Kevin Bresnahan

If you got the money, there is a solution to add a headphone jack to any audio gear with line outputs. $399 is the price you'll pay.

Unfortunately, Chesky is not very well distributed around my area. I've only found them at one store, Integrity 'N Music in CT. I have the Hazeltine and I agree that it is one of his best dates. The SACD layer sounds phenomenal. I want to pick up several more of these. Maybe after Christmas.

I have a 36" Sony 4:3 CRT XBR TV now. I've become an HD junkie. I watch it almost exclusively. Georgeous picture. Unfortunately, the 16:9 picture is only 33" diagonal. It's big, but I want bigger. The biggest 16:9 CRT TV ever made (and still being made) is a 34" by Sony. When you pillar box a 4:3 show, it's 22" diagonal. Microscopic. BTW, Sony still makes a non-XBR 4:3 36" diagonal CRT. If you don't need or want one bigger, it's a great bargain at less than $900. Be aware that it weighs 216 lbs (75 kg)! Kevin

I'm agonizing over this very thing right now. Rear projection TV, especially Sony's SXRD set, can have great pictrure quality. However, their off-axis viewing, both vertical & horizontal, leave much to be desired. They all suffer it to some degree and many truly stink unless you're sitting dead center in front of the thing. To me, here's the differences between LCD and plasma. LCD Pluses 1) No burn-in - LCD can burn in images; I've done it on a PC monitor at work. But it takes much much longer than a plasma. 2) No reflections in a brightly-lit room 3) Less power than a plasma 4) No burn-in - Watch 4:3 SD channels with side bars 5) Long life - Replaceable back-lighting can extend the TV's life 6) No burn-in - Play games with static images without worry. 7) Beautiful picture 8) Can be used as a PC monitor. 9) Decent viewing angle - Maybe > 100 degrees off axis and you still have a good picture. Not great, but watchable. 10) No burn-in - Did I mention burn-in? Minuses 1) Poor pixel response time - Even with today's 4-8 ms response time, I still see "motion blur" in every LCD TV today. This is particularly annoying with sports. Watch the sidelines during a football game. They blur on LCD. They shouldn't. 2) Poor blacks - Blacks look "gray", particularly in a dark room. The darker the room, the more the backlight has to work, lightening the overall picture, including "black". Plasma Pluses 1) Beautiful picture - Truly amazing picture on many of these TVs. 2) No motion blur - Although some people can see another artifact, which I think is from plasma's "pixel shifting", that can annoy them as much as motion blur 3) Great off-axis picture. Just like a CRT TV. You can still see the picture even if you're 179 degrees off axis. Minuses 1) Burn-in - Although the latest sets have nearly eliminated this problem, you still have to run the set for about 100-200 hours with a constantly changing screen. 2) Power hog - Most plasmas use about 1/3 more power than the same size LCD. In the size I'm looking (46"-50"), the Pioneer 5070 is very good, using only 351 Watts. The Panasonic plasmas are above 500 Watts. 3) Glare - Glass screen. Reflections in a brightly lit room can be distracting. 4) Not good for gaming - Burn-in potential 5) Life - ? Supposedly, they've upped the life expectency of plasma to 60,000 hours. The thing is, by then the phosphors will be so dim, who would want to watch the thing? You can't recharge a plasma screen. I go back & forth between the Pioneer 5070 plasma (5071 at Best Buy) and the Mitsubishi LT-46131 LCD. Motion blur annoys me a lot. I watch a lot of football. I am going to go watch some football on the Mitsu to see how bad the motion blur is. If it's as bad as it has been on the Sony, Sharp & Samsung LCDs, I'll likely go with the Pioneer plasma. BTW, regarding your inquiry about a "pure" monitor. This seems popular in the plasma industry, but not so in the LCD world. Almost all the LCDs are TVs. Kevin

I love the Johnny Hodges set. It is probably my favorite Mosaic right, but just by a bit. I may even buy a second box as a back-up. Later, Kevin

Well, I got one for all you... if he's not crazy for planning to do this, am I crazy for going with him? God, we're gonna be wrecked the next day. I don't care how old you are, you gotta get sleep. But it'll be worth it for this special night. I remember pulling regular all-nighters in college. How did I do that?

Tascam's CD-RW750 is one of the most affordable Tascams out there. It is discontinued so act now. They also offer a Hi Rez recorder, the DV-RA1000 that even records in DSD, the SACD format. Too bad it won't "make" an SACD out of this DSD recorded disc, but still, it has potential. Denon & Tascam still seem like the best of the bunch right now. Too bad about the HHB. It was "the one" for quite a while. Kevin

Times have changed since this thread was started. Word is that HHB was bought by Sennheiser and the quality has plummeted. I would stick with Denon or Tascam if I were to buy a CD burner right now. Tascam is a "professional" unit, meaning it doesn't have SCMS and can use PC blanks. That pushes it to the front of the pack. However, it is expensive. Kevin

Can you hear Mark Elf's Keith Jarrett-like whining? Great guitarist but the whining drives me crazy. Don't sit near the stage.

Michael Cuscuna may have been in charge of the reissues in 1980 when this was released on LP, but I wonder if it wasn't someone else who worked on it. Michael's made it clear enough that he doesn't think this session is "Blue Note material". That's why he let Water reissue it. He didn't want to. It's OK, but I'd certainly grab one of Harold's Contemporary CDs over this one any day. Later, Kevin

When I was a kid, Mitch Miller's Christmas sing-alongs were our family favorites. They were easy to sing along with since it was about 40 guys singing at full volume. No matter how badly you sang with them, they would easily cover your boo boos. BTW, this thread is bumming me out incredibly. In the past few years, I've burned a lot of old C&W stuff for my Dad. He was a huge Hank Williams fan. When he first asked for my help, I used to gack at some of the stuff he had me convert from LP to CD. Since his death in July, I no longer have this onerous task. I wish I still did.

A .pdf cannot infect your computer (as far as I know) but the term "self-extracting" is scary, scary. That means the file is an .exe file. NEVER click ANY .exe files! All .exe files? I think my Nikon View shortcut desk icon is an .exe -- that's a bad thing? Never click any .exe files in E-mails. There are other extensions that can do damage as well, but .exe is easy to spot. About the only file that I open in E-mails is .jpg files.

But John, they most certainly do! All you have to do is forward that e-mail to spoof@bestbuy.com. Believe me, they will shut down any websites linked to that e-mail. They will likely send you a nice "Thank you" e-mail as well. NO! Even if you KNOW the sender, do not open ANY .exe attachments unless you speak with the person over the phone to find out what they sent. Many viruses send themselves out via E-mails to everyone on the infected person's address book. The E-mail from a "friend" may be from the virus. Later, Kevin

A .pdf cannot infect your computer (as far as I know) but the term "self-extracting" is scary, scary. That means the file is an .exe file. NEVER click ANY .exe files! Definitely a nasty spammer. I shudder to think what that attachment would install. It's probably a keylogger. Keyloggers are getting more & more prevalent. These applications record everything you type and send it to the thieves, who go through it looking for usernames and passwords. FWIW, I was very upset when my Mom decided to get off the web when my father died. Now, given how poor her PC skills are, and how prevalent these scams are getting, I am so glad she made this decision. One less PC mess I have to fix. Later, Kevin

I have seen both and I have a copy of the artwork. I bought the John Hardee CD that came out at the same time (called "Tired"), but I didn't buy these because I had the material on the Classics CD and I didn't feel I needed the alternates. I'd love to go back in time and get those now. I just love the way the Japanese remastered stuff back around then. Kevin

A Tina Brooks two-fer - "The Waiting Game" combined with "Minor Move". Oh, wait a minute... Wayne Shorter - Adam's Apple, Eve's Plum (you have to be over 35 to get it) Stanley Turrentine - My Prostate Never Lets Me Go Larry Young With Cannonball Adderley - Into Somethin' Else

Grant Green - Am I Blue Or Is It Just Cold In Here?

That was great! Love stuff like this. Too bad work blocks youtube.com or else I could show it to some co-workers. Later, Kevin

PM sent with questions on: * Sonny Rollins - East Broadway Run Down (UCCI 9076) * Charles Mingus - The Black Saint And the Sinner Lady (UCCI 9077) * Milt Jackson - Jazz n' Samba (UCCI 9087) Kevin PS. In case anyone here knows, are these the gatefold mini-LPs? I think these came out in the late '90s.

I heard she went on to sing in Boyd Rayburn's band.

I have to wonder if this isn't just Miles's heirs trying to extend their copyright control. If they release "Kind of Blue" with some digitally mixed in crap, the copyright, set to expire in 2061, would now expire 70 years from the death of whoever adds the crap. They could do this with every recording Miles ever did and extend the copyright ad infinitum. From the US government's website (http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html#hlc): "A work that was created (fixed in tangible form for the first time) on or after January 1, 1978, is automatically protected from the moment of its creation and is ordinarily given a term enduring for the author’s life plus an additional 70 years after the author’s death. In the case of “a joint work prepared by two or more authors who did not work for hire,” the term lasts for 70 years after the last surviving author’s death." Belden himself got burned by this. He made a Jazz version of Puccini's "Turandot" for Blue Note, figuring it would be out of copyright since Puccini died in 1924. It turns out that "Turandot" was finished by Franco Alfano, who died in 1954. So Puccini's estate (why Puccini's estate and not Alfano's estate?) controls "Turandot" until 2029. Kevin

Correct Clem. I just can't believe a guy like Hoffman (god to some here) doesn't know his shit. Chuck, I just went over and re-read that thread, including the question on post 29 and Hoffman's answer on post 30. What's wrong with his answer? He simply says that raised area on the LP comes, "During the "squashing" of the vinyl to the stamper." If what you're saying is that the stamper is contoured to include the raised middle and edge, what's wrong with saying that these edges are formed "during the "squashing" of the vinyl to the stamper"? Are they not formed then? BTW, I'm not defending Hoffman at all here, as I agree with you that he's garnered a bit too much of a rep as some kind of audio God when he's really just a mastering engineer. However, I just don't see where this thread exposes him as a fraud. The guy has definitely been there when they press LPs. He talks about it often. If what he's reporting is wrong or different from what you've seen, it could be that the process RTI is using today is different that it used to be. Just to be clear, I was only referring to that thread so that people here could click the youtube.com links. I couldn't verify them yesterday at work (I fixed them last night). I think those videos are pretty cool to watch. I never knew how an LP was made. I never intended to bring this thread's conversation over here. I don't like doing that. Chuck, if you want, feel free to take this to PM. I don't need to pollute Jim's board with this stuff. Later, kevin

Hoffman's rep is built on his mastering skills. Nothing to do with pressing LPs. Most of his LPs are pressed by Kevin Gray. I imagine most of what he knows, or doesn't know, is from watching Gray at work. Kevin

On the Steve Hoffman forums, Hoffman posted a www.youtube.com link that had two very good videos showing how records are cut. You should watch them. I can't check the links at work any more (www.youtube.com is blocked) but the links were: Part 1: and Part 2: Later, Kevin

Mount the external hardrive and then it's a simple "Copy & Paste" operation. I prefer to use Windows Explorer for this. To open Windows Explorer, simply put your mouse over the "Start" button on the taskbar, click the right mouse button, and select "Explore". Unce "My Computer", you should see your C: drive (where the files currently reside) as well as the external drive, which could be mounted as D:, E:, F:, etc. - depending on how many other drives are in your system. With Windows Explorer, "Copy & Paste" is "Drag & Drop", which I find much easier. BTW, if these .wma files are protected with DRM, they won't work on another machine unless you re-acquire the licenses. If you copy them over to an external hardrive and try to open them on another machine, it has to be mounted on the Internet to acquire those licenses. I refuse to use .wma for just this reason. .mp3 is fine with me. Kevin