Category Archives: Testing

A Letter to a PR Company

Posted on February 11, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

Today I sent an email in the following terms today to a PR company for a large TV manufacturer: Meanwhile, I know you guys have just started this account, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to make a suggestion. … Continue reading →

Posted in Admin, Equipment, Rant, Testing, Video | Leave a comment

Black to Grey

Posted on February 10, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

Hmmm. Jez Ford has drawn my attention to this article on CNET, which says that the black levels of Panasonic plasma TVs become less black over time. It’s all a bit vague, but it seems to be saying that the … Continue reading →

Posted in Equipment, Testing, Video | 2 Comments

The Perils of Double Blind Testing

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

While in Japan I had an interesting discussion on whether or not one can hear the differences in cables. I am not in the ‘can hear a difference’ camp. To quote from one of my own articles: The first and … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio, Mysticism, Rant, Testing | 2 Comments

Yes, it is louder

Posted on September 11, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Earlier in the week I remarked on the the live Pink Floyd release, ‘Pulse’, on DVD. You may recall that this has the surround soundtrack in two formats: 448kbps (the maximum specified for DVD) and 640kbps (the maximum specified for … Continue reading →

Posted in Disc details, DVD, Testing | 1 Comment

BD-Live Travails

Posted on September 4, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Here’s an email I sent last night to ‘BD-Live Help’. I mentioned here a while back how my BD-Live logon with The Da Vinci Code had failed. I whinged to Sony’s PR company at the product launch mentioned in the … Continue reading →

Posted in BD-Live, Blu-ray, Testing | Leave a comment

Blu-ray Error handling

Posted on September 2, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Early this year I foolishly purchased a Blu-ray disc from one of those shops that insist on opening the sealed cases. It wasn’t until a couple of weeks ago that I got around to doing anything with the disc, and … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Testing | Leave a comment

Oppo BDP-83 Blu-ray – the standard source

Posted on August 26, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

For the past year or more I’ve had on long term loan from Sony Computer Entertainment a Sony Playstation 3. This has been the source I’ve been primarily using for my Blu-ray reviews. At the time, the PS3 was the … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Testing | Leave a comment

Firmware updates

Posted on July 23, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

I go out to my office this morning, planning to finish off my combo review of the two new Panasonic Blu-ray players, the DMP-BD60 and the DMP-BD80. I switch on the system. The BD60 is plugged in at the moment. … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Equipment, Testing | Leave a comment

Over-rating our capabilities

Posted on June 24, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Subjective assessment of home entertainment equipment is important because there are characteristics of performance which aren’t well conveyed through measurements. I am not saying that these things aren’t captured by the measurements (thoroughly and carefully conducted); merely that few people … Continue reading →

Posted in Imperfect perception, Mysticism, Rant, Testing, Video | Leave a comment

Expectations destroy results

Posted on June 22, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Later, experimenters at Caltech felt that Feynman’s very presence exerted a sort of moral pressure on their findings and methods. He was mercilessly skeptical. He loved to talk about the famous oil-drop experiment of Caltech’s first great physicist Robert Millikan, … Continue reading →

Posted in Mysticism, Testing | Leave a comment