Feature News Stories (662 Posts)

Saving Audiophila: How To Get a Young, New Generation of Audio Enthusiasts Hooked

The heyday of audio equipment came in the 1960s and 70s. Now, with the economy faltering, the industry has to find a way to get a new generation hooked on top of the line audio equipment. Continue Reading

Home Theater Enthusiasts Can Take Control of Their Credit Cards As Banks Act Poorly

HomeTheaterReview.com tells you how you can continue to purchase the specialty audio and video equipment that quickens your heartbeat and causes you to strategize financially, without falling prey to horrendous credit card interest rates. Continue Reading

Nowhere To Sell: Specialty AV Makers Look For New Channels To Sell Their Goods

Like most American businesses, the specialty audio/video trade has gone through quite a roller-coaster ride over the last several years. Once tried and true customer-attracting techniques need to be changed to accommodate different times and new clients. Continue Reading

Hollywood Sets New Trend: Recycle Your Home Theater (LA Style)

West Los Angeles has begun a new initiative in trying to live an uber-healty lifestyle: the recycling of old electronics in an easy way for consumers to adhere to and want to put into practice. Continue Reading

Telarc Records To Stop Producing Its Own Records - Firing 26

In another sad sign of the times, the Grammy-winning, Cleveland, Ohio-based audiophile company Telarc Records has announced that it will no longer produce its own albums on its label. The company president has resigned from his position. Continue Reading

Last Chance at Circuit Liquidation Sale is This Sunday

Great American has pulled the plug on the Circuit City chain a week earlier than expected. One possible reason is that the going-out-of-business sale in the stores has caused such a rush of purchasing that there isn't a whole lot left for bargain hunters to buy. Continue Reading

Spinal Tap To Tour In 2009

Turn your amps up to 11 because Spinal Tap has just announced they will be touring in 2009. The faux heavy metal band created by director Rob Reiner for his film, "This is Spinal Tap" will be on their "Unwigged and Unplugged Tour". Harry Shearer, aka bassist Derrick Smalls, will lead the group on the tour. Continue Reading

Dish Network Loses Over 100,000 Subscribers In Q4 2008 - More Expected

Echostar's Dish Network is in a little trouble. The satellite provider lost over 100,000 subscribers in the forth quarter of 2008. This news comes as Dish Network is about to end its relationship with AT&T Continue Reading

Sherwood's New $439 Bluetooth AV Receiver - Can It Do It All?

The latest A/V receiver from Sherwood America, the RD-7503, offers high performance at a suggested retail price of just $439. The RD-7503 is a 100-watt x7 receiver which includes Bluetooth audio streaming, HDMI 1.3 audio repeater capability and lossless audio decoding Continue Reading

NHT Goes "Dark" In Bad Economy

Now Hear This, aka NHT, is a speaker company with an interesting way to get around tough financial times. NHT isn't filing for bankruptcy or going out of business. Instead, the firm plans to sell its current inventory and then simply take a break for awhile. Continue Reading

Apple's 2009 iLife Will Teach People How To Play a Musical Instrument

The latest thing you can do with an Apple product? Learn how to play a musical instrument. Steve Jobs and company's new Apple iLife 2009 can be used to learn to play the instrument of your choice. iLife 2009 also features nine tutorials from famous rock stars like Sting, John Fogerty and Sarah MacLachlan. Continue Reading

Vizio Now Number 2 Flat HDTV Seller in America - Samsung Is Tops

Look out, Samsung. The breath you feel on the back of your neck comes from Vizio, who has just passed Sony to become the second largest HDTV seller in the United States with a 14.3 percent market share. Samsung currently leads the market with a 20.2 percent share. Continue Reading

Specialty AV Brands Look To Dealers To "Push" Their Products Over Creating New Consumer Demand

If you are a manufacturer of specialty audio/video products, you want to retailers carrying your products to do something more aggressive about moving the merchandise than just directing customers to the right aisle and swiping the occasional credit card. Continue Reading

DirecTV Investor Lends Over $500,000,000 To Sirius XM (SIRI)

The company behind much of the backing of DirecTV has come to the rescue of struggling satellite radio provider, XM Sirius. Draws like Howard Stern and to a lesser extent Oprah Winfrey and Martha Stewart have helped the network but its not out of Continue Reading

Are Blu-ray's Days Numbered? The Half Life of AV Disc Theory

HomeTheaterReview.com's publisher/editor Jerry Del Colliano muses about the longevity (or lack thereof) of various audio/video formats, including the current HD champ Blu-ray, and how and why the companies change their offerings for the consumer. Continue Reading

Pioneer To Leave The HDTV Business - Slashing 10k Jobs

It's with a heavy heart that we report that Pioneer plans to stop producing HDTVs in 2010. The company's KURO line of plasma HDTVs has been almost universally hailed as the best panels money can buy, but that alone could not ease the company's economic woes. Continue Reading

Is Dish Network Looking To Get More HD Bandwidth By Buying Sirius XM?

Okay, we know that one of satellite provider DirecTV's top investors has loaned $500,000 U.S. to Sirius XM Radio. Now we can begin speculating about whether DirecTV will benefit from this development, and if so, what's there for DirecTV at the end of this rainbow? Continue Reading

Elevator Music Kings Muzak File For Chapter 11

Muzak is one of those brands like Xerox or Scotch tape - people use the name to describe a whole genre, whether it's really that specific item or not. Muzak is the generally cutesy-fied version of music that seemed to forever be playing in elevators and supermarkets. Continue Reading

Sirius XM In Fear Of Takeover From EchoStar (Dish Network)?

Once upon a time - okay, back in 2008 - two satellite radio providers, Sirius and XM, got hitched at the behest of Sirius CEO Mel Karamzin. Now it seems that the radio marriage may include a cable TV partner, namely Echostar's Dish Network. Continue Reading

Sunday's Super Bowl Was 2nd Biggest TV Broadcast of All-Time

Never mind all that fretting over shrinking television audiences. The Nielsen ratings show that the Sunday Super Bowl football game, with the Arizona Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Steelers facing each other on the gridiron, got the second biggest viewing figures in history. Continue Reading