Most readers of Audiophile Audition will be familiar with the tremendous increase in complexity of setup and operation that has occurred as home electronics has moved from the simple stereo audio system to multichannel audio and video. Many purchasers of their first home theater system find themselves stuck between incomprehensible user manuals, a rat’s nest of cabling, and control options they don’t understand and the unaffordable option of hiring an expensive home installation expert to set up their system. Running cables to each of the speakers is one of the most time-consuming tasks in setting up a system, and why many users simply don’t bother with surround sound for their home theater system. If the wires aren’t properly labelled, speakers can be out of polarity with one another, compromising the resultant sound. Then there is the challenge of proper adjustment of the volume and delay of each speaker in a HT setup. Many rooms greatly constrain surround speaker setup, and the added two channels of 7.1 contribute to the confusion. Fidelity and interference problems have plagued most wireless speaker approaches. Many AV receivers and preamps now come with so-called automatic calibration technology, but it is a complex process and doesn’t always work.
A company active in Oregon and California hopes to remedy that situation with new technology incorporated in their Summit IC chip. Focus Enhancements, Inc. designs world-class solutions in advanced video and audio technologies. Their semiconductor division develops application-specific products to address the audio distribution and TV-out video encoder markets. They also market ICs for the portable media, navigation systems, and smartphone markets.
The Focus Enhancements Summit Chip (FS848) was demonstrated recently in New York City and also at the January Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It allows for the transmission of 48K/24 bit DVD-quality audio wirelessly to up to 7.1 speakers in a home theater or a PS3 gaming platform. Using Summit’s SpeakerFinder technology, the location of each speaker is found at power-up, and each one is assigned to the proper channel, while MyZone technology optimize the sound in less than a second to deliver the optimum sonics to a “sweet spot” almost anywhere in the room.
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