Hi-fi 2101 - who has the answers?

Posted by: Sproggle on 24 June 2001

It is the year 2101, and human society has exceeded all expectations. Nobody is starving, average life expectancy is over 100, crime levels are extraordinarily low and most of the Serious Crime Squad's time is spent tracking down Pot Noodle pushers.

One thing, however, is unchanged. People are still dissatisfied with their hi-fi systems. What are your hi-fi problems in the year 2101? Perhaps you can't find anything to play your old DVDs on? Or maybe you're annoyed that hardly anything is coming out on vinyl anymore? And is it better to stick with mass-market global companies such as Linn and Spectral or do small specialists such as Sony and Technics really have the edge? And what do you make of Naim's extraordinary return to manufacturing hi-fi after thirty years as the Intel / AMD of its time? Who has the questions? Who has the answers?

--Jeremy

Posted on: 24 June 2001 by Steve Hall

With the understanding of how higher brain functions interact with reality now well understood, major HiFi/AV companies have now done away with speakers and now relay directly into the brain.

Mana has broken out into the shoe market, and a phase 4 trainer now gives better base response than was ever available before.

Posted on: 24 June 2001 by Steve Toy

Microchips will be so tiny by then that one the size of your fingernail wil be ten times more powerful than the human brain. Memory capacity or processing speed will not be an issue where musical reproduction is concerned. Transducers, both at the microphone and speaker end, will be so sensitive that, microphones could be mounted on a head-shaped plastic model that could be taken anywhere to make recordings, with most of the head itself being empty for reasons outlined above, and speakers could drive up to 120 db with a 120 db dynamic range off an amp capable of only 0.5 watts per channel, but equipped with a 500 va power supply - that would be deemed adequate, given that this would still be the costliest component. Band width would be adjustable, but would encompass the full electromagnetic range in the Universe, and so could be used to "fry" your genetically-modified hamburgers at the same time as playing your music, but there would be debates on this Forum - still running! that doing so degrades PR&T slightly. Music data would be stored in RAM, but with absolutely no compression and the sampling rate would be around 240 khz with a 1 gig resolution. There would be no need for preamps. Also multi-channel sound would disappear as genetic engineering laws were passed in 2054, limiting cloned humans to two ears! By then the market will have realised that two ears equals two speakers, and no more!

[This message was edited by Steven Toy on MONDAY 25 June 2001 at 03:49.]

Posted on: 26 June 2001 by Bruce Woodhouse

As power shortages affect even the developed world, HiFi buffs in other countries such as Britain resort to desperate measures to obtain quantitities of black market batteries with which to (briefly) power up their systems. Clusters of once affluent middle aged men hang around on street corners trying to swap dope for pre-owned duracells.

England lose the ashes series, again, but a British player wins Winbledon before being unveiled as an android and disqualified.

Yours cheerfully

bruce