O’Reilly — Review: Zoom H2 Handheld Surround Recorder

After tantalizing hints and a more tantalizing shipping delay, the Zoom H2 is finally here, promising digital surround-sound recording in the palm of your hand for only $199. Was it worth the wait? Well, let me say that it certainly lives up to its moniker: this is one Handy Recorder.

Link to Story

More info from O’Reilly related to surround sound. This is an older review of a hand-held four channel recorder. There are lots of links to other resources and lots of reaction from readers who are trying their own experiments with surround sound.

DIY Surround-Sound DVDs + Surround Sound from your Mac

Learn how to make 5.1-channel Dolby Digital DVDs at home without pricey pro software. Plus — a sneaky way to hook multiple speakers to a stock Mac.

Link to Story

David Battino has a bunch of cool tips related to surround sound and your Mac. There are a number of tips in here which are brand new to me. It’s great to see people thinking and talking about surround sound and the DIY and consumer level.

Pushback on HD Radio in AM: Citadel Turns off Nighttime AM

Criticisms of problems in using HD Radio encodings for AM stations date back to the earliest days of the technology: The FCC approved nighttime broadcasting of HD Radio over AM a few months ago, but there are still relatively few AM stations using HD Radio, and thus problems are only starting to emerge.
[snip]

Radio World reports that Citadel Broadcasting, which has HD Radio enabled on 16 of its 66 AM stations, decided to turn off the 10 stations that were broadcasting digital signals at night due to reports of interference. The problem occurs when listeners hear “hiss” and stations on nearby channels hear noise.

Link to Story

I first heard of this problem a couple of years ago while sitting in on a talk at the AES convention in NYC.

Congressional Support Grows for ‘White Spaces’ Wireless Mic Interests

The FCC has rescinded its October deadline for issuing new regulations governing use of the hotly-contested “white spaces” within the TV spectrum. Sandy LaMantia, president and CEO of Shure Inc., lauded the continuing efforts of a growing bipartisan group on Capitol Hill lending its support to wireless microphone interests.

Link to Story

Radiohead proves fans will pay for downloads

When Radiohead announced its recent ”pay what you want” album-downloading experiment, one of the first questions industry watchers had was whether the move might create a snowball effect and encourage other bands to do the same.
Link to Story

10 million is a pretty good payday. Bye bye record company.

THE REMIX TOP BAKER’S DOZEN FROM AES 2007

Traditionally, the annual (American) convention of the Audio Engineering Society (AES) has been the playground for the recording industry elite, who labor behind Lexus-length SSL and Neve boards in multi-million dollar studios, rather than tiny MIDI controllers tucked into cramped bedrooms. You could think of AES as a luxury box at the Kentucky Derby as opposed to a NASCAR parking lot (which would represent, say, clearance day at your local pawn shop).

However, in the last few years, the AES show has been gaining steam as the “other NAMM” for computer-based project and home studios, an epicenter of music technology as companies such as the aforementioned SSL and Neve have started to adapt their products for the smaller-studio, computer-centric world.

Link to Story

New PlayStation3 to snub SACD

Super Audio CD, Sony’s favoured high resolution audio format, has suffered a significant blow with the news that SACD compatibility will be dropped from the new, cheaper PlayStation 3.

Link to Story | Source Home

I’d think the format would have to be significant first in order to suffer a significant blow ;-]

123rd AES Convention Reports from Sonic State

SonicState.com – a site oriented toward musicians – has a bunch of reports from the 123rd AES Convention in NYC. There are text stories but also a fair number of video reports from the convention floor with reps talking about their new products.

New games audio file format in the works

Interactive XMF spec to be presented at Audio Engineering Society Convention.

A new file format for games audio is to be unveiled at this weekend’s Audio Engineering Society Convention in New York.The iXMF (interactive XMF) spec is billed as “the first non-proprietary solution for distributing audio assets with associated behavior rules”.

Link to Story