Don't dismiss low-fi tech

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Gremlins have camped out at my house. This happens to me every once in a while. They lie in wait until my household budget has reach a point in the year where things are tight. Then they attack. Systems fail all over the house. This time they attacked some key systems in our house. My music studio computer was the first to go down. Now my surround sound system has a dead left channel. So for our family movie night last night I brought up an old stereo system with a psuedo surround dsp chip in it and re-wired my entertainment system. The system is one of those that has surround speakers and uses a dsp chip create false rear imaging. Usually this is done with phase shifting and a bit of echo. I was pressed for time so I just connected the front main speakers. Turned the dsp on and used the "Rock" preset for the eq. Surprisingly I had a better theatrical audio experience with the fake 3D surround then I did with the real surround system. The 3D imaging was fantastic! Not only did sounds appear from the left and right sides but also in the foreground between the couch and TV. The speakers for this system push more air than the other system so the bass was deeper and there was more range in the spectrum. I stopped using this system because it didn't decode Dolby or DTS and I wanted a surround system. With how well this performed for our family movie night, I think I can delay running out and buying another surround system for a while.  I'm always surprised by little golden nuggets in low-fi tech.

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