Sony G90 manual I L L E R, Series such as Star Trek The Next Generation . Each

A U D I O

Death to Convention

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When we embarked upon the re-launch of The Perfect Rather than teaching us the law, our professors taught us

Vision, I envisioned the experience as a great		how to think about the law. There are too many “rules” for
adventure – an opportunity to explore uncharted		any student to sit down and absorb them all – just as there
territory in home entertainment. Everywhere I looked and		are too many audio products for any reviewer to cover. And,
listened, there were new experiences, as the emergence of		like the law, the results obtained from an audio product are,
digital technology shattered the old notions of what is pos-		to a degree, fact specific. What is needed is a broader per-
sible in home audio.		spective in approaching each product.
I didn’t expect that the most challenging adventure		In law school, they taught us to read cases and discover
would be developing an editorial approach that would do		for ourselves the issues within those cases. Only then could
justice to the topic. As I planned the audio section for each		we begin to comprehend the use of rules in the law. Similar-
issue before me and the ones beyond, I came face to face		ly, it is the issues presented by each product and each sys-
with a harsh reality – there weren’t enough pages to cover		tem that must be our starting point in understanding multi-
the subject using conventional techniques. Indeed, our sub-		channel audio. If we reviewers can understand and share
ject matter is so rich that using the conventional approach		the larger issues with you readers, you won’t need a review
of reviewing consumer equipment one product at a time		of every product to guide you. You will be better equipped to
would yield superficial coverage of the available products at		guide yourselves. And an informed marketplace produces
best, while we were forced to ignore many of the fascinating		better products through economic force.
issues that underlie those products.		And how do we fuse the structure of DS9 and approach
We needed a new way.		of law school in the audio review section? Crudely, at first, I
For inspiration, I turned to two wildly different sources:		suspect. There isn’t a manual that tells us how to do this. So
Star Trek and law school. By way of analogy, most audio		like Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark, we’re going to
reviewing today is similar to the episodic structure of a TV		make it up as we go along.
series such as Star Trek: The Next Generation. Each		In this issue, you can read the first installments of two
episode is a whole story, with a beginning and an ending.		serial system reviews – one by Barry Rawlinson and the
And next week the crew is off on another adventure that		other by me. Rawlinson, with his design background, will
typically has nothing to do with last week’s. In contrast, Star		approach the Linn system he is reviewing from a different
Trek: Deep Space Nine is serial in structure. While elements		and invaluable perspective. Meanwhile, I’m off on a journey
of each show are episode specific, there is a dominant plot		to confront humankind’s ancient enemy as I review an evolv-
structure running from week to week that makes DS9 seri-		ing system based on Revel loudspeakers.
al. That’s what we need in TPV’s audio section: a review		I envision an audio section that will provide more con-
structure that is open enough to feature products while		text and insight than is possible with a conventional review
using those same products to explore the larger plot that is		structure. There are limitations with this approach, of
our quest to accurately recreate the sound of the original		course. The most significant is that we will be covering a
event, be it music or movie.		smaller number of products than if we just limited our
You may well wonder what law school has to do with any		reviews to 1,500 words and grabbed every product we
of this. Even lawyers who love the law will tell you that		could get (worse yet would be writing 3,000 word
law school was a nightmarish experience. One of our		reviews that cared not for the larger issues –
principle objectives at TPV is to provide guidance to the		think about it). Because of this limitation, we
intelligent reader who is interested in home entertain-		must be highly selective in choosing the products
ment. This objective flies square in the face of the reality		we review. We want products of high performance
that even if you read every publication available on con-		that have something to teach us.
sumer electronics, you could not read a review of every			This then is our manifesto of freedom from
product you might be interested in.			the old conventions of audio reviewing.
Faced with this limitation, I found myself in			But what did you expect? TPV is not a
a situation not unlike my first year of law.	T O M	M I I L L E R	conventional magazine!