Home Cinema Choice March 2023

Some things never seem to change, like perennial rivals LG and Samsung using the CES show to both insist their form of TV technology is superior (p22). At the same time, however, the home entertainment world is in a constant state of flux, with the fortunes of media formats waxing and waning, new product categories springing into life, and new brands arriving on the scene. And then you get the comeback stories. This issue we have reviews of hardware from both Pioneer and Loewe, two electronics manufacturers with long, respected histories that – for different reasons – withdrew from the UK market for a time. Loewe's Bild OLED TV (p52) shows the German company has lost none of its sense of style, while Pioneer's VSX-LX305 receiver (p48) proves the reborn…

➜News high lights FOCAL Vestia speaker range primed for home cinema systems ASTELL&KERN Do-it-all desktop headphone amp/player SONUS FABER Long-running Homage lineup revamped AT THE PLEX This month's cinema releases MERIDIAN AUDIO DSP8000 XE loudspeaker ROCKY: KNOCKOUT COLLECTION Pugilistic treats enter the 4K BD ring & MORE! Leica Cine 1 ➜ www.leica-lasertv.com Optical lens specialist Leica, known for its camera technologies, says it's a 'logical step' for it to enter the home projection market. Arriving this spring is the Cine 1, an ultra-short-throw model with 4K HDR DLP optics, triple-laser light source and onboard tuner/smart TV hub. Leica's proprietary LIO image optimisation, allied to an aspherical Summicron lens, promises pristine image reproduction and natural colours, while accompanying audio comes from an integrated speaker system with Atmos decoding. Pricing begins…

Focal Vestia ➜ www.focal.com…

Denon no longer sells BD players, but remains committed to physical music formats even while streaming marches on. Its new DCD-1700NE is a CD/SACD spinner with a styling reminiscent of its Blu-ray decks of yore, and features a proprietary drive mechanism, Texas Instruments DAC and AL32 Processing Plus upsampling. Optical/ coaxial outs allow it to be used as a transport, and the player will also handle hi-res music stored on DVD-R/W discs. Pricing is £1,299, with silver or black options available. www.denon.co.uk…

The Lost Boys (4K BD) Beautifully remastered 4K HDR visuals mean this '80s horrorcomedy classic is no longer lost in the shadows. The Rig (Prime Video) This spooky sci-fi puts a Scottish oil rig in peril from a mysterious entity, leaving Martin Compston (and slick 4K HDR) to save the day. Shadow Master (BD) The Crow meets Ong-Bak in an apocalyptic actioner bursting with bone-crunching brawls. Let’s get ready to rumble… Reacher: S1 (BD) As solidly made as its leading man, the punchy smallscreen adaptation of Lee Child’s novel Killing Floor is now on disc. Eight for Silver (BD) Writer-director Sean Ellis’s atmospheric and brutal period chiller will leave werewolf movie fans howling with delight.…

South Korean manufacturer Astell&Kern has carved itself a niche selling high-end 'head-fi' – portable hi-res audio players with drop-dead styling and high-spec electronics. But it knows we don't all listen to music on-the-move, which is where its new ACRO CA1000T comes in. An upgrade on its previous CA1000, this desktop device can be thought of as a music player, DAC and headphone amplifier combined. It's priced at a reassuringly expensive £2,299, but that ticket, says Astell&Kern, gets you a couple of world's firsts. One concerns the DAC implementation, which uses a pair of ES9039MPRO chips to improve power consumption and 'reduce noise'. File handling is up to 768kHz PCM and DSD512. Secondly, the CA1000T has upgraded Astell&Kern's Triple Amp System, adding a twin-triode Nutube vacuum stage. Going for gold The…