Introducing Wharfedale Diamond 10's

We've just received the all new Wharfedales Diamond 10 speaker line up into our store and the price range, these speakers are simply untouchable in respect to quality, sound, and finish. The front baffle has a beautiful high gloss, black piano finish and the sides of the speakers have an elegant curved panel that help diffuse standing waves within the cabinet. The Speaker drivers are made of Kevlar which help in keeping the sound even across the entire speaker and provide stenght and the perfect amoutn of stiffness. The Diamonds are a very warm sounding speaker, so listening to your favorite music for hours won't fatigue your ears. The Diamond Range consists of 5 floor standers, 3 bookshelf speakers, 3 center speakers, 2 surrounds models, and 3 powered subwoofers. Available in Rosewood, Blackwood or Cinnamon Cherry vinyl.

Stronger cabinet walls: The concept of curved cabinet walls, for strength and the reduction of internal standing waves, has been retained from the Diamond 9 Series. However, these walls have been made stronger through a superior method of bonding and curving the panels, increasing rigidity and, aided by internal bracing, reducing the audible effects of panel resonance.
Composite front baffle panel: The front baffle features a composite panel structure with a piano-black finish. This contributes to the speaker’s smart new look and, more importantly, to its improved sound quality, as it reduces the effects of vibration and provides a stable platform for the drive units.

Improvements to the mid/bass drive unit: To make the most of the stronger cabinet, the main drive unit chassis has been enhanced with a massive flange that is secured using six screws, thus improving its stability. A diamond pattern has also been moulded into the surround of the Kevlar cone; this is more than just cosmetic as the pattern reduces and damps standing waves in the surround, yielding a cleaner high-frequency acoustic roll-off and enhancing the ability of the mid/bass unit and tweeter to work as a cohesive whole.

Rear-firing twin reflex ports: The speaker’s twin reflex ports have been moved to the rear of the cabinet, to reduce the effects of audible distortion. These ports extend the bass to below 45Hz, contributing to an impressive sense of sonic scale.

Tweeter diffuser: Over the soft-dome tweeter is a metal diffusion grid which, as well as protecting the dome when the speaker is being used without its grille, also irons out high-frequency perturbations right up to 30kHz, delivering a smoother response and crystal-clear treble detailing.

Enhanced front grille with ‘invisible’ fixing: The front grille has been improved to ensure it has no adverse effect on the speaker’s performance. In addition, it is now affixed without pegs, therefore eschewing the need for unsightly holes in the piano-black finish front baffle.

Low Profile Chassis: The open nature of the chassis reduces reflection from rear cone movements, allowing air to move freely through the driver, which in turn results to an overall even response with a much lower distortion. Formed from a high density, injection-moulded polymer pioneered by Wharfedale, the chassis itself provides substantial damping of ring waves.

Neodymium-Powered Tweeter Mounted in Cast Alloy Surround: With the use of neodymium, the strongest of ‘rare earth’ materials, a concentration of the magnetic field is directed within the area of voice coil excursion. The cast alloy mounting plate has a profiled cross-section to optimize the dispersion of high frequency sound so it integrates flawlessly with the bass/mid-range drivers and produces a fast and more linear response possible.

Blended SRBP Cone Surrounds: The new textured surround allows a large ‘vMax’ apart from providing a compliant driver gasket, which dramatically improved dynamic response. The diamond profiled surround features rim-edge stiffeners which effectively damp cone resonances.

Offset Bi-Wire Terminals: Utilizing the same familiar offset terminal block as with its predecessors, the gold-plated contact areas and bridging strips allow firm connections with the best possible connectivity, whilst the offset pattern provides allowance for heavy duty cables and a wider range of cable connection options. So bring your favorite music and have a listen the the all new Wharfedale Diamonds. I am sure you will not find a speaker in its price range or even higher that sounds or looks better.
[source: Wharfedale.com]

Kanto's Desktop/iPod Powered Speakers

Model: iPair5 | MRSP $399

These studio monitor inspired 2 channel powered multi input speakers by Kanto set a new standard in its price range for performance, quality and vesatilty. I personally think they are seriosly undervalued, especially when you compare it speaker systems twice its price point. Avaialble in High gloss Black, White or Silver, they are loaded with a 5-inch midbass driver and a 1-inch tweeter. One speaker has an iPod dock built-in on top of it. The provided credit card sized remote control can fully operate the iPod, select inputs, adjust bass, treble and volume from about 10 to 15ft away. The opposite speaker connects to the powered speaker via a 20ft high quality microphone cable that is very easy to connect and disconnect.

The speakers are very versatlile in terms of connectivity. Besides having a built-in iPod Dock, it also comes equipped to connect to a laptop or an MP3 player via a 3mm input jack and also has RCA inputs for connectivity to a TV, CD or DVD player. Very portable and easy to setup and take down, its perfect for small venue's, party's or meetings. You can even load your presentation or a movie onto your iPod and out put it via the built in S-VHS jack on the back of the powered speaker to a projector or monitor.

The powered speaker also has a 120V power outlet! This is awesome because this allows you to connect powered devices directly to the speakers. You can essentialy run your entire system off of a single wall outlet. Also a great feature having the power outlet directly on the speaker is that you can plug in an Airport Express unit directly into the back of the speakers and run an MP3 or Mini Jack cable to one of the audio inputs on the iPar5 giving you a Zoned Audio system that you can fully control from iTunes or an iTouch/iPhone using Apples "Remote Application". You can add multiple iPair5 speakers (and Airport Express attached to the back of the powered speaker) to differnet rooms in your home or office and have an awesome sounding MultiZone audio system all without running any cables! The remote application allows you to control your iTunes library and mange multiple zones of audio with the touch of your finger. This still leaves the ipod Dock and an additional input avaialble for local zone listenting if you wanted to play sound from another source other than your Airport Express.

As far as the sound performance goes, the iPair5 has a great soundstge with great dynamic range. Great attention is given to the Mids and Highs and the Bass is very tight and responsive. The voice coil has a nice flat sound that makes it great for listing to music with female or male vocals. Because the cone is made of paper the sound is warm and not to bright. Come by and have a listen to these speakers for your self. You really will be amazed at the out put and performace these speakers pack at $399.

Effects of watching TV on your Eye's

Watching TV on an LCD, LED, Plasma or a projection screen have different effect on your eyes. For example, when watching TV with the lights turned off there is a mis-conception that you can "damage" your eyes. This is not true. As the light intesity & contrast levels change on your TV from frame to frame, your eye's can get tired because the iris constantly contracts and dilates. The effect of fatigue is greater when watching TV on an LED or an LCD TV when compared to a Plasma TV. LCD's and LED TV's tend to be brighter and Plasma's traditionally emit a warmer light. There is also a difference in watching TV when compared to projectors. TV's are an active light source whereas projection screens reflect light which makes a projector a passive light source.

When watching TV on an LCD, LED or a Plasma it is a good idea to have the lighting in the room dimmer than the light being emitted from the the screen. It is also recommended to sit about 3 to 5 times the width of your Plasma screen away or 4 to 6 times the width of your LCD/LED screen away. If you have children and are concerned about them sitting to close the screen, we can install an automation system that will turn the screen off if they happen to be too close and than turn back on when they are far enough from the screen. This help develop a habit early on in there age to not sit too close to the TV screen.

New Store Signs

If you've driven by the store recently you may have noticed new Signs and a hot new Logo designed by our friends atUrbanGeko. We thought it was time to upgrade our look and define our identity better. We refer to ourselves as the Lifestyle Technology Experts. Technology that makes your house a home and can integrate with everykind of lifestyle with out technlogy becoming a focal point. Instead, we feel technology should make "Everyday Easy". To find out exactly what I mean by "Everyday Easy" pop by and check out some of the technology we have to offer.