BACKLIST
:— Future
perfect?
‘We’ve seen the future of home entertainment and it’s called Betamax; no, sorry, it’s laser disc; er, we think it might be DAT.’ Eddie Gibb looks at CD-i, the latest technology threatening to revolutionise your living room. And right, a former
hi-fi salesman confesses.
Aside from the odd scare about the cardboard packaging corroding CDs, the hi-fi buying public appears to have accepted that vinyl is virtually dead. lt‘s increasingly difficult to buy a record these days outside the impenetrable world of dance white labels. But it took a while for people to be convinced that CD was here to stay. For every gadget junkie that wants to own the latest gizmo as soon as it’s available, there are five sceptics who‘ll hang back to see which way the market jumps. ‘Remember Betarnax videos,‘ they‘ll comment sagely.
For a while DAT (Digital Audio
U
‘ 41594 BM: home entertainment in a box
Cassette) looked like a contender but seems to have found a good home in professional recording studios. There were allegations that major record corporations were blocking its progress in the domestic market because they didn’t care for the prospect of punters making perfect copies of each other’s CDs. Some shops are stocking DCC (Digital Compact Cassette) but as an upgrade for ordinary cassette decks, rather than an alternative to CD players.
It looks as ifCD will be the dominant form for buying pre-recorded music in the foreseeable future, so ifyou’re holding back waiting for the next big thing, it‘s a long way off. But there is something you should know about, and it's called CD-i. The ‘i‘ is for ‘interactive‘ and CD stands for, well, CD. That‘s the first point to make clear. You can play your ordinary music CDs on a CD-i player, so this a development
HI-FI
of an existing system. rather than an entirely new format.
But boy, what a development — we‘re talking CD with moving pictures, so you can buy movies on this format. And games. That‘s why it‘s such a big deal, because a single piece of technology has taken CD-i into territory already occupied by CD. video and computer games. three major developments which have revolutionised home entertainment. You can't record using CD-i, so the video recorder hasn‘t reached the end ofthe road. but hi-fi and video mags are rating the quality of pre-recorded films on CD very highly. ‘After watching CDs, [pre-recorded videos] start to look like very old technology.‘ reported What Hi-Fi? recently.
The Philips CDiZIO costs about £400. plus you‘ll need a Digital Video Cartridge at £150 to play full-length movies. At the moment. the software available is limited and serious games players say the packages available on CD-i are no competition for Sega and Nintendo systems. And if you‘re only interested in playing music, CD-i is a bit pointless. ‘It‘s not the best £600 Cl) player you can buy, and will be shown up by the better £300 machines on the market when used as a music-player. but it‘s consistently listenablc.' according to What Hi-I"i?. However if you listen to music and buy videos and fancy playing a few games, it’s worth having a look at this all-in-one box of tricks. (Eddie Gibb)
EIIIIIII Off the
record
‘The new Muzakai Cl) 303-203 represents excellent value in its price range,’ says the salesmen earnestly. ‘In fact,’ and here comes the clincher, ‘I use this one myself.’ Blimey, it must be alright then. Really?
One tonner salesman (we’ll call him John) maintains that people who work in hi-fi shops can usually be relied on to give an honest opinion.
‘There were times when the manager would say, “We’ve bought a lot of this and we’ve got to shift it”,’ remembers John. ‘But it’s less dishonest than people think. Often you spend time trying to stop people buying crap.’
Some shops do stock a few dodgy items, partly to emphasise the quality of the good equipment for the cloth- cared punter, explains John. Another reason is that while Muzakai’s 0|) players are excellent, its amps are dogs - but the shop has to stock the lot.
[in you have to parler hi-fi to buy it? ‘We would have competitions to see who could talk the most bullshit to a customer who fancied himself as a bit of a buff,’ he recalls. If a salesman tries to tell you your speakers will sound better with the cables are running north-south due to the earth’s polarity, he’s definiter bullshitting.
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