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Disclosures
What Equipment Do I Use, and Where Do I Use It?
This is the stuff I have chosen. Mostly my decisions have been based on what I like. But I also take into account my needs as a professional equipment reviewer. Thus one element in my choice 
of the Sony and Denon DVD players is that they provide certain information about the DVDs that they are playing (audio bit rates and channel identification in the case of the Sony, the organisation of MPEG encoding of DVD frames in the case of the Denon). Likewise, the Loewe TV supports both RGB and component video input, making it useful with all kinds of DVD players. In addition to the equipment listed, I frequently have other equipment laying around which may be pressed into service.
I use:
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VAF Research loudspeakers: Signature I-93 speakers for the front stereo pair, and Signature I-91 for centre and surround channels.
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a Paradigm Servo-15 subwoofer.
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a
Marantz SR-18 home theatre receiver (5 x 140 watts). As it happens, my actual receiver was reviewed by
Silicon Chip and found to produce something like 2 x 185 watts of power.
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two
Marantz MA-700 mono power amplifiers for the front speaker pair. These are rated at 200 watts into eight ohms, 300 into four ohms. But they actually deliver considerably more.
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two DVD players: a
Sony DVP-S725D, and a
Harman Kardon DVD 30 DVD Audio/Video player.
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a Denon DCD-755AR CD player.
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a Sony SLV-EZ727 VCR.
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a Loewe Xelos 5381ZW TV -- widescreen but not entirely flat (and consequently produces a slightly better picture than most flat tubes), 76cm diagonal 16:9 aspect.
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an LP Morgan Galleria projection screen with Novares projection surface, 83.5" (2.12 metres) 16:9 diagonal.
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speaker cables which are thick, low impedance and inexpensive (~$5 per metre). Interconnects good quality, but not 'audiophile' brands. I suspect that the different sounds of interconnects appear only in the minds of their adherents.
The room is 6.1 metres long by 4.95 metres wide by 2.5 metres tall. The baffles of the main stereo speakers are 1.2 metres forward of the rear wall. They are toed in somewhat towards the listening position, but not pointing directly at it. The listening position is 2.7 metres from the front three speakers, 1.8 metres from surround speakers. All the speakers are placed at the industry recommended angles with respect to the listening position, with the surround speakers around 0.5 metres above the height of the listener's head.
The back wall of the room is covered in sound-absorbent foam, the left wall has floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, largely filled with DVDs, CDs and books. The right wall has two windows and a flat surface, and a long, 800mm tall, bench, upon which most of the equipment resides.
Last updated: 12 August 2004