now available on newsstands

Issue 126, December 2007 of Widescreen Review:• 2007 Holiday Gift Guide

• “Toshiba 52LX177 1080p REGZA™ LCD” By Danny Richelieu

• “IsoTek Systems Power Conditioners” By Doug Blackburn

• “ADA PTM-8150 Amplifier” By Danny Richelieu

• “DISH Network ViP 722 HDTV DVR” By Charles Wood

• “Audience aR1p Power Conditioner” By Doug Blackburn

• “Digital Performance Testing Raises The Bar For HDMI™” By Jeffrey Boccaccio

• “The Hijacking Of HDTV” By Charles Wood

• Over 40 Blu-ray Disc, HD DVD, and DVD picture and sound quality reviews

• And more...

Wow, November already. Where did the year go? Now that it’s dark earlier and much cooler in most parts of the country (itstill feels like the middle of summer here in Southern California), many of you will be spending more and more time indoors.So, why not kick back and....read a magazine! It’s that time of year when Widescreen Review offers their special Holiday sub-scription rate, and you don’t want to miss out. Subscriptions are now available for U.S. Residents for only $20 for 12 issuesand $30 for 24 issues. Canada and Mexico readers can get their subscriptions for $25 for 12 issues and $40 for 24 issues,and our other international friends can get their copies for $45 for 12 issues and $85 for 24. These prices are much lower thanour regular rates and are good for new subscriptions and renewals. If it’s not time for you to renew yet, don’t worry, we will justadd the extra issues to whenever your subscription is due to expire.

In the meantime, please enjoy this month’s online Newsletter. I think you’ll find the archived On Screen interview withMichael Green and Bob Hodas, Wizards of Room Tuning, to be informative and valuable. And don’t forget to sign up for thehuge DVD giveaway on page 8!

2 Recent News

3 The Studio Scoop: Rumors, Reports, & RamblingsBy Stacey Pendry

7 New Equipment: Coming Soon To A Retailer Near YouBy Danny Richelieu

9 From The Archives: Michael Green And Bob Hodas—Wizards Of Room Tuning, Part IBy Gary Reber

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November 2007 • Volume 2, Issue 18 • The Official FREE Newsletter Of Widescreen Review Magazine

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Recent News

Industry View

Here are some of the recent headlines that have made it to the News section of WidescreenReview.com,which is now updated daily as our Web staff finds worthy home theatre-related stories and press releases. VisitWidescreenReview.com throughout the day to find out what’s going on in the world of Home Theatre.

Toshiba Sells 90,000 Units Of HD-A2 HD DVD Players Last Weekend(Tech Whack)

“Toshiba’s low cost HD DVD player HD-A2 was being offered at aprice of USD 99 at some of the largest retailing stores in the US mar-ket last weekend.

This sale was huge as the company managed to sell as many as90,000 units from Friday to Sunday...”

Philips Hints At Selling MoreStake In LCD Joint Venture(Korea Times)

Dutch electronics giant Philips may sell more of its stake inLG.Philips LCD (LPL), a joint venture LCD maker, as the companyseeks to strengthen its presence in the smaller home appliances mar-ket centered around the lucrative healthcare and lifestyle sectors.

‘For now, we don’t have detailed plans to reinforce the TV busi-ness,’ Kim Tae-young, CEO of Philips Electronics Korea, said in ameeting with reporters in central Seoul, Thursday...”

Sony CEO Sees 'Stalemate' In DiscFight (Associated Press)

“The head of Sony Corp., Howard Stringer, said Thursday that theBlu-ray disc format the company has developed as the successor tothe DVD is in a ‘stalemate’ with the competing HD DVD format, chieflybacked by Toshiba Corp. and Microsoft Corp.

‘It’s a difficult fight,’ said Stringer, speaking at the 92nd Street Y cul-tural center in Manhattan...”

Da-Lite Adds High Contrast MatteWhite Surface To Picture King®

“Da-Lite Screen Company is pleased to announce the addition ofthe High Contrast Matte White Screen surface to the Picture King® tri-pod screen line. The High Contrast Matte White surface provides again of 1.1 and a 50° viewing angle with the ability to clean the surfacewhen needed...”

Image Entertainment And TheCriterion Collection Sign NewMulti Year Agreement

“Image Entertainment, Inc. today announced the signing of a newexclusive home video distribution agreement for North America with theCriterion Collection, extending the term through July 31, 2013. Thisagreement replaces the existing exclusive distribution agreementdated August 1, 2005.”

WHV Inks Deal With ParamountAnd DWA To Fight Piracy In China

“At a press conference on November 7 in Beijing Warner HomeVideo (WHV) announced it has signed an agreement with Paramountand DreamWorks Animation to distribute DVDs in China. WHV willleverage its distribution infrastructure and expertise to provide highquality, studio-authorized copies of these blockbuster films on DVD.”

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Paramount/DreamworksLovely Bones

Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, andSusan Sarandon star in this upcomingdrama, which began filming in Wellington,New Zealand in October 2007. The exactrelease date has yet to be announced, butis slated to hit the big screen sometime in2008.

Adapted from the Alice Sebold novel,and produced and directed by PeterJackson, this film is about a young girl whois brutally raped and murdered. Now inheaven, she watches the effect her deathhas on her family, especially her father, ashe becomes obsessed with vengenace,which slowly creates a rift between hus-band and wife.

Love GuruThis comedy began filming this past

September in Toronto, Canada with a tenta-tive release date of June 2008.

Written by and starring Mike Myers asPitka, he plays the part of an American boyraised outside of the U.S. by gurus. Hereturns to his country of birth to break intothe self-help market. Pitka’s first challengeis to settle romantic troubles and perform-ance issues of a star hockey player whosewife has recently left him.

In addition to Myers, the all-star castincludes Ben Kingsley, Jessica Alba, JustinTimberlake, Vern Troyer, and RomanyMalco.

The DuchessSome of Britain’s finest thespians star in

this upcoming drama about the life of an18th Century aristocrat, Georgina, TheDuchess of Devonshire, who is an ancestorof Princess Diana. The Duchess was cele-brated and reviled for her extravagantlifestyle and political views.

This project began filming in Bath,Somerset England on September 17, 2007,with no firm release date yet announced.Directed by Saul Dibb and based on theAmanda Foreman novel, this project starsthe lovely Kiera Knightley as the Duchessand the dashing Ralph Fiennes as the Dukeof Devonshire.

Stacey Pendry

There was very little in the way of newand creative flicks to draw audiences intothe cinema this year. It is no wonder thatsales/rentals of DVDs are down consider-ably from previous years. It would take avery strong fourth quarter to break evenwith 2006’s total takings.

With this in mind, I am casting my atten-tion to the future and highlighting someprojects currently in production. It is my sin-cere intention to provide our readers with aglimmer of hope for the coming year.PS...all information below is current at thistime, but is subject to change.

Disney/Buena VistaOld Dogs

Currently filming in Bridgeport, CT, thiscomedy stars John Travolta, RobinWilliams, Seth Green, Matt Dillon, KellyPreston, and the A-list goes on and on!

John Travolta will be reunited withDirector Walt Becker (Wild Hogs) in thisproject.

A basic outline of the plot is: two friendsand business partners have their livesturned upside-down when they becomeplaced in the care of seven-year-old twins.

The Chronicles Of Narnia: Prince CaspianIn production since February of this year,

this sequel to The Lion, The Witch And TheWardrobe is due to be released in May2008. It sees the Pevensie siblings returnto Narnia, and they are enlisted once againto help ward off an evil king. The castincludes Liam Neeson, Ben Barnes,Warwick Davis, William Moseley, AnnaPopplewell, Skandar Keynes, and PeterDinklage.

Wall-EPixar’s newest in-the-works project is set

in the year 2700. Wall-E is a robot whospends every day, day in and day out forthe past 700 years, doing what he was pro-grammed to do. But he soon discovers hewas meant for much more. Voice talents inthis film include Fred Willard, Jeff Garlin,and Ben Burtt.

Warner Bros.The Dark Knight

Filming since mid-April 2007 at locationsin London, England this action flick pairsBatman with James Gordon. The two joinforces with Gotham’s new District Attorney,Harvey Dent, to thwart a deadly bank rob-ber known as The Joker. Due to bereleased in July 2008, this flick starsChristian Bale, Heath Ledger, MaggieGyllenhaal, Gary Oldman, and MorganFreeman in its all-star cast.

WatchmenThis DC Comics production began film-

ing in Vancouver, Canada this pastSeptember. Starring Patrick Wilson, MalinAkerman, Billy Crudup, Jeffrey DeanMorgan, Jackie Earle Haley, and MatthewGoode, the release date is still up in the air.

Briefly, an ex-superhero is murderedprompting a vigilante named Rorshach tobegin an investigation into the murder. Hesoon finds that there may be a more terrify-ing conclusion to his investigation than justmurder.

Yes ManStarring Jim Carrey and Zooey

Deschanel, this comedy is about a guy whochallenges himself to say ‘yes’ to every-thing...for an entire year. David Isersonpenned the screenplay, which began film-ing in October 2007.

Harry Potter And The Half-Blood PrinceThe gang at Hogwarts is back in this

adaptation of J.K. Rowling’s wildly popularnovel series. Due to be released over the2008 Thanksgiving Holiday, the sixth install-ment in the franchise sees the return of allthe principle cast members: DanielRadcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, TomFelton, and Jim Broadbent. And in thisinstallment, beloved Harry learns moreabout Lord Voldemort’s dark past when hediscovers a book marked mysteriously“This book is the property of the Half-BloodPrince.”

I Want ToKnow

The Studio ScoopRumors, Reports, & Ramblings




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Tim Roth, and William Hurt in the key roles. The Hulk is still searching for a cure to

the condition that turns him into an enor-mous green monster when angered. Thesequel finds Bruce Banner, a.k.a The Hulk,hiding out in Siberia, when he is capturedby the Russian government. He eventuallyescapes, but not before the evil regime col-lects enough of his DNA to create a mon-ster of their own. The monster, known asthe “Abomination,” is sent to retrieve TheHulk in hopes of returning him to his previ-ous captors.

The ChangelingClint Eastwood directs this upcoming

mystery, with J. Michael Straczynski pen-ning the screenplay, about a mother’sprayer for her kidnapped son to bereturned home is answered. It soonbecomes evident to the mother that thepolice have given her a child that is nothers. The mother must then confront thecorruption in the Los Angeles PoliceDepartment. The story is based uponevents in the 1920s in Los Angeles.

Starring Angelina Jolie, Amy Ryan, andJohn Malkovich, this film began productionin October with a tentative release date ofNovember 2008.

Hellboy 2: The Golden ArmyThis sequel to the 2004 Columbia-Tristar

Hellboy began filming this past June inBudapest, Hungary, with a tentative releasedate of July 2008. Universal purchased thefranchise, after Sony put the rights up forsale, believing it to be an unprofitable ven-ture.

Ron Perlman reprises his role as Hellboy,and stars alongside John Hurt, Selma Blair,Doug Jones, and Jeffrey Tambor in this fan-tasy adventure.

It is up to Hellboy and his friends to saveEarth from creatures in the mythical world,who have started a rebellion againsthumanity.

Sony/ColumbiaHancock

Filming of this fantasy action adventurebegan in Los Angeles in May of this yearand is due to be released in July 2008.

The plot revolves around a hard-livingsuperhero who enters into a relationshipwith the wife of a public relations profes-sional hired to repair the superhero’s flag-ging image. The cast includes Hollywoodheavy-hitters Will Smith, Charlize Theron,and Jason Bateman.

You Don’t Mess With ZohanWritten by Judd Apatow, the hilarious

mind behind The 40 Year Old Virgin and

Knocked Up, this comedy stars real-lifepals Adam Sandler and Rob Schneider.Filming began this year in New York Cityand is due in theatres in June 2008.

A brief synopsis of the plot is a MossadAgent (The Israeli government’s IntelligenceAgency) fakes his own death so he can re-emerge as a hairdresser in New York City.

Step BrothersIn another Apatow Production currently

filming in Los Angeles and due out in July2008, two spoiled guys become competi-tive stepbrothers when their single parentsmarry one another. This film is set to starWill Ferrell, John C. Reilly, MarySteenburgen, and Adam Scott.

This project is being directed by AdamMcKay and was co-written by Apatow andFerrell.

MGMManagement

In this project, which is currently filmingand due out in September 2008, America’sgirl-next-door, Jennifer Aniston, is back toher romantic comedy roots. She plays atraveling art saleswoman who is plaguedby a motel manger (played by Steve Zahn),who has fallen for her and will not leave heralone.

Written by Stephen Belber, not muchinformation is available regarding the otherkey role holders in this film.

The ReaderThis film is set in post-war Germany

where a young man’s decades-long obses-sion with an older woman runs headlonginto a war crimes trial, where he learns anawful truth.

In production since October of this year,the film is slated for release in December2008. Starring in this romantic drama isNicole Kidman, Ralph Fiennes, BrunoGanz, Karoline Herfurth, and Volker Bruch.

Dead Like MeIn this big screen adaptation of

Showtime’s hit series of the same name,Rube Sofer departs and a new head grimreaper named Cameron Kane takes over.The new boss is a slick businessman whocouldn’t care less about helping the newlydead, as his predecessor had previouslydone. George and Reggie reconnect whenGeorge is sent to reap a friend of Reggie.Daisy and Mason, not happy with the cur-rent management, begin to drink heavily,again. This project is currently filming inMontreal, Canada and was to be releasedlate this year, however I have not been ableto uncover a more accurate release date.

Directed by Stephen Herek and written

The Studio Scoop

Paramount/DreamworksIndiana Jones And The Kingdom Of TheCrystal Skull

Steven Spielberg is back at the helm ofthe next installment of the Indiana Jonesfranchise. Starring Harrison Ford, ShiaLaBeouf, Cate Blanchett, the dreamy RayWinstone, Jim Broadbent, and John Hurt.This chapter of I.J. began filming atUniversal Studios, Los Angeles in June ofthis year with a tentative release date of May22, 2008. The screenplay was written byDavid Koepp with the story written by thealmighty George Lucas. It was widely specu-lated that this fourth installment in the adven-ture series was to rely heavily on computer-generated effects (C.G.). But the productioncrew has stated that it will be filmed in muchthe same way as the previous Indiana Jonesfilms were, using stunt men in place of C.G.

Tropic ThunderIn this Dreamworks comedy, a series of

freak events force the actors of a big-budgetwar film to become the soldiers they are por-traying.

Starring Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr.,Jack Black, Nick Nolte, MatthewMcConaughey, and sadly missing previousstar, Owen Wilson (who dropped out of thefilm while recovering from a reported suicideattempt), this flick began filming in Hawaiithis past July and is due to be released July2008.

Madagascar: The Crate EscapeThis sequel to the Dreamworks animated

hit, finds the New York Zoo animals stillstranded on the African island ofMadagascar. Alex the Zebra, Melman theGiraffe, and Gloria the Hippo make their wayto the wilderness of the African mainland.There Alex meets his long-lost family, butfinds communication difficult after spendingso many years in the New York Zoo.

Directed by Eric Darnell and Tom McGrathand featuring the voice talents of Ben Stiller(when does this guy sleep?), DavidSchwimmer, Jada Pinkett Smith, Chris Rock,Cedric the Entertainer, and Andy Richter, thisanimated franchise began production in June2006 and is tentatively slated for release inNovember 2008.

UniversalThe Incredible Hulk A.K.A Hulk 2

This sequel to the 2003 Hulk began filmingin August of this year with a reported releasedate of June 2008. Directed by LouisLeterrier and written by Jack Kirby, this latestinstallment in the Marvel Enterprises series,boasts an entirely fresh creative staff, due tothe disappointing performance of the firstHulk film. Starring Edward Norton, Liv Tyler,




debauchery in Sin City. One of the newly-weds wins a huge jackpot after playing theother’s quarter in a slot machine. Theunhappily married pair then set out toundermine one another in order to get theirhands on the winnings. Also starring isQueen Latifah, Michelle Krusiec, Lake Bell,and Krysten Ritter.

Directed by Tom Vaughan and written byDana Fox, this film is currently being filmedand is due to be released to the cinemas atthe end of June 2008.

Space ChimpsCurrently filming and due to be released

in May 2008, this Vanguard Animation proj-ect features the voice talents of KristinChenoweth, Patrick Warburton, StanleyTucci, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Daniels, and AndySamberg, and is directed by Kirk DeMicco, who also shares writing credits withSimon Goltsman, David Goetsch, andJason and Ross Venolur. The music is setto be created by The Blue Man Group.

The plot features Hamm III (Samburg),the grandson of the first chimp astronaut,who is blasted into space by an unscrupu-lous Senator (Tucci). The fun-loving chimp

must soon get serious and tackle the mis-sion at hand—to rid a distant planet of itsevil leader (Daniels). With the help of histwo simian colleagues (Hines andWarburton) he tackles the challenge inearnest.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about the2008 upcoming movies in this month’snewsletter (which will inevitably make it toyour home theatre). With a little luck and alot of creativity, perhaps 2008 will outshinethis year in film releases....fingers crossed!

by Stephen Gadchaux and John Masius,the film stars Ellen Muth as George, HenryIan Cuscik as Cameron Kane, Callum Blusas Mason, and Sarah Wynter as Daisy.

20th Century FoxAvatar

Now filming in Hawaii and due to bereleased to the big screen in May 2009, thissci-fi adventure stars Michelle Rodriguez(the former Lost star currently on probationfor drunk driving), Zoe Saldana, SigourneyWeaver, and Giovanni Ribisi.

In this film, a group of humans are pittedagainst the indigenous aliens of a distantplanet. Nothing new there, but JamesCameron is directing this film (a.k.a Project880),which was developed as a parallelproject to his other endeavour, Battle Angel.Both films will use the same digital 3-Dcamera system developed by Vince Paceand virtual production studio developed byRobert Legato.

What Happens In Vegas...This rom-com stars Cameron Diaz and

Ashton Kutcher as two people who findthemselves married after a night of drunken

The Studio Scoop


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JVC reaches new heights with the HD-100 Projector, featuring the World’s Highest NativeContrast Ratio, an astounding 30,000:1. With the HD-100, you can count on brighter whites,velvety blacks and clarity beyond compare. And because it’s 2.35:1* Cinemascope capable,your entertainment is larger than life. Which should make your life more entertaining.

Put it all in focus at tv.jvc.com

*A separate lens adaptor which is not included is required for 2.35:1 playback.

Focus on: my pursuit of perfection


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Phoenix Gold® introducedtheir Super Bessel ArrayIHI100 in-wall loudspeakersystem recently. Featuring six76-millimeter midwoofers,able to move effectively thesame amount of air as a sin-gle 8-inch driver, and a 1-inchsilk dome tweeter, the loud-speaker has a frequencyresponse of 75 Hz to 20 kHz.Selling for $250 and available January 2008, the IHI100 has apower handling rating from 15 to 150 watts and has a nominalimpedance of 6 ohms.

Danny Richelieu

SIM2 recently introduced theirnewest DLP®-based 1080p projector,the C3X 1080, one of the first to uti-lize Texas Instruments’ latestDarkChip™ 4 DMD. The three-chip,17-inch-square, 22-pound projectorfeatures a high-gloss, sculpted cabi-net and all-new, all-glass optics withSIM2’s proprietary ALPHAPATH™ light

engine incorporated into the design.The projector is said to have a

10,000:1 contrast ratio and incorporates 10-bit video processingand a newly developed, more advanced color management system.The C3X 1080 includes two HDMI with HDCP inputs and its RS-232and USB ports allow for increased flexibility with control andfirmware updates. Four color options are available (gunmetal, black,red, and gold), and it is selling for $30,000.

JL Audio began shipping their Gothampowered subwoofer, featuring two of their13.5-inch woofer drivers, which boast a 4-inch peak-to-peak excursion envelope andhave been optimized specifically for theGotham. The subwoofer includes a built-in3800-watt switching amplifier. Each cabinetrequires one full month to fabricate frombeginning to end, constructed entirely out offiberglass with extensive internal bracingand a wall thickness exceeding 1.1 inchesthroughout. A full suite of signal-process-ing features is built into the subwoofer,including variable slope and frequency forthe low-pass filter, an ELF (Extreme Low-Frequency) trim control,and ARO automatic room equalization. The 34-inch high subwooferweighs 360 pounds and is selling for $11,000.

JL Audio Gotham

SIM2 954 442 2999 www.sim2usa.com

Meridian, in conjunction with Ferrari(yeah, that Ferrari), has introduced theF80 desktop audio system. The F80includes internal AM/FM tuners, a CDplayer (with “more than a strong hint ofMeridian’s top ‘hi-fi reference’ productsinside”) and the capability to playbackDVD-Video discs. Using three power

amplifiers to deliver a total of over 80watts to the two front loudspeakers and

integrated rear subwoofer. The loudspeakers themselves are a sin-gle full-range driver, using a neodymium magnet and magnesiumand aluminum alloy cone. The F80 is supported by a solid die-castmetal base and each loudspeaker is housed in its own separateenclosure created from an alloy-injected composite, a material thatwas brought on by the partnership with Ferrari. The F80 will be sell-ing for $3,000 and is available in five official Ferrari colors.

Meridian F80

Meridian 404 344 7111 www.meridian-audio.com

SIM2 C3X 1080

Coming Soon…To A Retailer Near You

NEW Equipment

LG Electronics unveiled its second-generation Super Blu™ Blu-ray Disc andHD DVD combination player, theBH200 ($1,000). Unlike the first-gener-ation player, the BH200 fully supportsthe HD DVD specification, including

HDi interactivity, and is also compatiblewith Blu-ray Disc’s Profile 2.0, otherwise

known as BD-Live. Picture-in-picture compatibility is available forBlu-ray Disc and HD DVD titles that feature the advanced interactivi-ty, and the HDMI v1.3-compatible player can deliver 1080p24/30/60.The player features QDEO™ video processing for scaling standard-definition DVDs up to 1080p.

LG BH200

Definitive Technology 800 228 7148 www.definitivetech.com

LG Electronics 800 243 0000 www.lgusa.com

Definitive Technology introduced thenewest addition to their Mythos line—theMythos Ten ($900). The wall-mountable

loudspeaker can be positioned either hori-zontally or vertically to be used as a left-,center-, or right-channel, and is tuned to

match the Mythose SuperTowers as a dedicated center channel.Employing two racetrack-shaped 5-inch by 8-inch drivers, two 5.25-inch midrange drivers, and a pure aluminum dome tweeter, the 93dB per watt per meter loudspeaker has a frequency response from31 Hz to 30 kHz (±3 dB) and can handle from 10 to 300 watts ofpower.

Phoenix Gold 503 978 3321 www.rodinaudio.com

JL Audio 954 443 1100 www.jlaudio.com

Definitive Technology Mythos Ten

New Video

Phoenix Gold IHI100

New Electronics

New Loudspeakers




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Create A ControlledAcoustic Environment

Gary Reber, Widescreen Review:We’restarting the conversation while we open thefirst group of boxes containing the ClampRacks.

Michael Green, RoomTunes/MichaelGreen Designs: Yes.

Reber: Michael, how are your ClampRacks designed? What are the benefits ofyour rack designs?

Green: These are actually Deluxe JustaRacks, which can double for a ClampRackif you decide to do top and bottom clamp-ing on the components. These are the firstmechanical grounding racks that have everbeen made. What they allow you to do isadjust the vibrating energy from each ofyour components. Every part on the circuitboard vibrates and has its own little signa-ture. That signature changes depending onwhat else is vibrating around it.

What this rack allows you to do is devel-op a vibration synergism between your dif-ferent components and even the room itselfby “tuning” the components. As you tight-en the shelves on the rack, it takes energyfrom the components, sends it into the rack,then down the rods and into the mechanicalgrounding devices at the bottom, the bot-tom cones, which then transmit the energyinto the floor. If you want the sound, or the pic-

Michael Green And Bob HodasWizards Of Room Tuning

In this edition of On Screen we explore the controlled acoustic approach to home theatre surround sound. Can the videophileand audiophile be considered separately in the context of a home theatre experience? I think not. Both the videophile’s goal ofrealistic reproduction of the theatrical experience in the home and the audiophile’s goal of the recreation of the concert or record-ing venue experience are mutually supportive in a home theatre music system optimally setup to maximize spaciousness andscale. The primary raison d’etre of the theatre or concert hall is not spaciousness in and of itself, but rather the ability to containa sizeable audience. The large number of seating positions inevitable results in a whole range of better and worse seats acous-tically and visually. With the typical home audience consisting of just one, two or a few people (on occasion), the optimization ofthe reproduction of the soundtrack for all or most of the likely seating positions is well within reach.

Michael Green and Bob Hodas, who spent time with us at our home re-setting-up our reference systems, approach surroundsound set-up with the idea that when you listen to a sound system you are listening to the room as much as the system. If youaccept this premise an understanding of the way a room works acoustically will provide great insight into appropriate systemset-up. The result of treating your room in the way prescribed is to substantially eliminate the boundaries of the room acoustically,thus allowing for a sense of stage width, depth and height extending beyond the physical boundaries of the room.

Editor Gary Reber talks with both Michael Green and Bob Hodas during the two day period the three spent together creatinga controlled acoustic environment in the living room of the home which serves as Widescreen Review’s reference system facilities.Michael Green is the President of Michael Green Designs and RoomTune who design and manufacture acoustical and tunableaudio products distributed by Ultra Systems (800 724 3305). Bob Hodas has made excellence in audio a primary goal from his earlywork with The Doobie Brothers, through the recent remix of Aladdin for Walt Disney’s World On Ice, and has recorded a number ofrecords for the Windham Hill and Hearts Of Space labels. He has consulted on the development of many successful products withmanufacturers such as Dolby Laboratories and Monster Cable®. As a contributing editor for Recording Engineer/Producer and Mixmagazines he has written articles sharing knowledge that contributes to the advancement of audio quality. He tunes more than 200recording studios on a regular basis. Mr. Hodas can be reached at 510 649 9254 in Northern California.—Gary Reber, Editor �

Michael GreenPresident, Michael Green Designs/RoomTune

FROM The Archives




hobby is that nobody really agrees on whatis correct.

Reber: And that’s okay.Green: That’s completely okay. You eat

Jiff peanut butter, I eat Skippy. It’s still peanutbutter. The problem is that we’ve tried to buildan industry around absolutes, but the thingthat makes music, for instance, so wonder-ful is listening to the same piece of classi-cal music played by different groups in twodifferent halls with two different conductorswith two different audiences on two differ-ent nights and you come up with somethingthat’s unique to each performance. I com-pletely oppose the idea of “this is correct,”because music does not work that way. Musicis a moment and you may walk out of a con-cert, or poetry reading, or whatever perceiv-ing something completely different from whatI would. Whose to say what’s right? It’s an artform. That’s why there are so many compo-nents,because people have varied tastes. Buthere’s the problem. Let’s say your system iscomprised of components from ten differentdesigners. Those ten designers would prob-ably disagree with each other about howmusic should sound. And when they designtheir component or their speaker, they voiceit in their own home, to their own taste, withtheir own equipment, at some specific alti-tude, with a certain level of humidity and soon and so on and so on. And let’s say thatmonth they are eating Jiff! They have all thesefactors influencing them when they are de-signing. Then they put their product in a boxand say “this is what is right.” They ship it toanother part of the world, or even next door,and it never sounds the same as what the

ture, if you’re using a laserdisc, to be a littletighter sounding, or to get a little cleaner,sharper looking, you simply tighten up theshelf; if you want it to sound more open andharmonic, then you loosen up the shelf. Soit kind of acts like tuning a string on a guitar.Everything I design is based on mechani-cal grounding principles. The key is to inte-grate the system together-acoustically, me-chanically and electrically.

Reber: Tell our readers about the vibra-tions occurring in amplifiers, processors,preamplifiers and D to A converters that com-municate outside the chassis through the sig-nal path, and the impact vibrations have onsound quality.

Green:When we started to research howmuch our music and pictures are being al-tered by the vibration of parts on the circuitboard, we were pretty amazed. All of thesecomponent parts are part of a formula thatmakes the component work the way it does.Part of that formula is vibration, and how youalter that vibration. And it does get alteredwhether you want it to or not, because ofhumidity, because of other parts it may beattached to, and because of other sympa-thetic vibrations around it. If you can gain con-trol of the vibrations you can tune the com-ponent—it’s just like a string of a guitar. Thatguitar string is passing a signal. But whatyou do to that string, by attaching it to a pieceof wood and by tightening and looseningit, is to make it change. Well electronic parts,from the aspect of vibration, are not that dif-ferent from the guitar string.

Reber: Is this something that can bemeasured or seen?

Green: Dramatically. You can hook up toa Melissa Computer System, or you can set upa microphone in the room and make changeson your rack. If you have a spectrum analyz-er, you can show changes in the harmonicstructures of your music. We did a few suchtests over in Europe last year. We watchedhow the harmonic structures of different instru-ments changed depending on the mechan-ical changes we made. Did you ever hearsomebody say about their music system,“the guitars and cymbals and pianos andeverything kind of has the same sound char-acter?”Well, that’s because each instrumentis not able to develop its own harmonic struc-ture. The reason they’re not able to do thatis because of the vibrations.

Reber: Should the object be to tune outthe vibrations? What would be the result?

Green:You don’t necessarily want to tuneout the vibrations. But you do want to con-trol the vibrations so that you can make thesonic or visual changes that you want to make.An interesting part of our industry and this

designer created in his or her own room. Thecustomer takes it out of the box and tries tomake that designer’s personal taste work.And they’re trying to match it up with otherdesigner’s work, who went through the sameprocess. Something’s wrong.

Look at how different that is comparedto, say, let’s all sit down and play a guitar, aviolin, a cello and a drum. You take all thesevery different instruments, which all are playeddifferently, but you have the one thing that anaudio system doesn’t have: you are able totune the instruments together. Bingo! Andthat’s what the rest of the audio industry is

Room at beginning stages of JustaRack building with Michael Green.

Michael Green at work assembling a JustaRack.

FROM The Archives




ers, even the cables—everything that is pass-inga signal. Finally you’ve got the room itself,which involves both mechanical and acous-tical vibration. You see, vibration is part of theformula. So when we’re talking about dialingin, we’re talking about making these threeareas work together. What we do is designproducts to give you flexibility and control.For example, we’ve designed acoustic prod-ucts to make the room as live or dead as youwant. We even go to the extent where we’renow building rooms in homes and storeswhere we can change the resonant char-acteristics, the pitch, of the walls. See, you’renot just hearing the speaker, you’re hearingthe wall too. You can either adapt the speak-er to the wall, or you can adapt the wall tothe speaker, or you can do both and get thebest of both worlds.

Getting back to “dialing in,” what we usu-ally do is we give three elements to the cus-tomer. The customer already has electron-ics. Wegive him tunable racks to put his elec-tronics on, we give him tunable speakers, andwe give him acoustic tuning devices to putin the room. He or she then starts to follow aneasy process.In fact we have a guide bookcalled “Let”s Tune Your Room,” and the cus-tomer starts through this process of dialingin the sound that he or she wants.

Reber: This would be a good time to talkabout the acoustical treatment of a room.

Green:Most everybody thinks of an acous-tical wave as a straight line that’s travelingthrough a room. When it reflects off a wall theythink of a ball on a billiard table. That’s not thecase. Acoustics are more like a bunch of ballswith each ball representing a particular fre-quency. These balls, or waves if you preferthis term, are pushed around the room by themovement of the drivers in the speakers.These balls are bumping into each other and

missing. They’re trying to solve everythingelectronically. As far as the electronic endof it goes, that’s fine. We do need to be ableto fix as much as we can electronically. Butwhen you get to the end of that road, you’vegot to turn towards mechanical physics.

Reber: So the rack system is a basicfoundation to that whole theory. Becausethat’s what all the components that makeall this stuff work rest on.

Green: If you look at everything that Idesign, it doesn’t take you too long to figureout where I’m coming from. Whether you’relooking at my speakers or my racks, or myother designs, the same principle is followed.

What we’re after is this. We think con-sumers are in varying states of confusion.They are spending all this money trying toobtain good sound and good video perfor-mance. They keep turning towards all thesedifferent electronic design philosophies—philosophies that are really not harmonious,not really able to work with the other philoso-phies of other designers. So we took a lookat the big picture and said, “why is this thingnot working, why are these approaches get-ting stuck in the mud, and what can we doabout it to allow people to dial in the soundthat they want?” Because that’s the bottomline. No matter who you are, or what your tasteis, or what your beliefs are, or what you thinkmusic should sound like, you should be ableto get that. And if you follow the way the indus-try has done things in the past, you’re pret-ty much getting everyone else’s taste, andthey are saying to you, “well if you like it you’reright, if you don’t, you’re wrong.” You don’t seesomebody building an instrument with thatin mind, or playing music with that in mind.So we came along and came up with a dif-ferent path for people to follow. That’s whatthis is all about.

Everything follows a very thought-throughmethod of listening, all the way from the small-est rack that we design through to the biggestspeaker that we design. What we have is asystem that’s really a big instrument. And thenall you have to do is sit back and dial in whatyou want to hear. Every part is affected bytuning.

Reber: You often use the term “dial in”interchangeably with “tuning.” Define thata little bit more in terms of the actual stepsand what is needed to do that.

Green: “Dialing in” is just another way ofsaying “tuning.” You’ve got three things thatyou’re going to be dialing in. First there’s theelectrical side, meaning the electrical charac-teristics of the components and even thequality of electricity coming out of the wall.Then you’ve got vibrations—the mechanicalgrounding of the components, the speak-

everything in the room.Reber: They are varying sizes?Green: Yes. Every frequency is a differ-

ent size ball. Patterns are formed in the airand as the air starts to move around the roomthe waves or balls are pushed around andhit the room boundaries, the walls. When theyhit the walls, some of these frequencies, de-pending on the size of the wall and the mate-rials it is made of, actually soak into the wallcausing the wall itself to vibrate. This is themechanical vibration part of room acoustics.Other balls or waves reflect off the wall andthen run into another wave about the samesize. These waves in turn bump into otherwaves and then it builds into what’s calledthe laminar effect, it travels along the wall.You can hear it when you walk close to a walland all of a sudden you can hear your voicespread all the way out across the wall. Thathappens on every surface, no matter how bigor how small the surface is. It’s just like if youtook a cup of water and poured it on the table.Some would splash, but a lot would run alongthe table. If you turned that table sidewaysand called it a wall, that’s what’s happeningwith the sound waves. You’re pushing all thatenergy along and it’s moving down the walland then gathering in the corners, especial-ly the upper corners where there is no furni-ture to break it up. Since it builds acousticpressure in the corners, we can come alongwith our acoustic treatment and catch it asit corner loads and shouts back into the room.

Reber: So that’s how the CornerTuneworks.

Green: Yes.Reber: And the object of it is to catch

the wave as it comes out from the corners.Green: Because you have more control

catching the wave coming out from the cor-ner. The more dampening you do on the wallitself, the more sound you’re losing. You don’twant to lose the sound, the frequencies, youjust want to control them. For example if youjust deadened your wall, no matter whatspeaker you had, you would end up havinga very dead, sucked out sound. You’ve alreadylost the music! All rooms have some thingsin common. They have walls, and becausethose walls are connected, they have cor-ners. Corner loading then occurs becausemuch of the energy builds up in the corners.So that’s where I start, with the CornerTunesto control the corners. Once you control thecorner loading by “barricading” your majorcorners, then you’ll start to hear other areas.Halfway between the corner and the next cor-neryou will generally want more acoustic treat-ment. Of course all of this is on those diagrams.

Reber: Some companies, as you said,approach acoustical treatment by putting

FROM The Archives




monics back into that piano and get thatharmonic structure back. It’s not possible.The best you can do is end up with some-thing that sounds very artificial.

Reber: Isn’t that one of the arguments fordampening a room and designing speakerswith, say, very narrow or focused or controlleddirectivity, to eliminate reflections. Isn’t theidea to hear the direct sound rather than anyreflection or the room character and that’s thereason for applying dampening materials?

Reber: Well think about it. It almost goesback to that straight line theory whereby soundis a straight arrow that travels right from asource to your ear. If you pay attention to myvoice when I’m talking to you, you’ll noticethat as much as you’re hearing my voice,you’re hearing the room. You can hear thewalls talk back to you right now when I talkto you. To try to take that sound and treat itunnaturally by killing those walls, or deaden-ing those walls, all you really are going to dois make those walls sound like this (dead-er and darker sounding). You’re going to hearthe walls anyway. The walls are just going tosound dead. So that whole theory of pointsource is pretty far removed from any writ-ing in the past on music theory. Music the-ory has never agreed with point source. It’sjust some of your modern day acousticianswho are trying to change physics. I don’t knowwhere they got stuck, but they got stuck.

Reber:Many loudspeaker designers de-sign their drivers and test and refine their de-signs in anechoic chambers.

Green: Some do, and then others buildthem in typical rooms. You may have noticedthat the ones that are finished off in anechoic

frequency-deadening materials on walls.Green: Think about the words: “dead-

ening.” You know, “dampening, deadening,absorbing.” Music is based on just the oppo-site. Harmonic structure for example. Takea piano. It’s like having a whole series of sus-taining or deadening pedals on a piano. Youwant the piano to be able to develop har-monic structure. Any time you dampen thesound from the piano to stop the note short,you will notice that the harmonic richnessthat the piano board is developing, also dies.You can treat a room the same way, if youdampen or deaden your room, or even thecircuit path in your electronics, you’re killingthe sound. You’ll never again be able to re-store that sound. Once you stop the naturalharmonics from developing, you’re done for.No engineer can tell me that you could comeback later and synthetically add those har-

chambers usually have drivers with a lot moredampening on them than speakers that arebuilt by ear. It’s kind of interesting. It’s calledan anechoic chamber, but what it really isis a bunch of dampening. Put a bunch offoam in a room, all you’re really doing is dis-torting the air pressure, the sound waves.There’s a big difference between making asound or a note, and making a frequency. Afrequency is just the cycle. Sound is quite abit bigger than that. A sound is also harmon-icstructure. You not only hear resonances atthe particular frequency, but you also hearresonances that are developed up and downfrom that frequency. What happens when youuse too much dampening, or when you usedampening at all, is that you start to decrease

Typical Tunepack configuration in a recctangular room.

Horn loading in the corners.

CornerTune in corner.

Stopping the reflected wave.

EchoTuneCornerTune

TuningStrip

Room with soundstage zone.

EchoTune

CornerTune

TuningStrip

FROM The Archives




flow of energy. It’s kind of like operating avalve controlling the whole energy-drainingprocess. To tighten up the image and sound-stage, and harmonics, you would tighten theshelves. To get more of a full harmonic sound,you would loosen them up.

If you want to make a more effective me-chanical ground and gain even more con-trol, what you would do is also put one Audio

and into the tuning boards so the energy isnow common between the tuning board andthe inside the component. By tightening thosetwo nuts right there, above and below the tun-ing board, you’re changing the resonant pitchto a higher frequency in the tuning board,which means more energy will now run overto the rod and will flow down to the floor. Ifyou loosen it, you’re going to slow down the

Point on the top of your component, and usetwo shelves or “tuning boards” to sandwichyour component, instead of just setting thecomponent on one shelf. You gain about 50percent more control over your componentand the way that it sounds. Again, the ideais not to squeeze your component, but justto make positive contact so that you can drainthe energy into the shelves. That’s what themechanical flow chart is all about.

Reber: So after we’ve done all of that,we’ve got the rack that’s become extremelystable, the AudioPoints are in place and ofcourse, as we clamp, everything becomesvery snug in terms of the electronic compo-nents. Then the last thing is to work with thephysical perimeter of the room. Actually I hadalready RoomTuned our main or living roomand we’re now adding to and repositioningthe RoomTunes in both the living room andin the family room.

Green:Yes. You could start with the room,either way.

Reber: And so that’s where the variousRoomTune acoustic products come intoplay. So let’s talk about what you did there,how you approach that.

Green:The speakers produce the soundwaves. These waves build up in the room andmake their way to the wall. The wall will dowhat it does with the sound. As we talkedabout before, it’ll reflect part of it, it’ll absorbpart of it, and transmit part of it up into thecorner. So the first thing to do acoustically isdeal with the corners because that’s wherethe concentrated waves are going to formand then horn load back into the room. Sostart with the CornerTunes.

Next you start to work on the other areasof the room that are hot spots such as themidpoint of the room where wall meets ceil-ing. Your room, because it’s open on one side,rightby the speaker, is creating some asym-metry acoustically. By putting some RoomTunes on the right side in the opening to thedining room you’re blocking out interferencefrom this opening. In fact we’re using the floorstanding RoomTunes to “barricade” the din-ing room acoustically.

Reber: What is the principle behind theRoomTunes having a different treatment oneach side? Do they have a different innertreatment?

Green: There’s an absorbing side and aharder, reflecting side. It’s most important thatyou don’t point the damping material at thelistener, because anytime you do that with adampening, absorbing type of material, youstart to lose your harmonic balance in theupper frequencies. You can start to make yourviolins sound very dull. You get a lifelessnessin your system. You lose dynamic range. So

Mechanical transfer flow chart: providing a series of conduits for excess energy to move to ground.

FROM The Archives




a loose position and then gradually tightenit up, which will give you more focus, but youdon’t want to tighten it up so much that itstarts sounding like what people call “CDdigital sound,” that real hard sound. It’s pret-ty easy and intuitive once you get started,and it’s explained pretty well in the assem-bly instructions.

Reber:To prepare for this stage we’re tak-ingoff all the rubber associated with the equip-ment,actually the rubber feet attached to thebottom plate of each component.

Green:Right. You need to do that becausethe excess energy is draining, moving to alower state like mother nature wants. It goesfrom the capacitors and transistors to the PCboard, and then from the PC board to thestandoffs, and then from the standoffs to thechassis. Let’s say you’re doing fine at thatpoint, but if you run it into a rubber foot on thebottom of the chassis, you’re inhibiting thetransfer of this energy to the next stage, whichwould be a mechanical transfer device, inthis case the AudioPoint, and from there tothe shelf of the rack. So you’ve got to removethat piece of rubber because it’s just soak-ing up energy. It’s robbing the signal that’spassing through. It’s interesting too, becausewhen you start to go through this process yourealize how delicate that signal really is, andhow easy it is to change that signal. It’s a lotmore susceptible to vibration than we mightthink, because in essence, it is vibration. That’swhy a lot of times when you hear equipment,the equipment itself has a signature soundto it. Part of that is because of the resonantcharacteristics of all the parts the signal isrunning through, actually dampening part ofthe music. It changes the harmonic structureand the fundamental note is affected.

Usually when I’m done putting a systemtogether like this one, one of the first thingsthat the customer says is, “That’s all so prac-tical. There’s really no magic to it. You’re justdoing what makes sense.” And they’re right.This is just what makes sense. In essencewhat we’re doing is we’re making all yourelectronics variable. So this stage is reallykey. We’re going to see the best of both worldshere. It should be pretty incredible. It’s un-fortunate that the two design camps fighteach other so much of the time. If the twocamps can work together we can wind upsolving a lot of problems because you can’tdo everything by mechanical physics, andsometimes when you tweak things out elec-trically, it only works as well as your physicswill allow. So the two really need to work to-gether. They’re going to interact regardless,the question is how well are they going towork together.

the harmonic structure and sound really be-comes distorted. You know what’s really inter-esting to me about all this stuff we’re talkingabout is that you can go down to the libraryand read all this. You can dispute this wholedeadening movement, and yet we have awhole industry that for the past 40 years hasbeen trying to base itself on science that real-ly doesn’t work. Kind of interesting, isn’t it?

Reber: Yes.Green: It’s the same way with rubber and

other dampening materials. Run a note througha piece of copper, measure the harmonic struc-ture,and you’ll probably get seven to nine har-monic layers going up and down from thenote. Now take a piece of rubber or PVC orTeflon, a piece of any kind of dampening mate-rial, and set it on that copper and watch howit changes and distorts the harmonic struc-ture. So what do we do? We design cableswith a bunch of dampening materials think-ing that we’re preserving the signal, when whatwe’re really doing is stealing the signal. We’rerobbing it. We do it to cables, we do it to cir-cuits,we do itwith most everything else we’redesigning. Right now you’re opening an ampli-fier, think about what we’re seeing. Here’s thetransformer, and what do you have on eitherside? A big hunk of rubber. We have a sys-tem set up in Ohio that’s completely devoidof any dampening materials. It’s pretty inter-esting. What it does is give us total control toshape the sound any way we want to. Weend up having a system that sounds a lotmore like real instruments, instead of thelocked in character of most components.

Reber: What stage are we at right now?Green: We’re just setting up the racks for

the components to go on. We want to makegood grounding contact with the bottom conethat goes into the floor. Energy wants to trav-el to a lower state. Another way to say this isthat energy wants to be grounded. It’s impor-tant that it makes contact with the floor, tofacilitate this natural transfer of energy fromthe component to ground. That way excessenergy can be “grounded” out of the rack. Ifnot, it’s just going to stay in that rod and goback up into the shelves, which isn’t neces-sarily a disaster, but it certainly isn’t desirable.So we mechanically ground the rack to thefloor and then we tighten up the shelves towhere we want. To start with, not too tight, butsince we’re not clamping the components atthis time, not too loose either because thetighter shelf will drain off more of the excessenergy.

Reber: When begin clamping then whatdo we want to do?

Green:At that stage you’re going to leaveyour boards pretty loose. You can start from

Reber: Where are we now?Green: I think we’re up to the mechanical

grounding drain.Reber:This is the stage at which we posi-

tion the AudioPoints between the bottomchassis of each component and the shelf.Explain what the purpose of AudioPoints are,what they’re made of, why use only threeand what’s the benefit?

Green: The AudioPoint is a pure brass,geometrically designed, mechanical ground-ing device. Its job is to gather the vibrationfrom a component chassis and send it at acertain rate of speed into your next surface,the shelves, which we call “tuning boards.”We use three because that’s the smallestnumber possible without leaving the com-ponent unstable. So we take the energy fromthe components, through the AudioPoints,

Above Michael Green tightens Tuning Boards OnJustaRack. Below completed JustaRackswith components resting on AudioPoints.

FROM The Archives


[Editor's Note: The room tuning continuesin the next issue of the WSR Newsletter!]



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