News

Late August news bites: Texas">http://www.ti.com/">Texas Instruments announced August 25 the completion of its acquisition of chipmaker Burr-Brown">http://www.burr-brown.com/">Burr-Brown Corporation in a stock swap. Burr-Brown is highly regarded in the audio industry for its low-noise, high-speed digital/analog converters and digital signal-processing (DSP) ICs. The company also makes ultra-high-quality analog components, a segment of the semiconductor industry expected to grow by 25% in the coming year, according to industry analyst Dataquest.

Last week, BMG">http://www.bmgentertainment.com/">BMG Entertainment, the music and entertainment division of Bertelsmann">http://www.bertelsmann.de/">Bertelsmann AG, revealed that it will join several other major labels (see previous stories EMIhttp://www.stereophile.com/news/10798/">EMI; and Universalhttp://www.stereophile.com/news/10814/">Universal;) by bringing its own digital downloads to the Internet this September. The company says that it will start with approximately 50 songs and 50 complete albums, to be made available via several retail Web outlets at prices ranging from $1.98 to $3.49 per song and from $9.98 to $16.98 per album.

The Secure">http://www.sdmi.org/">Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) will soon move into Phase II of its evaluation of digital audio watermarking, following listening tests conducted in early July at Sony's Whitfield Street Studios in London and administered by Sony VP of engineering Malcolm Davidson. A soon-to-be-published report from Paul Jessop of the International">http://www.ifpi.org/">International Federation of Phonograph Industries reveals that the participants in the tests—almost all of them audio-industry professionals or journalists—averaged just slightly better than 50% in their abilities to detect the watermarks.

Chicago's Maxwell Street district is considered by many to be the birthplace of Chicago blues. But the old neighborhood is in danger of permanently losing some of its historic buildings, thanks to expansion plans by the University">http://www.uic.edu/">University of Illinois at Chicago. The potential loss of the neighborhood has sparked protests by a coalition of blues musicians, including a hunger strike by 69-year-old APO">http://www.acousticsounds.com/">APO Records artist Jimmie Lee Robinson.

Audiophiles aren't taking to the streets just yet, but John Atkinson is more than a little riled about the proposed watermarking of SACD and DVD-Audio recordings. In this month's "As We See It," "Watermarking:">http://www.stereophile.com//asweseeit/257/">Watermarking: the Devil's Work!," JA exhorts the audiophile masses to rise up in protest.

Want to do some audiophile shopping and do some good for others? The">http://www.fatwyre.com">The Cable Company, along with several manufacturers and audiophile publications, have set up a program by which they offer to donate up to 10% of August purchases to CARE and the International Rescue Committee, these contributions to be used to assist the worldwide disaster-relief efforts of those humanitarian organizations.

When a manufacturer makes extraordinary claims about a product, the result is sometimes an extraordinary review. That's what happened when Jonathan Scull examined the Richard">http://www.stereophile.com//accessoryreviews/255/">Richard Gray's Power Company 400S AC line conditioner last June. His report raised a chorus of reader and industry reactions, all of them included here along with some additional unpublished observations.