ctober was a sad month for the audio community as we mourned the passing of Jim Thiel. Kathy Gornik, president of Thiel Audio, released the following statement concerning the company’s future.

While this is undeniably a very sad time for us at Thiel, having lost not only one of the best audio engineers in the world but also a great man who was so very dear to us, we recognize how fortunate we are that he left us such a rich legacy. Jim was our polestar -- always insisting on the highest of standards in virtually every aspect of our endeavors. Rest assured, Thiel will continue to forge full steam ahead. We have enlisted a team of talented engineers who have been charged with applying Jim Thiel’s advanced driver, crossover, and cabinet designs to future products, several of which are already in the pipeline. We are very fortunate that Jim carefully documented all of his research and design parameters, giving us three decades of legendary achievements from which to base the company’s bright future. Beginning with some very exciting new-product introductions slated for 2010, Thiel will continue to showcase leading-edge products that have been engineered and built to the highest standards.

From everyone at Thiel, we would like to thank all of our wonderful industry friends and customers for the amazing outpouring of support you have shown us. It has meant more to us than you could know, and we are so grateful to be a part of such a wonderful community. We look forward to working and prospering with all of you in the coming years.

A memorial for Jim will be held at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show, in January. A celebration to honor the life and work of Jim Thiel will be held Thursday, January 7; details to follow.

In our previous coverage of the Sony PlayStation 3 120GB, we didn’t mention that the newer, slimmer, more energy-efficient version of the Blu-ray-capable gaming console is the first PS3 that can output Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio bitstreams. This means that the native bitstreams of these audio codecs can be output by the PS3 for decoding by a receiver or processor, rather than being transcoded to PCM by the PS3. This hardware-based limitation of earlier PS3s was one of the few knocks against it. The PS3 250GB, scheduled to be launched November 3, will presumably have the same capability.

If you own a Logitech Squeezebox, you can preview Queen’s new hits compilation, Absolute Greatest, free until its official release on November 16. Owners of certain Squeezebox models will also be able to access track-by-track commentaries by bandmembers Brian May and Roger Taylor, as well as exclusive band photos. Just select the "Queen" application in the Squeezebox’s Apps menu to preview the new album. Queen fans who don’t own a Squeezebox can download the commentary track for "Bohemian Rhapsody" in WAV format at Logitech’s website.

SoundStage! BackStage! No.126

Hi-Fi Centre, one of Vancouver’s premier high-end audio stores, celebrated its 25th anniversary last month with a gala event featuring representatives of many manufacturers and distributors demonstrating their latest products. The event was attended by SoundStage! Network writers Vince Hanada and Aron Garrecht, and Associate Editor Roger Kanno.

Some of the highlights included a state-of-the-art home-theater system comprising Classé’s SSP-800 surround processor and new CT-series power amplifiers, B&W 800-series loudspeakers, and Wolf Cinema’s stunning DCX projection system. While their newest components were being demoed in the big home-theater system, Dave Nauber, Executive Vice President of Classé, was demonstrating B&W’s classic Nautilus speakers amplified by eight channels of their Delta series of amplifiers. There was also a top-flight system comprising Vienna Acoustics The Music speakers, McIntosh electronics, and what Transparent Audio’s Brad O’Toole described as "about $80,000 worth of our Opus-series cables."

Naim Audio’s Ovator S-600 speakers, which we made a ShowStopper in our recent coverage of the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, were on display with a new Naim component, a DAC that’s expected to be available starting in November for about $4400 CDN. The Naim DAC includes an Apple Authentication Chip that allows it to recognize the digital output of an Apple iPod connected to its front or rear USB port. Not only that, the DAC is said to be able to play WAV files with sampling frequencies of up to 768kHz from storage devices connected via USB. The demo included 24-bit/352.8kHz DXD WAV files of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, played from a USB thumb drive.

Some of the best sounds of the evening were provided by a smaller system comprising Vienna Acoustics Beethoven Concert Grand speakers and McIntosh electronics, the latter including the new MEN220 room-correction system ($4500 USD), demonstrated by Ron Cornelius of McIntosh. This extremely flexible component, which uses RoomPerfect technology licensed from Lyngdorf, not only tightened up the bass in the small demo room, it also extended the depth and width of the soundstage and focused the imaging. And with its separate high- and low-pass filters, the MEN220 can be used as a crossover for biamping speakers or integrating subwoofers into a system. Response curves can be customized by the user with the PC interface, and the room correction can be optimized for a specific listening position or for a larger, "global" area. The MEN220 is an analog, two-channel-only component with balanced and single-ended inputs and outputs.

Until next month . . .

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