Editor's Review (May 1972)

THIS ISSUE celebrates our 25th anniversary, as AUDIO first saw the light of day in May, 1947. Title then was "Audio Engineering," and it had evolved from "Radio Magazine," which had been established some 30 years earlier.

Editor in 1947 was John Potts with C. G. McProud as Managing Editor and Sandy Cahn Advertising Director. The Editorial Advisory Board included C. J. LeBel, Howard Chinn, and John Colvin. The first issue had 56 pages and there were articles on square wave analysis, graphical characteristics of cathode coupled triode amplifiers, the Altec 603 speaker, and IM testing. In addition, there was a page of record reviews by one Edward T. Canby.

Mono 78's, of course. The Radio Music Corporation was advertising phono transcription pickups for both vertical and lateral cut discs and the Racon Company had a new range of speakers ... "Only Racon makes speakers with Racon Acoustic Cloth which is processed by a patent method which gives a non-vibratory wall." New Products mentioned included a Fairchild cutter head (response 30 to 8000 Hz) and two wire recorders.

I almost said "Happy, uncomplicated days" but anyone who had unwound yards of steel wire from drive wheels and spindles would contest that one.... But we had no stereo, no LP's, no transistors, and tape recorders were very primitive, to say the least. We certainly have come a long way in 25 years.

The Next 10 Years The prognostications by some of the leaders in the audio industry (page 22) make interesting reading. Our prophets seem cheerfully optimistic about the future--although Stephen Temmer looks over his shoulder at quadraphonic sound, saying "We've abandoned the fundamentals of communication: the transmission of information in favor of transmission of location." This argument could also be applied to two-channel stereo, but the truth of the matter is that two channel gives us more information than one and four gives us a more accurate sound field than two. In one of his recent WNYC broadcasts, Harry Maynard said, "One of the most impressive four-channel demonstrations was given by Advent almost two years ago. They played Boston Philharmonic four channel tapes through a two-channel system with two $114.00 Advent speakers and then compared with a four-channel system using four AR-4x's1, then cost about half the price of the Ad r hearing this demonstration, I must say I'd rather have $500.00 invested in four AR-4x's and four-channel equipment than in two $114.00 speakers and two-channel equipment." (Since then, Advent has released their own small speaker which we will review in due course.) Stephen Temmer may be concerned about the use of too much gimmickry in quadraphonics-in this respect we agree with him. But condemning quadraphonic sound for this is about as logical as blaming his Neumann microphones for the ghastly noises made by some alleged singers.... More and more companies are using the CBS SQ system and matrix records of various kinds are now finding their way to the dealers. But this does not mean that discrete systems are dead-far from it, as the article on the JVC-Dorren broadcasts (page 57) shows. Discretophiles (if I can coin such a horrible word) glibly talk about 45 dB between channels, "if you listen closely to channel A, you will not hear a peep from anything carried by channel B, or C, or D." But matrixers point out that a violin or saxophone or whatever playing in one corner of a room is not 45 dB down in the other corners.... It seems to me that the only real argument for discrete systems is the undeniable fact that it is a better medium for the composer-particularly for electronic music. So the battle goes on.

Snap, Crackle, and Pop Here is something which has had me guessing for a long time. It concerns static crackles and pops on records. I have certain records which I have played hundreds of time, taken them to demonstrations where they were subjected to all kinds of infamy-yet the surface is as quiet as a Dolby tape. But other records, made by the same companies, produce the most irritating noises at the slightest provocation. Right from the first playing in fact. I must stress that this phenomena is not confined to any particular make of record--all very puzzling.

Oh, John! A few months ago, I commented on the ingenuity of designers who had built transistor radios into the most unlikely places. Since then I have come across another one worthy of mention.

Marketed by Unique Boutique of Martinez, Ga., it is called John's All Transistor Radio and--you've guessed it--it is housed in the toilet roll holder!

-G. W. T.

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(Source: Audio magazine.)

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