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Pure VL-60967
by IsThisNameTaken
I've had this radio for a little over a year now and am more than pleased with it. The shiny "piano" black finish really is stunning, although somewhat of a magnet for fingerprints and dust! On the front of the radio there is a small, but readable, amber display with four buttons beneath (As well as several other on the top). ... The display is very easy to read, displaying the time when on standby or listening to iPod or Mp3 Player and shows the radio station or frequency when using FM or DAB. The only issue, if at all, is that the display can be a bit too bright at night time. Even on its lowest brightness I find it too bright at night, but maybe that's just me. The user interface is straight forward and easily navigated, allowing you to set alarms, and change the "source".
For those who like foreign music, or live away from home and want to listen their favourite station this radio is perfect! The internet radio is easy to use and provides over 10,000 stations. You can search for stations alphabetically or by genre, country, language etc. The radio is easily connected to your home network and (depending on your bandwidth) loads stations with a few seconds.
The radio also allows you to listen to FM or DAB, connect your iPod via the iDock or other Mp3 players via the Aux in, as well as stream music wirelessly from your PC.
The sound quality is excellent, and it lets you fiddle with the bass and treble until you get to your taste. The radio has two stereo speakers and a subwoofer which all provide brilliant quality and volume. At full volume I can hear my music through out most of my house. Which brings to one of my favourite features...
This is something that I did not know when I purchased the radio and only discovered on setup. The remote, rather than traditional infrared, uses radio frequency. This means that the range of the remote is dramatically increased to about 50m. Upon set up you will asked to "bind" the remote (just press a few buttons) this means that you can control the remote from almost anywhere in the house.
I would highly reccomend this radio, and my only quibbles are:
The gloss finish is a nightmare for fingerprints and dust
The display is a little too bright for my taste
Entering letters when searching for stations or inputting wifi details is tedious, the letters are layed out alphabetically and you can scroll through them using either the remote or the +- controls on the unit. However even when using the arrows on the remote you can only move left and right not up and down.
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Denon AVR-1507
by Supersenna
I made a big mistake when I bought this amp. Thinking (5 years ago) that I wouldn't need a Flat screen TV with HD and therefore not need HDMI inputs, I bought this amp because it had optical inputs and an 8 channel discrete input. Unfortunately Blu-ray players nor the PS3 I ended up buying later do not have 8 channel outputs. 7.1 is ... also not accessible from a PS3 via optical -who knew?
Audio:
As a 5.1 cinema amp, this does a fine job. It comes with a microphone to set itself up. You definitely need to have a dedicated ".1" sub as the full lower frequency range does not get sent to the other 5/7 channels (as does any cinema amp these days). 5/7.0 misses a lot of the movie. It never seems anywhere near as loud as the specs claim. As there is no HDMI there is no real 7.1, the extra two channels are "matrixed" like the "x" addition in Dolby Pro-Logic 2x. Please note, it is NOT THX certified though stated above.
As a music amp, this is terrible. It sounds weak and suffers from typical Digital sound that is not continuous. I have recently disconnected my CD player form it and gone back to my traditional 2.0 stereo analogue hi-fi amp.
Features:
Most users, including myself, leave everything on "normal" and "0" (apart from its own set up). So features are quite pointless really. You do have many options DTS es, Neo 6, Dolby Digital ex, Dolby Pro-Logic 2x. It also has an ipod capability if you buy the optional Denon ipod dock.
Appearance:
Plastic faced, nice clear display which you can dim or switch off.
Summary:
Don't buy anything without HDMI inputs/outputs. Use this only as a cinema amp with a dedicated sub, use something analogue for music.
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Apple TV MC572B/A
by panandtilt
~~Product~~
Since obtaining our Apple ipad 2 last year and buying an iphone around a year ago we have become more impressed and interested in Apple products. So after hearing a friend talk about the Apple TV we decided to treat ourselves and ordered it directly from the apple store on-line. The service, by the way, was ... excellent and we received this little gadget within a few days. Apple TV is a small compact black box which can be easily connected to any modern TV with HDMI and capable of 720p 60/50Hz,2 . It doesn't look out of place in our lounge, in fact you hardly notice at just under 10cm squared with a height of nearly 2.5cm. It comes with the necessary cabling and instruction manual as well as a remote control.
System requirements are:
*Wi-Fi (802.11a, b, g or n) wireless network (wireless video streaming requires 802.11a, g or n) or *10/100BASE-T Ethernet network
*iTunes Store account for renting films
*Netflix account for streaming Netflix content
*For streaming media from a Mac or PC: iTunes 10.2 or later; iTunes Store account for Home Sharing
*MLB.TV subscription required to watch live and archived games
~~How to use~~
Not being that technically minded we were surprised at how easy it was to set up and control. Our itunes account (free to sign up) was beneficial because it allowed us to watch our downloaded itunes movies and listen to our music. Over Christmas we were able to listen to our music (all wirelessly I might add) and have a stream of our personal photos being shown via the apple TV onto our main TV screen, something which the visitors loved, but the kids hated!
The main thing about this little black box is the range of films, shows, documentaries, radio stations and TV series that you can rent from either itunes or Netflix at slightly inflated prices, there are literally thousands of them. We may now consider stopping the movie package we have with Sky and use this more instead.
~~My opinion~~
We have been very impressed with the Apple TV. Not only can you access a huge range of films and shows (rental fee required) but you can also stream your own music and photographs (JPEG, GIFF AND TIFF formats) onto your TV. It has good picture quality and if you love gadgets then this is one to add to your collection.
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