Widescreen Reviewphile —Good Grief!
Dear Gary I’m writing this letter as a response to Richard Hardesty’s CEDIA Expo 2000 article. At the end of the article Mr. Hardesty asks people to write to him about whether or not Widescreen Review should start including “audiophile” audio coverage in addition to its current HT coverage. I say—NO! It would take the Screen out of the Widescreen Review. I think that Widescreen Review should stay true to its CORE mission of the state of the art in home theatre. I think that expanding your coverage to include Stereophileesque topics is WAY beyond the scope of the magazine and will ultimately hurt the excellent coverage you provide geared toward home theatre. I don’t want to bash Stereophile or audiophiles but they do represent a niche market. To say they represent a “large” market is wholly subjective and frankly quite laughable. To include “audiophile” set ups in your magazine would be a niche within a niche. Widescreen Review transcends that. Would it be interesting to see? Possibly, BUT, it definitely isn’t worth the quality loss that would undoubtedly happen to the rest of your coverage and would be much too theoretical for me. Additionally, what is it with audiophiles anyway? Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for good audio, however, they seem to always want to push what they deem as “realistic” on the rest of the world. If I want realism I go to the symphony or to another kind of concert. Then, between the rude people, and the parking hassles it’s all the reality I can take for another year. When I’m home watching a movie I want to be taken to another place ENTIRELY. I want my movie experience to transcend reality not to be constrained by it. Movies should be larger than life. A realistic frontal soundstage would undoubtedly take much of the “Magic” out of MY home theatre experience! I implore you, please do NOT add audiophile coverage to Widescreen Review.
Fred Danowski,
Equipment Review Editor/Special Projects Editor Shane Buettner Comments:
I think you misunderstand Dick Hardesty’s CEDIA article. The ideas expressed in Dick’s CEDIA article are entirely within Widescreen Review’s “CORE mission.” His point is indeed that we should pursue the state-of-the-art “best it can be” experience in home theatre, but that state-of-the-art is not what the current THX acolytes are selling to people. They’re pushing inferior gear, set up in an inferior fashion that uses all sorts of electronic shenanigans to recreate the movie theatre in your home. If this is your goal and you only watch movies such a system will be fine for you. But the movie theatre is an undoubtedly low-fi target that will leave music listeners unsatisfied. According to Widescreen Review’s latest readers poll 84 percent of our readers say they listen to music in their home theatres. Dick’s point is that 84 percent of our readers may not be
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