGAS--Bluetooth speakers are taking over CES 2013, but the vast majority of them are cheap, small, and seemingly indistinguishable.

Polk Audio's new Woodbourne is on the other end of the spectrum, with a stylish retro-looking design that's made to be the centerpiece of a room. The Woodbourne's mahogany wood veneer top gives it a furniture-like feel, not to mention its sizable footprint: 24 inches wide, 7 inches tall, 6.88 inches deep, and 17.5 pounds. Most Bluetooth speakers focus on portability, but the Woodbourne is meant to be placed in a room and never moved.… Read more

LAS VEGAS--A monitor's picture quality is its most important attribute, and sound quality (if it actually does sport speakers) rarely factors into the overall rating. That however may change once I get my hands on the HP Envy 27-inch IPS monitor with Beats Audio.

With the Envy 27-inch IPS monitor with Beats Audio, HP not only breaks the record for longest monitor name ever (to be honest, I didn't confirm that), but according to HP, it also marks the first time a standalone monitor has used Beats Audio.

The monitor's built-in speakers are angled upward and according … Read more

LAS VEGAS--One of the most irritating things about earbuds is their tendency to tangle. Fortunately, CordCruncher offers a solution that keeps its cords from getting all knotted up.

Initially a venture on Kickstarter, CordCruncher reached its funding goal in April 2012.

This year marks the first time at CES that the 'buds were displayed in its original and new packaging.

The earbuds are made out of latex and elongate up to 3.5 feet when you pull out the inner cord.

Once you're finished using them, simply stretch the thicker cord that envelops the outside until it meets with … Read more

LAS VEGAS--At CES Unveiled today, the Canadian audio company, Matrix Audio, demoed its newest (and smallest) member of its family of portable speakers.

Known as Qube, the $49.99 speaker measures 1.5 by 1.5 inches and is about the size of a golf ball. It connects to devices through an auxiliary cord that plugs into any 3.5mm headphone jack.

With its aluminum finish and polished colors, Qube sports an attractively compact design. Currently, it comes in black, silver, and red, but will come in three more pastel colors at the end of February.

The speaker will be … Read more

Samsung just couldn't wait to tease the upgrades of several products, releasing the news even before their big press event tomorrow.

These include some common sense upgrades for products, like an NFC pairing for Bluetooth streaming for its portable speakers, and the addition of a content recommendation engine on its BD-F7500 flagship Blu-ray player.

Another notable upgrade is the inclusion of vacuum tubes for its 2012 audio products. While the tubes look really cool, the sound quality improvement is questionable. The upgrade is for Samsung's HT-F9750 HTIB, as well as for the HW-F750.

LAS VEGAS--Portable speakers are one of the simplest ways to amplify your tunes, but there are a surprising number of different standards for a simple product type, among Bluetooth, DLNA, NFC, and AirPlay. There's one easy way around the problem: support them all.

LG is debuting six portable and docking speakers at CES 2013, offering a wide range of compatibility with different wireless audio standards. The high-end ND8630 dock supports nearly everything: AirPlay, DLNA, NFC, Blueooth, dual dock (for Lightning-equipped iOS devices and some Android devices), and a minijack input. The battery-powered NP6630 is nearly as well-equipped, except it … Read more

LAS VEGAS--You can get Netflix on your TV, gaming console, Blu-ray player, smartphone, laptop, tablet, AV receiver, and now, finally, you can get Netflix in a sound bar, too.

LG is rolling out four new sound bars at CES 2013, including the NB3730A, which has built-in Wi-Fi and a limited suite of streaming-media services including Netflix, YouTube, Amazon, Hulu Plus, Vudu, and Pandora. That's the first sound bar I've seen with streaming-media capabilities, but I'd be surprised if people were willing to pay much extra for the functionality, especially with the superior Roku LT available for just $… Read more

Alex Chorine built his very first amplifier when he was 15, and one amp led to the next. He kept building amps for friends and friends of friends. This was in the Soviet Union, where there was no established high-end audio industry. Chorine went on to earn an electrical engineering degree from the Moscow Institute of Technology, and started working with TVs, but audio was his passion. He took on side projects building guitar and bass amplifiers and pro sound systems. He modified European VCRs to work with Russian TVs. He came to the U.S. in 1992, and a … Read more

Samsung's obsession with tubes started with last year's CES darling, the DA-E750, and now the company is adding vacuum tube amplifiers to home theater systems and even sound bars.

The newly announced Samsung HW-F750 is dubbed the "world's first sound bar with a vacuum tube amp," which is technically true: like last year's models, it has a tube preamplifier paired with a digital amplifier. In any event, the difference is largely academic, as I didn't find that the DA-E750's tubes added a distinctively analog sound, although it was a good-sounding tabletop system.… Read more