CEDIA 2010 Show Report, Coverage by Jim Clements

The 2010 CEDIA Expo has come to a close as I write this. There was a lively tone at this year's event. Also, attendance sppeared to be up over last year. Here's to hoping for a great 2011!

This is a close up view of the mounting hardware of the new, compact Paradigm Millenia One speaker package.

This line up of Thiel speakers was looking good on the show floor.

This Pioneer receiver has integrated iPod control functionality. It can also be controlled by the iPad on the right.

Particularly at CEDIA, manufactureres love to show off their in wall and in ceiling speakers. It seems like everybody carries a line these days. I love checking out all the different approaches to mounting these speakers. The Revels are shown from behind in the above picture.

There were lots and lots of 3D flat panels and projectors at the show. I am personally interested in reviewing some of the 3D projectors in 2011. I am a firm beleiver that in order to get the most out of 3D you must have a very large screen that takes up much of your field of vision.

There remain lots of choices for two channel systems. Look for a continued resurgence of two channel audio in the next year.

Finally, I was delighted to see lots of wireless solutions. From the slick and cost-effective Summit Wireless/Aperion Audio surround system to the LG wireless HDMI 1.4 bridge to the Panamax Blue Bolt System and all points in between. Customers will now be able to install an integrated system with nothing much more than the necessary power cords. And I hear they are working on eliminating the power cords too! The savings and flexibility this provides the end user is tremendous. I know I had to invest a good deal of money running in the cable for my theater retrofit. With wireless, moving components around the home or bringing them in and out of your system will be much easier to do.

Since I started this blog down below with an interior image of the Harman HPAV trailer, I thought it would be fitting for me to close with my own image of the HPAV as seen from the outside. This mobile show room contains two live demos inside. There is a two-channel system that features top of the line Levinson electronics and Revel speakers. The theater demo includes Lexicon electronics and a JBL Everest speaker system. Harman takes this showcase on the road to spread the word about their product offerings. For those of you not fortunate enough to be able to attend CES, CEDIA or RMAF, then you may seek out this unit when it comes to your town so you can get a taste of a show demo.

Shown here is Sharp's new Aquos 3D Blu Ray player. It can be mounted horizontally or vertically. The stand is included. It features a built-in 802.11N wireless bridge. It can stream videos from Netflix, VUDU or YouTube.

Seen here is the new Sharp XV-Z17000 3D DLP Projector. This projector offered a bright, detailed image in its live demo. Look for availability in the coming months. No official pricing, but the word is that this projector should carry a very attractive price tag.

Richard Gray's power company was on hand to demonstrate their whole product line. They have a surge interrupter that is placed at your home's electric service that is said to be able to arrest lightning strikes before they enter your home's internal wiring network. It is based on non-sacrificial components and so the claim is that it can handle multiple strikes. They also make the more tradtional surge supressors and noise filters for your equipment rack.

Anthem had their much anticipated receiver line at the Expo. Seen here is the MRX 700. These units are in production now so you should expect to see them on dealers' shelves before the Holiday season. These receivers include the much heralded Anthem ARC room correction system. They were delayed in development, but the delays were so that Anthem could be sure to get the best and most reliable product to market. The unit atop the receiver is a new Paradigm wireless transmitter.

No, this is not a fallout shelter for mice neither is it a smoker. It is the new Sonance Landscape series subwoofer. The installer buries the sub in your yard and the bass exits out of the little smoke stack. Brilliant!

This new LG 3D Blu-ray player can connect wirelessly to LG TV's. The player is in the middle of the display. The outboard transmitter is in the lower right of this cabinet. The small dongle on the bottom shelf (which is about the same size as a USB thumb drive) is the receiver. The dongle plugs into a USB port on the TV. The transmitter can handle HDMI inputs from any Blu Ray player but the receiver will only work with LG TV's.

Jim Milton is seen here admiring his own image as reflected in the new 6-chip LG LCOS projector. The projector uses polarization so the glasses do not have shutters and are lighter and more comfortable (to me) than many of the shutter glasses. The projector comes bundled with 6 sets of glasses. MSRP is $15,000.

This is the Paradigm Signature S1 loudspeaker which was serving as the main L/R speakers in the Paradigm/Anthem demo. These speakers sounded very nice in the demo with lots of air around the instruments. Vocals were very natural when demo'd in 2-channel. I started singing along and almost got kicked out of the room. These speakers feature updated drivers and retail for $899 each.

This is the Paradigm Signature SUB 1 subwofer that was being used in the demo mentioned above. It has 6 8-inch active drivers, two on each of three opposing sides to cancel vibrations and cabinet stresses. The amp serves up 1,700 watts RMS and 3,400 watts peak. Needless to say this was a big part of the demo's theatrical impact. Somewhere around $6,000.

This is a compact Paradigm Surround system, the Millenia One, shown in a lifestyle setting. The cabinets are very hefty and rigid aluminum. Also, Paradigm has devised a unique and ingenious mounting system for the satellites that allows the installer to angle the speakers in an almost infinite number of positions. The white box on the wall is the sub that follows a similar compact form factor.

Panamax/Furman was showing a new line of energy management products that builds on their existing Blue Bolt technology. Seen here are their existing power management components for the AV realm. Some have voltage regulation, filtration and even battery back ups.

What is new is a wireless bridge (not shown) that can communicate with outlet modules you place around your house. With the Panamax/Furman on-line interface, you can turn on and off components in your home from anywhere in the world. The product is programmable and can automatically power off devices at night (or while you are away) that otherwise would draw power while in standby mode. You can use their very slick on line interface to basically monitor and manage your power in a myriad of ways.

This is Leon Speaker's new compact subwoofer. This little unit is very solidly constructed and sounded very nice on the show floor.

It's Saturday morning at CEDIA Expo at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta and the show is getting ready to open for another day of excitement.

Energy was showing off their freshly updated line of Veritas speakers. Shown here is the V-5.2-C center speaker. It looked very nice in this gloss rosenut finish. All the Veritas speakers feature stronger magnets that allow the spacing between the mid and tweeter to be further reduced to inprove response in the critical bands covered by these two drivers. Energy claims that other driver and crossover enhancements make the new speakers a much easier load for amplifiers to handle.

Klipsch was showing off their new Reference II line. They have done a major update to the Tractix horns and titanium tweeters. They are also rolling out a new line of compact high-powered subs that have the capability to keep up with the output of their very sensitive towers. Their subs can be retrofitted for wireless operation with an upcoming add-on dongle that connects to the plate amp. The dongle gets its power from the amp so no wall wart is required in the vicinity of the sub. Klipsch had a live demo where they A/B their old and new Synegy towers. The increase in imaging and air was amazing with the new speakers.

This is the new Vivitek D8300. They had a live demo of this projector in their booth. It is a native 1080p (1920x1080) resolution with claimed 6,500 Lumens and 2,000:1 Contrast Ratio. Its light engine employs a DLP® processor with BrilliantColor™ technologies from Texas Instruments. It has a Gennum video processor as well. The lens offers 1.3x zoom with manual lens shift (+/-120% vertical and +/-30% horizontal). The lenses are easily interchangeable if you need wide angle or long throw. This product is expected to ship Fall 2011. No pricing at this time.

MK Sound had their whole line up on display in their booth. They have made improvements to the fit and finish of the products they do offer.

I was impressed with MK Audio's in-wall speakers. They have some of the most rigid baffles and one of the better mounting schemes among all the in-wall's I have seen at the show.

Wisdom Audio announced their new sub at the show. This bad boy has dual 15" drivers in a transmission line enclosure. It has a claimed output of 130 dB at 20 Hz. It is a passive dsign that is rated to handle 5 kW of input power. Sensitivity is 101 dB. They ran two of them in a demonstration that included the rest of their flagship speakers. Needless to say, this system produced top-notch sound.

This is Phase Technology's Cine Micro system. The cabinets are real wood. They just look plastic because of the glossy finish.

Induction Dynamics was showing their full line of speakers.

Vivitek was showing this short throw DLP projecter in their booth. I plan to post about their middle of the line DLP projector tomorrow.

Earthquake announced their new outdoor sub which is the larger stone in the rear. This is a passive sub that is built to Earthquake's usually high standards. Rumor has it that they are working on a powered outdoor sub.

This is Earthquake's in-wall sub. I was impressed by its build quality, solid back box and mounting system which fixes the cabinet directly to the wall studs.

Earthquake had a live demo of their Tigris speakers in a surround set up. They also used their own sub, tactile transducers and amplifiers in this set up. It was an impressive demonstration.

This is the business end of the all-new REL Gibralter sub. It was on static display. It looks like a very promising unit.

Mitsubihi announced their upcoming 3D front projector, the Mitsubihi Diamond 3D. This will be Mitsubishi's first LCOS front projector. It will have motorized lens shift and zoom with generous ranges of adjustment. It runs at only 19 dbA in low lamp mode and has a claimed lamp life of 4,000 hours also in low bright mode. Tentative specifications are 1,000 ANSI lumens and 120,000:1 contrast ratios. No pricing yet. There was a working prototype on display in their booth. Look for this product to be on dealer's shelves by the end of the year if all goes well.

This is a new projector from Mitsubishi, the HC 4000. This entry level projector is 1080p and employs the DLP Dark Chip 3 light engine. Interestingly, this projector has 2 anamorphic modes such that the projector will work for most widescreen modes with a fixed anamorphic lens in place. The lamp life is a claimed 5,000 hours. The ANSI contrast is stated as 750:1 witha ratio of 4,000:1 for full on/full off. This projector looked very nice in its demo, especially considering an MAP of $1,495.

This is the new Phase Technology 8" wirless sub.

Phase Technology also announced their new wireless surround speakers. The transmitter includes a sub input and the unit comes bundle with a dongle to retrofit any sub to run wirelessly. Now maybe my brother in law can put his surrounds in the right place.

This is a new Revel 18" powered sub. It is powered by a built-in multi kilowatt amplifier.

I had a little difficuly parking my Camaro this morning. I can't wait till I get the bill for the windows!

This is a speaker made by a new start up company, Ton. Their speakers are contained within these sculpture like enclosures that light up like the one in the image above.

Here is the new Lexicon switching mode amplifier. It is an 8 channel, 100 watt per channel distributed audio amp. All the circuits on the left side of the board are replaced by the single chip on the right. The whole box weighs less than 10 pounds.

The SpeakerCraft booth resembled a primordial camp site. By far the most unique booth at CEDIA, IMHO.

This array of colorful speakers are being marketed by SpeakerCraft.

Pioneer is offering a new line of receivers that can control iPods. The audio connection is digital so you can take advantage of the higher quality DAC's in the receiver. The GUI displays cover art which is a surprisingly rare bit of functionalty. The receiver can also be controlled by an iPad with a free app. (The iPad is on the right.)

This is the high end two channel system being offered by TAD which is under the Pioneer umbrella of companies. The speakers have concentric mid/highs with beryllium dome tweeters. As it goes with this sort of thing, if you have to ask, you probably can't afford it.

CalMAN was showing their new calibration software that features automatic calibration with Panasonic displays and many video processors. They claim to be working with other display manufacturers to expand their automatic calibration capabilities. In this image, the calibrator moved the primary color point to the standard point on the graph. The CalMAN software automatically brought it in to spec.

Here is one of the new Pathios hybrid integrated amps. It is 100 watts per channel class A/B.

This Pathos hybrid amp is 10 wpc and pure Class A.

This is a Levinson/Revel two channel system. SRP is just a shade under $100k.

This is a new Levinson switching mode monoblock amplifier.

Revel has a unique mounting system for their new architectural speakers.

This is an actual shot of the Summit conrtroller that was being demo'd with the Aperion wirless system.

I was able to experience a demo of the Aperion Audio Intimus 4T Summit Wireless System this morning. This is a complete 5.1 or 7.1 turnkey sound system. It comes with a controller (which replaces your surround processor), a remote and the powered speaker system. The speakers are powered with built-in switching amps. The satellites are bi-amped and the center is tri-amped. The system has a robust auto calibration routine that even identifies the locations of the various satellites using ultrasonic means during set up. Then, using the remote, you can have the system adjust channel balance and delay to instantly move the sweet spot to wherever you are in the room. The system sounded quite nice and the best news is that the entire 7.1 system is only $2,999 and the 5.1 system is $2,499. Look for these to be available early 2011.

Here also are Aperion's new wireless surround speakers. These were on static display in the Aperion booth. These speakers can be had for $499 per pair.

I missed the Harman HPAV Mobile Showcase at CEDIA last year. I’m not going to let that happen again. Just check out the image above and you’ll see what I mean. (PS - This year, Harman is set to announce a new line of Lexicon digital amps at CEDIA.)

I am also looking forward to seeing all the new wireless audio solutions. It looks as if there are a lot of new consumer choices in the wireless audio product category in 2010.

Earthquake offers a range of wireless products. They also offer several loudspeaker and multichannel amps. I plan to report what Earthquake has in store. As in the SWAT 2.4 shown below.

I plan to check out the Phase Tech wireless subs this year. This is the 10” model in a cherry satin finish.

Since I’ll be in the market soon for a new front projector and screen, I will also be looking at the new 3D front projectors and screens.

Stay tuned for my blog updates through Sunday!