Robots invade vinyl, a key TV upgrade launches, studio monitors vs hi-fi speakers and more
All the hi-fi and home cinema news, direct from our experts
by Alastair Stevenson · What Hi-Fi?
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August is here, and while many of us may be focused on the imminent Bank Holiday weekend or the family summer vacation we’ve been planning all year, that hasn’t stopped the hi-fi and home cinema news from flooding in.
So we’ve once again penned a fresh entry to our weekly hi-fi and home cinema news digest, Rewind, breaking down all the key announcements every discerning film or music fan should be aware of.
A new player from Astell & Kern
Astell & Kern is the first brand most of us think of when talking about premium portable music players, which is why when it launched its spiffy new PD5 last week, we stood up and took notice.
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The PD5 is the successor to the Astell & Kern SR35, which launched back in 2023 and won back-to-back What Hi-Fi? Awards all the way up to last year.
The new player features a similar design, but thoroughly reworked internals. These include eight Cirrus Logic CS43198 DACs, a new EnviroTune feature designed to let the player optimise its settings to ambient conditions and a more efficient circuit that adds eight hours of extra battery life, bringing it up to 28 hours of listening from a single charge.
Read the full story: The Astell & Kern PD5 digital audio player follows the Award-winning SR35 with a 28-hour battery life and eight DAC
We asked engineers to break down the difference between hi-fi speakers and studio monitors
One of the big questions we always get from hi-fi newbies is, what’s the difference between normal and studio monitor speakers? And when we explain, they usually then follow up with, “So shouldn’t I get the ones the pros use?”
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Last week, we decided to get answers to both questions directly from the horse’s (engineer’s) mouth. Ever-curious staff writer Ioan Hazell chatted to industry heavyweights from big-name brands, getting their hot takes on the strengths and weaknesses of hi-fi speakers and studio monitors.
Read the full story: “What are the real differences between studio monitors and hi-fi speakers? We asked the professionals”
Marantz launched new AV receivers
It was another busy week for hi-fi and home cinema powerhouse Marantz. Fresh off the back of our experts publishing their Marantz CD 70 and Model 70 reviews, the firm unveiled not one but four new AV receivers last week.
Specifically, the brand lifted the lid on its new Cinema 50 Series 2, Cinema 60 Series 2, Cinema 60 DAB Series 2 and Cinema 70s Series 2 AVRs.
The 50 Series 2 is the brand’s new flagship (apparently the naming follows golf scoring conventions, so lower is better), but every model is built around a 32-bit, eight-channel DAC which, according to Marantz, will let them deliver “ground-breaking advancements in sound quality”.
Read the full story: Marantz adds four new AV receivers to its home cinema line-up with "ground-breaking" feature sets
Dolby Vision 2 is launching
Dolby Vision 2 is a big bit of new tech, with audio-visual giant Dolby promising the new standard will deliver palpable picture quality improvements. But, to date, we’ve not seen much content mastered in it, or reviewed any TVs actively supporting it.
That’s now set to change with Hisense and Dolby confirming the first TVs to get the standard. Specifically, we now know the format will make its debut on the Hisense UX, UR9, UR8 and U7 TVs.
Read the full story: Hisense TV owners, listen up! You're about to get a major Dolby Vision upgrade
You can now get your AI-made music pressed onto vinyl
Everyone loves AI music. Said no one… well, until last week, when music generator platform Suno announced a new service that will let its users press their AI-prompted tracks onto 12-inch records. And the AI treats don’t end there; if you’re not a dab hand with a pencil, the platform will even use its robot smarts to create the artwork for you.
Read the full story: Now not even vinyl records are free from AI slop
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