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New Research on Professional Mixer Consoles Forecasts Market to be Worth $1 Billion US in 2023
The professional mixer console market achieved global revenues of $775 million US in 2018 and is on track for annual sales of nearly $1 billion US by 2023, according to a comprehensive new report from Futuresource Consulting. The market research firm has been focusing on specific product categories in the professional audio industry, from microphones to professional headphones, which previously have not been fully characterized on a global perspective. Audio mixers are an interesting category, since they are at the center of the action
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Sonus faber Launches Olympica Nova Speaker Collection at RMAF 2019
Sonus faber announced the launch of its Olympica Nova high-end speaker collection, with seven completely new models, at the 16th Annual Rocky Mountain International Audio Fest (RMAF). The newly expanded Olympica Nova series embraces the authentic values that inspired the original Olympica line while adding a substantial amount of freshly developed technology, from new drivers and crossovers, to a new cabinet structure and internal volume tuning, and a new exterior look.
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Theory Audio Design Launches at CEDIA Expo 2019
Theory Audio Design is a new loudspeaker and electronics manufacturer from Lake Forest, CA, dedicated to combining acoustic performance and aesthetics in new audio products for the modern home. Founded by Paul Hales - a 30-year loudspeaker engineer, AV industry veteran, and owner of the highly regarded audio manufacturer Pro Audio Technology (PRO) - Theory products marry PRO's acoustic performance and professional features with sophisticated contemporary design at a much lower cost
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USB-IF Announces Publication of USB4 Specification that Doubles Bandwidth to Extend USB Type-C Performance
The USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the support organization for the advancement and adoption of USB technology, announced the publication of the USB4 specification. The USB4 is a major update to deliver the next-generation USB architecture that complements and builds upon the existing USB 3.2 and USB 2.0 architectures. The USB4 architecture is based on the Thunderbolt protocol specification contributed by Intel Corp. to the USB Promoter Group. It doubles the maximum aggregate bandwidth of USB and enables multiple simultaneous data and display protocols
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Denon Introduces PMA-150H Network-Enabled Integrated Amplifier and DAC
Denon announced its latest high-performance integrated network amplifier, the PMA-150H, directly targeting new generations who want to upgrade their listening experiences. The compact PMA-150 easily connects all popular digital and analog sources, including CD players, TVs, turntables, and USB devices. Its HEOS built-in technology enables users to access music over Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and wired Ethernet using the HEOS app, or streamed directly via Apple Airplay 2 and Spotify Connect
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Microchip Simplifies Power Delivery (PD) in Growing USB Type-C Charging Market
USB Type-C has become increasingly popular, and with the introduction of Power Delivery (PD), it is now possible to charge more types of devices - and charge faster - than ever before. To remove the traditional complexity and high costs associated with implementing USB Type-C, Microchip Technology announced two new USB-IF-certified USB 3.1 solutions that simplify USB Type-C PD for a range of applications. The new USB705x family also introduces unique PD implementations called HostFlexing and PDBalancing
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SEAS Launches New Prestige Titan L19RNX1 Woofer
SEAS Fabrikker continues to deliver on its promise to completely renew its product portfolio since the company revitalized its production, moving manufacturing from Taiwan to a new production line in Moss, Norway. Following the announcement in May 2019 of a completely new product size of woofer in the Excel Graphene Woofer Series, named the 19-series, SEAS has now launched the L19RNX1 (H1878-08) in the affordable Prestige Titan Series. The new L19RNX1 woofer was designed to respond to the challenges of high-res audio reproduction with improved clarity and dynamic capability
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Bryston Introduces BDA-3.14 Multi-Function Streaming DAC with Integrated Music Player
Bryston has introduced the BDA-3.14 multi-function DAC that adds an array of impressive features to its existing BDA-3 DAC platform. Delivering the level of performance and build quality that users expect from Bryston, the new DAC includes a built-in music player, onboard digital volume control and an updated user interface. The BDA-3.14 will be available from Bryston dealers beginning Q4, 2019 and carry an MSRP of $4,195 US
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A Year of Living with HRA Streaming
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Long before smartphones and Spotify, teens walked around with music in their pockets. Like Pandora today, the quality wasn't great but they were "your tunes," not some consultant's idea of "what kids want." It was 40 years ago in July that the TPS-L2 debuted, a dignified blue portable cassette player called the "Soundabout." The portable cassette player was the first of the legendary Walkman line. And 420 million Walkpeople later, that first $470 (in 2019 dollars) Sony ancestor changed the face of mobile music. 2019 has been a year of milestones. Some good, like the Walkman's birthday, and some... well, not so much.
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On July 1, 1979, Sony unleashed the Walkman TPS-L2, turning mobile music listening mainstream.
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MQA support by the CE industry, delivery platforms, and record labels has continued apace. With 325 MQA-encoded CDs now on the market and TIDAL's catalog of MQA-encoded "master" files growing to some one thousand albums, the new format is poised to become a viable alternative to bulky PCM or HRA FLAC delivery where file size or network payload carriage is tight. Live music streaming service nugs.net added MQA support this year, as has the China-exclusive on-demand streamer Xiami Music.
The wave of TIDAL buzz that crested on our shores back in 2018 has subsided a bit now that the Gallic Xandrie SA launched Qobuz in North America at this year's AXPONA show. I've been enjoying Qobuz for most of this year, and am pleased to report that TIDAL and Qobuz should not be thought of as duplicates. They are largely complementary. Though each offers strengths in genre-specific areas, their catalogs do overlap, especially for popular mainstream titles. For less poppy music, each provides a unique window into a world for which most music enthusiasts, in bygone days, could only pine. Whether it's Jazz, Musical Theater, Rap, World, Classical or Americana that trips your trigger, TIDAL and Qobuz both have something that will delight you.
Speaking of streaming, Primephonic has strategically realigned its offerings to focus on HRA Classical consumers, a niche-within-a-niche. With "...over 1 million classical tracks," and metadata tailored to the complex demands of classical, it's too soon to know if Primephonic will succeed but it certainly is well positioned. Last year saw the premier of OraStream's Brio, which offers streamed high-res content plus playback of local HRA files including DSD. OraStream provides the back end for Primephonic's streaming HRA service.
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Lossless 24-bit FLAC Streaming is now the top tier offered by Primephonic, the streaming service designed for classical music.
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However, all was not rosy this year, as Apple stuck to its insistence on distributing only lossy-encoded content from its now huge stock of higher-resolution lossless recordings. On August 7, Apple announced Apple Digital Masters, what appears to be a consumer-facing rebranding of its Mastered for iTunes program first started in 2012. FLAC already has spotty support in the Apple ecosystem, including some Apple TV models plus HomePod, iPhone 7, 8, and iPhone X. Could this mean we'll see FLAC support in the Apple Music app that's replacing iTunes in the upcoming macOS Catalina? Will Apple Music provide a Trojan horse "entrée" into Windows for ALAC now that it's open source? Will Apple start selling lossless music alongside its current lossy inventory? Only time and market forces will tell...
One format that clearly lost the consumer mindshare war this year, not that it ever had a chance, was the Pure Audio Blu-ray initiative led by Stefan Bock at msm-studios. Pure Audio Blu-ray was a valiant and well-designed attempt to address the hilarious blunders made by the DVD Forum and its DVD-Audio format. However, with no PR backing from the usual suspects, the audiophile masses (all 37 of us) were not made aware of the format's existence, and death ensued.
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OraStream's adaptive streaming supports native resolution at the maximum available bandwidth with extensive support for high-resolution audio formats, including FLAC.
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After three years of promotion by the Recording Academy's Producers & Engineers Wing along with gear makers and major labels, 2019 has finally seen widespread acceptance of HRA audio by the CE industry. With the sharp increase in appliance-level streamers from high-end manufacturers, casual audiophiles will have an ever wider range of choices in how they consume better quality audio. Hoorah!
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