STEAMTUNNELS BUYER'S GUIDE
StGTGO Systems Isn't it time you had some new gear? By Genevieve Robertson
All the buzz about the latest develop
ments in handheld devices, laptops and
digital imaging has overshadowed tremen
dous advances in an old-school consumer
product: stereo systems. Stereos are
becoming works of art that add class to a
room as well as great sound. New features
that let you play digital files as well as CDs,
cassettes and even LPs will quickly turn you
into an audiophile.
The first thing to decide is what fea
tures are most important to you. Do you
need a cassette deck? Will a single CD
player be enough? Is radio reception an
issue? Do you really need surround sound?
Also consider the space you have. Then
pick a price range and stick to it.
Most people can find something for
between $200 and $600. Keep in mind
that you do get what you pay for; if
sound quality and power are your biggest
issues, you may need to lean toward
higher-end systems.
Space Savers
The JVC MX-J500 ($280; jvc.com) is
a great mini system with all the basics and
enough power to drown out any roommate.
It features a dual cassette deck, three-CD
changer
and 120
watt three
way speak
ers. And
with a pro
grammable
timer and
an optical
digital out
put that
allows you to dub to an external minidisc or
CD burner, you really can’t go wrong.
If you have less-than-adequate space
for a bookshelf system, Nakamichi has a
solution. The SoundSpace 5 ($800;
• http://nakamichi.com/soundspace) is a
three-part system that mounts on the wall
and resembles framed
pictures. It definitely
grabs your atten
tion, with its sleek
silver exterior and
blue or orange LCD
that allows you to see
the CDs inside. The sound is
just as impressive, and at just three inches
thick, clears your space for better things.
Burner Included
Now that most of us
have been weaned off of
cassettes and are able to
create our own CD com
pilations on the comput
er, Philips has brought
mix-making back to your
home stereo. Philips
FWR8 ($599;
philips.com) is a com
pact system with a CD
burner. As a stereo it holds its own with a
three-CD changer, 200 watts of power, sur
round sound and three-way speakers, not
to mention great radio reception. Plus it
has the added bonus of a quality double
speed burner with text editing. It’s also
CD-R (write-once
CDs) and CD-RW
(rewriteable) com
patible so you can
listen to all those
CDs burned on the
computer. And
did we mention
the karaoke mike
input, so you can
sing along?
MP3-Friendly
Electronic music files are here to stay,
and consumer electronics manufacturers
are creating add-on devices to play MP3
files on your home stereo without having to
boot up. DigMedia has made a combina
tion CD/MP3 ($499.95;
mp3shopping.com) player
that will connect to any home
stereo for listening without a
computer. Digisette’s Duo-Aria
($199; digisette.com) is a
new portable MP3 player that
plugs into any cassette drive.
The MusicStore has a 5GB
hard drive capable of storing 84
hours of music ripped at
128Kpbs. It can be connected to
your computer to download
already stored files or
you can transfer to
and from with a
portable player that
has a non-expandable
48Mb memory.
Samsung makes a
similar product, the
Wingo ($399; samsung.com), with a bit less
memory.
▼
Hard Core
The next step in home audio is the digi
tal audio server (DAS). AudioRequest
($799; request.com) by Request
Multimedia seems to be the best of this
emerging category. DAS is a CD player,
MP3 Player and cassette player all in one.
It’s designed to play back and organize dig
ital music files through your home audio
system. AudioRequest has a 17.3Gb hard
drive, single-disc CD player and a Celeron
Stereos are becoming works of
art that add class to a room as
well as great sound.
processor along with software to convert
CDs into MP3s.
It can also connect the Internet
through your home computer, allowing you
access to online music files. However, since
these are digital files they aren't the same
quality as the original CDs, but you do
have the option to rip at 320Kbps, which is
almost CD quality (you just can’t store as
many hours). The best thing about it is the
ease with which you can sort through all
your digital music files. The player reads
artists, song titles and album titles to help
you create and store your own playlists. •
Want More?
Search keywords: Stereo Systems
at www.steamtunnels.net