Wednesday, January 22, 2014

My Home Audio Equipment Throughout The Years

When I was younger, even though we didn't have that much money, we still had a nice home audio system. This was the early nineties and CDs still had different quality levels of digital recording. My father played Bach loudly on his home audio equipment, and sometimes he mixed in rock 'n' roll. I didn't like the classical music at first, although today I love it.
Growing up, music was important. By the time I was buying my own CDs, my room was a haven. I had my own bathroom, a big bed, colorful lighting and a stereo with a remote control I used whenever there were commercials on the radio or a song came on I didn't like. It wasn't the best home audio system but it worked for me. Then we moved and my stereo became fuzzy and broken with age. I inherited my father's home audio equipment with its still-powerful Japanese speakers and slick black design.
I listened to music loudly during my teenage years, as do most teenagers, but then the iPod came out. This was a different beast. Music was no longer on discs, it was on computer files. So are you telling me I have to convert all my CDs onto my computer? Fine. Ever since then it has been less about buying albums and more about downloading tracks. I still value and treasure my home audio system, but instead of the individual player and receiver I had when I was in high school, I use my computer as my dock. I've invested in nice speakers still, so I have good home audio speakers, but I no longer listen to the radio. What about music in the future?
I want to be able to plug in an iPod or whatever music device I have to a wall in my home and have my home audio speakers blast it throughout the house, according to which rooms I allow it. Same goes for the car. There will be a music subscription service that plays whatever music you want, while also having access to your personal collection, and you will be able to bump it over your automotive electronics. This may take ten years or so but the future will be glorious when it comes. If there's anything I was taught while growing up, it's that music is powerful. It can make you feel better when you're having a tough time, and there's always something to match what you're doing. That's why it's important to invest in it and reap the benefits for years.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Home Audio System

It's a secret to no one that we live in the era of a fast developing technology. At present we use dozens of home gadgets every day. We take advantage of micro ovens, toasters, vacuum cleaners, DVDs, cell phones, etc; I can continue to name different gadgets for at least half an hour. Some of these gadgets make our life easier and more comfortable, like mobile phones, for instance; some of them save us a lot of time that we can spend on doing more pleasant things (I mean washing machines, vacuum cleaners, toasters and so on); but some of them have been created to entertain people and to make their lives more joyous, for example TV sets, DVDs and home speaker theater systems.
I spend a great deal of my spare time in front of my laptop and watching a TV set, I use micro oven every day and every evening I turn on my new home audio system that I received several weeks ago for my birthday.
I have an audio system that is made for an iPod. It's a bit big, but it doesn't matter for me, because I have quite a large room and enough space to allow myself to have such an audio system. There's also a USB port so I can charge and/or sync my iPod from it (it's a great advantage for me). You can connect other devices to it, as well, but not an iPhone, it doesn't work with iPhones, because it wasn't made for that.
My audio system is grey and black; it is almost all metal, with thick plastic mounting brackets for the two speakers. The separately packed tower speakers connect to the system with a special connector. With a small twist, the home audio system speakers are steadily in place. The modern floor-standing design may not appeal to some, but I really adore the minimalist approach to its chassis.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Simple Audio Secrets - Setting Up Your Home Audio Production Studio

Audio education production is a phrase that can be looked at in two ways. Let me explain what I mean:
  1. Audio education production can be a way of describing how to implement audio in the production of education video.
  2. Audio education production can be a way of producing videos that focus on the education methodology that focuses on techniques that are best for people who learn through listening.
There are different ways of learning including visual, verbal, physical, and aural. Some people learn better and faster with aural teaching. Others learn and retain more when they can use several senses at the same time. What this means is that when you are producing a video, you need to consider both the end-user and how important your audio is to this listener.As for education on how to best use audio in video production, do not overlook the importance of using good equipment and the right words. You would think twice about creating a website to sell your products with cheesy looking graphics. You should be just as careful about educating yourself on the proper methods of getting the best voice over on your video.
What, you ask, do I have to do to gear up for audio education for video production? Here are some guidelines that offer a good starting place.
Some people just do not have the voice for audio production. Tape your own voice and listen to it. While we tend to be critical of our own voice, try to be objective. Do you speak clearly? If you are not sure, ask someone else to listen to it and give you feedback on whether they can understand what you are saying.
If your voice passes the grade, the next step is to use the best microphone you can afford. Even if your voice is perfect, cracks and snaps and burbles will not make the listening experience pleasant.
The voice is okay. The microphone is okay. The next step is to make sure that the message delivered is crisp, clear, and concise. The best voice and the best sound will not compensate for a rambling voice on your video.
If you get the first type of audio education mastered, your videos will be able to deliver the kind of audio needed for the second type of audio education.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

How To Repair Compaq 17" LCD Monitor

The complaint of this 17" Compaq LCD Monitor was shutdown after few seconds to few minutes. That means the display sometime will shutdown in few seconds while sometime it will shutdown in couple of minutes. When there is a display the picture worked perfectly good until it shutdown. The first thing one would normally suspect is the defective backlight. For your information, a bad or a weak backlight can cause such problem and dry joints may also contribute to the cause of the fault.
Since I have a spare backlight, I swapped the LCD backlight with the working one. It is easy to do it, just remove the existing backlight connector and connect the good backlight connector to it. I have tested one by one the backlight and the result was the LCD Monitor still shutdown intermittently. This has proved both of the LCD Monitor backlights are okay! So now my concentration is looking for any dry joints in the LCD Monitor.
I put back all the internal metal casing like original except the main cover and switch "ON" the LCD Monitor. While at my left hand holding the LCD Monitor, my right hand holding the shaft of the screw driver, I began to gently knock on the LCD Monitor internal metal casing with the handle of the screw driver. The moment I 'hit' it, the LCD Monitor went straight into shutdown. Wow! From the test I believe you would have known what is the cause of the LCD shutdown-it was dry joint.
Opening up the casing again, you can clearly see three boards i.e. the power/inverter board, audio board and the Main board. I only suspect the power/inverter board because this is the board that controls the backlights. What I did was resoldered all the components in the inverter area except the SMD components because SMD components rarely have dry joints.
When I power "On" the LCD Monitor and hit it with the handle of the screw driver, the Monitor again went into shutdown. I told myself "it can't be" but anyway I have a very high confident that the fault must be in the inverter area and not in Main board or power board. Next, I carefully hold the LCD panel and use a test pen to lift up the corner of the inverter board and power "On" the Monitor. Guess what happen? The Monitor did not shut down even though I 'hit' a little bit hard on the metal casing. This again proved that the problem is somewhere in the inverter area.
I opened up again the metal casing and carefully scanned through all of the components in the inverter area-it look like I have already applied fresh solder to it. It was only the feedback circuit that have SMD components that I haven't solder. I used a magnifier glass to check if there are any dry joints in all of the feedback components but I don't see any. I went ahead to resolder all of the SMD components in the feedback circuit and power "On" the Monitor. To my surprised, the LCD Monitor no more shutting down no matter which way or how I tapped the LCD Monitor with the handle of the screwdriver. I put the LCD Monitor for many hours of burn in test and it just worked great. I have sent back the LCD Monitor to my customer and till now after couples of days there is no call from my customer.
Conclusion - Do not overlooks the dry joints in SMD components. Every part in the electronic board can be a suspect. Hope from this article you can get some ideas about solving intermittent problem in LCD Monitor.

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Home Audio Speakerss s

Sound, also perceived as the sense of hearing, is an integral part of our lives. Without the ability to hear or reproduce sound we are not complete. Sound is the vibrations that travel through air and can be sensed by our ears. Thus it is a medium of communication. It is used to gather information and knowledge about properties of the environment surrounding us. Sound can travel through air, water, and solids. These help sound waves travel and are known as medium. In normal conditions, human can hear a varied frequency range. But, sometimes we need to amplify the sound output for better quality of hearing. This requires the help of speakers.
Speakers are devices, which convert electromagnetic signals into sound vibrations. Thus speakers are machines that enable us to hear sounds, which have their origin somewhere else. Speakers, also termed as loudspeakers are attached to an audio system, which provides the electromagnetic signals that are then reproduced in the wavelength, which humans can decipher. The loudspeaker is the most variable element in an audio system, and is responsible for marked audible differences between systems. s
Home audio systems have come a long way since their inception as just another loudspeaker system. They have become a part and parcel of our every day lives. Today, many versions of home audio systems have evolved into our homes. Technological enhancements have made sure that we can take our audio or sound system wherever we go. As speaker systems are the most important part in the output of sound, they have evolved greatly. Many versions of speaker systems are available in the market today. Depending upon your choice of price and your perception of quality, you can opt for the one that best caters to your requirements.
Speakers are an integral part of any audio system, be it a simple radio or a home theatre system. Home audio speakers are generally multi-drive systems, i.e. they contain two or more drive units. These include woofers, midranges, tweeters, and sometimes horns or super tweeters. A home theatre system is complete only if all the above mentioned add-ons are attached with it to give a theatre-like sound experience. In home audio speaker specifications, the speakers are classified as "N-way" speakers. It indicates the number of bands of different frequency into which the system divides the sound. A 2-way system consists of woofers and tweeters, a 3-way system consists of mid-range speakers with a combination of woofers and tweeters. It depends upon person to person; rather there exists different perceptions towards the quality of sound and thus the drives in a speaker.
If and when you decide upon purchasing a home audio speaker system, you will be spoilt for choice. They come in various ranges of quality and pricing, thus you need to decide carefully what caters to your specific set of requirements. Good audio companies make available a host of choices for speaker systems that can gel with your audio systems. They also provide different designs and creations of speakers that fit into your décor. You can place your systems in such a way that it gives you the optimum output.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

The Power of One Album on a Home Audio System

There is one album that is very special to me. It doesn't matter what it is. But whenever I play it on my pro audio equipment or on my home audio system it all comes back to me, feeling the love and desire while I first played one of the songs on my guitar for my first love, then the soft longing I had in her absence when we parted for the summer, the confidence that we would see each other again soon and resume our happiness, then months later the disillusionment I felt while driving through the shrubby brown hills of West Texas on my way back to school and the understanding that maybe she and I weren't meant to be together, and worse, that everything we had lived together before was just passing the time, and that isn't that what life is - a giant collection of moments we have to pass as peacefully and blissfully as possible - and then the later memories, of how I played the album and that song again and again months and years later, after the pain had worn off, and those very feelings I first enjoyed became suffused in nostalgia with the richness of time.
And today, being able to reflect on all those feelings I no longer even feel them when I play the album on my home audio system, but rather a collection of them tied to the album itself, so that it's the memory of the album holding good memories that I find enjoyable when I'm not actually listening to the deliciously beautiful and melodic songs. The album's a little more than half an hour long and yet ironically it holds years of my life, which ordinarily I don't have access to in anything more than flashes and bursts of memories, little snatches of images of her face, and looking out on the road, and feeling sweetly melancholy and alone, and all the realizations from that period of my life being truer than anything I've ever known since.
All that from a single album played off a home audio system. I'm almost afraid that the more I listen to it, the more present memories I'll imbue it with, which will cancel out the old ones, and so I'm reticent to listen to it on repeat the way I used to while I first explored the intricacies of its steel guitar and syncopated cowbell.s

Monday, January 13, 2014

Planning to Buy a Home Audio System? Read This Before You Buy

When it comes to entertainment, audio systems are one of the most important choices to make. With many advancements in sound engineering, lots of classy audio system are available in the market to choose from. With lots of choices for audio systems, it can be confusing to choose the one for your entertainment needs. In the past, when you planned to buy a audio system, you went straight to an electronics store, and chose the speakers based on their appearance, sound quality, and price.
This process is simple and once you bought the speaker, you take it home and plug it into your sound system and will be satisfied with the music that the speaker plays. However, with many sophisticated technologies made available in audio systems today, you now have lots of choices to make such as the choice of features, acoustics, appearance, portability and much more. This article will help you to choose the best home audio system for you. Keep on reading to make a perfect choice in home audio systems.
Travel A Lot? Choose Portability
People often stay away from the portable audio system fearing that they will lack the audio quality. With the advancements in sound engineering, popular speaker manufacturers have made it possible to create ultra portable music systems with no compromise to quality. If you used to travel a lot and need to move frequently, you should definitely look for portable home audio systems. However, when it comes to buying portable home audio systems with great sound quality, you will have to spare thousands of dollars. Top quality with great portability never comes cheap.
Not an Audiophile? Choose Classy Looks
Not everyone out there needs outstanding music quality in their home audio system. Recent surveys indicate that most of the people buy home speaker systems mainly for interior design. The classy looks of the modern music system has found great importance in interior design. If you are not addicted to outstanding music quality, you should give first preference to the looks of the speaker. Great looking features with intermediate sound quality will not cost as much.
Not Enough Cash? There Are Home Audio System For You Too
You should remember the fact that not all the home speaker systems are costly. If you just want to listen to music with affordable quality, there are many cheap home theater systems available in the market. Though these audio systems don't come with the most impressive looks, they fulfill the basic role of delivering pleasant music and reproducing quality sound for television and movies. Look for Discount Home Audio Speaker Systems to save cash.
There are audio systems for everyone's needs. All you have to do is to identify your needs so that you can make better choices while buying home audio equipment.