Dior Homme AW07-08

Simple Luxury

Eight of the finer things in life that give joy in the owning -- or at least in the looking

There are certain things so well crafted or technically precise that they make you feel smarter just for owning them, others so wonderful to look at that holding them in your hands brings a smile to your face, and some so simple and useful that they become part of your daily life, even part of your identity. Here are a few we've discovered.

Tighe Meteorite 1/1 Fountain Pen - $10,000
In this age, when clipped e-mails and stick-on notes serve as long-form epistles, a man needs a fountain pen to make a statement. And often the statement is made even before putting pen to paper. Consider the conversation starter shown here: Its base was etched from 4-billion-year-old Gibeon meteorite by Grayson Tighe, one of the most highly regarded pen makers. "Something man-made could never duplicate this amazing material," he says. The nib is the most important component of any fountain pen. This one is made of 18-karat yellow gold and tipped with iridium and rhodium for durability and smooth ink flow. While this pen is one-of-a-kind, Tighe will offer limited-edition meteorite fountain ($7,500) and roller-ball ($7,400) pens (18 of each will be made). 905-892-2734, tighepen.com


2006 Harley-Davidson FXDI35 35th Anniversary Super Glide - $16,795
The motor company's firstborn factory custom cruiser became an instant icon of American motorcycle design. Thirty-five years later, Harley-Davidson is bringing it back through an exclusive run of 3,500 serialized remakes, updated with an electronic fuel-injected 1450cc air-cooled V-twin with a six-speed Cruise Drive gearbox. Cocky as ever, the commemorative Super Glide has a "1" emblazoned on its gas tank; the glacier-white-pearl paint, patriotic graphics, and chrome highlights that adorned the original body; a fat 160mm rear tire; and of course, Harley's trademark exhaust sound. 414-343-4056, harley-davidson.com


Zai skis - $3,500 (bindings and poles included)
In the Swiss Alps, in the town of Disentis, near the headwaters of the Rhine, a former Solomon and Völkl ski engineer named Simon Jacomet created the Zai alpine ski. From the Swiss language Romansh, zai means "tough," and this beautiful plank is that and more. The surface of the ski is hand-matched brown ash framed with lacquered Titanal (a light-weight blend of aluminum and titanium). It's eye-catching to say the least; you'll be the talk of the lift line. There are practical benefits, too: The natural flex of the poplar core makes the ski handle well over both hardpack and powder. The exclusive nano-carbon bottom coating developed by Zai allows for faster skiing and precision turning. (See zai.ch for more information.) For this season, only 1,000 pairs will be made, and the skis are available in the United States through just one retailer, Gorsuch,
in Colorado. 800-563-0629, gorsuchltd.com


Tasai Damascus Cabinet Chisels - $2,300 (set of 10); Hirotomo 10½-inch drawknife - $240
Any woodworker worth his sawdust knows how much easier it is to build furniture with
a quality tool designed for the task. For tongue-and-groove work, many craftsmen won't use anything but Japanese hand-forged tools. Among the best are those made by artisan Akio Tasai, a blacksmith for more than 50 years. Tasai uses a special high-carbon laminated blue steel for his chisels, which are tough enough to cut hardwoods without losing an edge.
He burnishes the metal to achieve a wood-grain appearance that distinguishes each chisel as a Tasai. For rough shaping, the ideal tool is the 10½-inch drawknife from Hirotomo. Hand-forged from high-carbon white steel, the sharp blade stands up to heavy use. The knife's handles are made from magnolia and balanced perfectly to transfer all the energy from your upper body into the cutting blade so you are not wrestling to keep it aligned. 800-537-7820, thejapanwoodworker.com


Corum Gold Bridge Watch - $18,000 (pink gold)
The first thing you notice about this watch is its guts. Visible through the transparent face, the movement looks, well, broken, or as if it's missing something important. Working parts in most watches are typically overlapping circular gears. Here, they are aligned linearly, as if someone squeezed them between the teeth of a vise. This creates a window on each side to view -- what's that? -- the hair on your wrist! The watch has been reintroduced after 20 years as part of Corum's 50th-anniversary celebration. What's new is the "slipping spring" winding system that prevents overwinding of the delicate movement. (You have to do the old-school twist only once every 40 hours.) Order quickly. Only 150 numbered timepieces, 50 each in white gold, yellow gold, and pink gold, have been made. 949-788-6200, corum.ch


Bowers & Wilkins 802d Loudspeakers - $12,000 per pair
Diamonds are superfluous on most luxury items -- watches, high heels, wedding rings -- but these gem-equipped speakers actually back up the bling. The technology: Tweeters move faster than any other part of a speaker and, as such, are highly susceptible to distortion. The softer the tweeter, the worse the trickle-down of corrupted sound. That's why manufacturer Bowers & Wilkins, which employs 20 full-time audio engineers at its "University of Sound" in England, crafted the tweeter dome of this speaker from some of the hardest stuff on earth, industrial diamond. The result: the cleanest, clearest tone in the audio industry, the company claims. And audiophiles -- such as the engineers at the Beatles' erstwhile studio, Abbey Road, and the technicians at Star Wars director George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch -- agree. 978-664-2870, bwspeakers.com


Ralph Lauren RL-CF1 Red Dining Chair - $13,500
It's a fair guess that designer Ralph Lauren would rather be driving his limited-edition McLaren F1 than doing most anything else -- except perhaps having a nice meal at home, where he can still feel as if he's in the driver's seat. Last year, Lauren took inspiration from the F1 to design this sleek yet comfortable dining chair, part of the new Black Mountain furniture series. The chair is handmade from 54 layers of carbon fiber and has a cushiony black-leather seat and back. Four fit nicely around the RLX Dining Table ($28,500). This is an experience to savor.
888-475-7674, rlhome.polo.com


Martin D-100 Deluxe Guitar, $100,000
C.F. Martin & Co. has been building guitars and ukuleles since the 1830s. In 2004, the company, based in the hills of eastern Pennsylvania, celebrated the making of its millionth guitar with a limited-series acoustic six-string. (Just 50 have been built, signed by chairman C.F. Martin IV, and numbered 1,000,001 to 1,000,050.) The D-100 Deluxe is crafted from hand-selected Brazilian rosewood and Adirondack spruce and adorned with Victorian- and Baroque-style inlays of herringbone pearl and abalone on its back, pickguard, headplate, fingerboard, and bridge.
Since this museum-quality flattop has Waverly gold hand-engraved tuners; an end pin topped with green-tourmaline dots bordered in 14-karat-gold settings; and bridge pins, nut, and saddle fashioned from fossilized ivory, one might be hesitant to pluck out "Turkey in the Straw" on it. But that's why the company, which has equipped the likes of Eric Clapton, Tom Petty, and Stephen Stills, and also offers custom-made guitars for any artistic inspiration and budget. Just add talent. 610-759-5757, martinguitar.com

The luxury and price of a villa can beat that of the best hotel

At St. John and other Caribbean hot spots, a week's stay at a villa can be cheaper and more luxurious than even the best hotel room

The benefits to renting a villa begin at the airport. There you will sit in the departure area and survey your fellow passengers, inevitably a kind of Peterson’s Field Guide to Caribbean flotsam and jetsam: the knots of senior citizens on their way to meet cruise ships; the frat boys in Señor Frog T-shirts; the would-be Jimmy Buffetts with leathery faces and thinning ponytails; the moms already applying sunscreen to their screaming kids and the dads already plotting their escape to a fishing boat or golf cart. You will look around at them and whisper to yourself, “After this flight is over, I will never see any of you people ever again. Not at the pool. Not at the reception desk. Not at breakfast. Never.”

While your cabinmates are checking in at the local upscale resort, you’ll be wandering through room after impeccably decorated room of your villa trying to figure out which one has the best view of the ocean from its private balcony. And if you’ve played your cards right, you and your handpicked companions may have paid less for your accommodations than the resort crowd did. With four bedrooms, St. John’s Hakuna Matata averages out to just $370 per night per couple—in the high season. Compare that to the nearby Westin St. John Resort, where the rack rate can be as much as $700 per night.

But beyond cost (and even beyond the undeniable tingle that saying the words “my villa” provokes), there’s a vast aesthetic difference.

A villa is somehow of a place—integrally part of the landscape—an authentic alternative to the McLuxury served up by even a well-meaning hotel chain. To stay in a private residence puts you in a community, not only of your neighbors and the locals you’ll meet at the market, but of a sort of “villa-ocracy” whose members have known how to travel right through the ages: from Italian counts relaxing in the hills of Tuscany to David Letterman taking a break on St. Bart’s.

As you may have imagined, the inaugural, stock-up trip to the liquor store is one of the great rituals of villa life. So are a host of other, usually boring, domestic chores. Like ending an evening of picking out constellations in the hot tub by throwing your bathing suit in the dryer, so it will be ready for the beach in the morning. Or telling the cook the snacks you had in mind for tomorrow’s poolside backgammon tournament.

Eventually, of course, you will deign to come down off the mountain and spend a few hours snorkeling across impossibly blue water or riding a horse over wild green hills or just lolling in the sand. And then, pleasantly sunburned and weary, you will return to your villa—up the dirt road and past the gate and up the long driveway—and, inevitably, someone will sigh happily and say, “Ah, home.”

And, for a week at least, they’ll be right.

Hot Property

Climate change will affect real estate values all across America. Is Vancouver the next Napa?

The view from the terrace, 11 floors above Miami's trendy South Beach, is dominated by a sweep of Atlantic Ocean that edges along a narrow arc of beach and stretches out to a flawless horizon. It is the kind of view that has enticed millions to invest in a booming South Florida real estate market. Now, after three years of devastating weather events, that boom has gone bust, and even after carefully pricing the condominium to undercut several others for sale in the building, the owner had to cut the price not once but twice before it sold. At a loss. "The market is flooded with properties," says Phyllis D. Hugunien, a Realtor for FX Realty Corporation. "They aren't selling. We're seeing price reductions of $20,000, $50,000, and more. Buyers are nervous about the future."

So it goes in post-Katrina Florida, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. While scientists and politicians quarrel over just how much impact climate change is having on the planet, the market has made its own decision. Anyone who owns property in these regions has watched his investment wither. And anyone thinking of buying property there will have to pay a "global warming premium" in the form of higher insurance rates.

Homeowners elsewhere shouldn't feel particu­larly secure either, according to Andrew Logan, director of insurance at Ceres, a nonprofit network of investors concerned with environmental sustainability. "The hot spot for now is Florida and the Gulf Coast, but looking to the future, climate change is going to be a huge issue in the whole country," he says. Insurance rates are already rising, and some companies are limiting coverage all the way up the Eastern seaboard to Massachusetts. Why? There's an increased risk posed by rising sea levels coupled with the prospect that unusually destructive hurricanes will be drawn northward as the Atlantic Ocean grows warmer.

What of these other hot spots? Suppose you want to buy property and you're looking at a 30-year ­mortgage. Should you consider the impact climate change might have on its value three decades from now? Insurance companies do. "Anyone thinking of making an investment in a property should consider what it will look like in 20 to 30 years," says Robert Muir-Wood, Ph.D., chief research officer at Risk Management Solutions. Will there be snow at your ski chalet? Will the shoreline stay put under your beach house? What about storms and the overall ecosystem? "If you don't find out, someone else will," says Muir-Wood, "and he'll use that information to devalue your property if you ever want to sell it."

Thanks to a report released in February by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the information that would devalue your property is easy to get and quite authoritative. The report states unequivocally that the earth is heating up as a result of the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Over the past century, average temperatures increased 1.4 degrees, and they're projected to rise 3.5 to 8 degrees over the next hundred years. Sea levels rose by six to nine inches in the 20th century and are projected to rise anywhere from seven inches to two feet over the same time frame going forward. And these numbers are on the conservative side, because the panel is barred from considering hypothetical conditions. Estimates of sea-level rise, for example, do not include the levels that would be reached if, say, Greenland's ice sheets continued to melt at an accelerated rate. Just two feet in sea-level rise would engulf much of South Florida and the Keys, Texas's Padre Island, and barrier islands along the coast from Maryland to the Carolinas. At 15 feet, it's good-bye Florida, Cape Cod, Long Island...you get the picture.

The effects won't be uniform around the globe. The poles are likely to grow disproportionately warmer than the planet's midsection. Precipitation patterns also will shift poleward, exacerbating drought conditions in temperate regions. And the warming will produce more extreme weather conditions everywhere, more powerful hurricanes in the Gulf, more flooding along rivers in the middle of the country, less snow in some areas, more in others. The time to assess the relative risks of buying a cottage on Lake Michigan or a Miami Beach condo is now--before the next storm hits.

South Florida and the Keys

Okay, this may seem like piling on, but if there were ever a place where the risks of freaky weather should be factored into real estate decisions, this is it. Even scientists who won't swear that climate change guarantees more hurricanes that are more powerful do believe rising sea levels and run-of-the-mill storms could make Florida a challenging place to own property, if for no other reason than the insurance costs. Most companies won't write homeowners policies here, and those that do have been raising premiums at double- and triple-digit rates. To take up the slack, the state was forced into the insurance business. In fact, the largest insurer in Florida is Citizens Property Insurance, a state-owned corporation that holds the policies on 1.3 million households. Citizens couldn't hold the line on premiums either, and Florida found itself in a crisis that state lawmakers tried to solve by legislating a premium cap. The plan would increase subsidies for both private insurers and policy­holders. How? By transferring more risk to Floridians. "There are limits on how much liability the state can take on without being overwhelmed financially," says Ceres's Logan. "If Miami were hit by a major hurricane, the state would be on the hook for most of that damage. Where are those tens of billions of dollars going to come from? The taxpayers."
Barrier Islands Along the Atlantic Shore

Hop on a boat in New York City and you can cruise down the coast to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, without venturing outside an inland waterway created by a chain of barrier islands. These slivers of sand have, for centuries, taken the brunt of whatever mischief the Atlantic threw at the coastline. But with its new climate-change-driven ferocity, that mischief is beginning to take its toll. Most vulnerable are the heavily developed islands from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Rehoboth Beach and Bethany Beach, in Delaware.

The problem for all the barrier islands--and the beaches of Florida--is erosion. For decades, these communities have been fighting a more or less successful war to save their shorelines, but climate change is tipping the balance in Mother Nature's favor. Take Rehoboth Beach. "In the last hundred years, erosion on the Delaware coast has eaten up about three feet of shoreline a year," says Stephen P. Leatherman, Ph.D., director of the Laboratory for Coastal Research at Florida International University, in Miami. "If the rate of erosion doubles, which is possible with current climate-change projections, erosion losses would jump to six feet per year." Roll those numbers out over the life of a 30-year mortgage, and Rehoboth Beach loses a whopping 180 feet of shoreline. "Right now, most of the houses along the shore are within that 180 feet," says Leatherman. Buy a house on the beach and you could easily lose it before you've paid for it.
New England Ski Resorts

The relationship between warming climates and skiing seems obvious: no freezing temperatures, no snow. "Even if you're making snow, the temperature outside has to be less than 32°F," says Robert Mendelsohn, Ph.D., a professor at Yale University.

And even if you didn't mind trudging across grassy fields and up the lift to get from your ski chalet to a trail covered in man-made snow, simple economics threatens these operations. Bruce McCarl, Ph.D., regents professor of agricultural economics at Texas A&M University, coauthored a report in BioScience that states the cost of making snow at -12ºC is five times cheaper than at -2ºC. A big resort can spend more than $100,000 a night making early-season snow. Shorter, warmer ski seasons and significant increases in snowmaking costs add up to an economic double whammy. In the next few decades, many ski areas will become more expensive to operate and may have to be abandoned, says McCarl.

Wine Region of Northern California

Growing grapes is easy. Growing grapes that make good wine is hard. Since the 1970s, one of the most productive regions for good wine grapes has been the Napa and Sonoma valleys of Northern California. Ironically, part of the reason for that success has been global warming, according to Rama Nemani, a research scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center at Moffitt Field, California. As warming moves northward, it can push marginal climates into a sweet spot that is beneficial for a while. In Northern California, the climate trends that began in the 1970s ushered in a period of high-quality vintages. In those 30 years, the frost-free season expanded by about 40 days. "That's an incredible amount of warming," says Nemani, "and it allowed the growers to leave grapes on the vine a lot longer so that the berries could be harvested at the optimum moment."

As the warming continues, the sweet spot moves farther north, and Napa and Sonoma's time may be coming to an end. Last year, the area suffered through periods of 103°F temperatures. "The vineyards can handle temperatures in the mid 90s," says Nemani, "but not that high." What if extreme weather becomes more common over the next 10 to 20 years? "If you look at the spread of vineyards, you see every decade that more are moving north, no doubt about it. Washington and Oregon are beginning to produce the quality of wines that Northern California does." A study published in the 2006 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences estimates that the number of American vineyards will drop by 81 percent by mid-century, with most of the wine production limited to the Northeast, Northwest, and a narrow strip along the West Coast.

And now vineyards in British Columbia are making good wines. "The Canadians are rubbing their hands together over the prospect of wineries on Vancouver Island and the Okanagan Valley. They think they're going to hit the jackpot with global warming," says David Graves, one of the owners of Napa's Saintsbury vineyard. There goes that sweet spot.
Rocky Mountains, Colorado

One of the most beautiful excursions in the United States is along Trail Ridge Drive over the Continental Divide. The road starts on the front range of the Rocky Mountains and climbs above the tree line into the rarefied air of the 11,000-foot Milner Pass. Once across the divide, the road winds down into a high valley where Grand Lake, the state's largest, is surrounded by mountains blanketed in thick, green pine forests. At least, that's how it was a decade ago. Today, those slopes aren't green. They're covered by dead, rust-brown trees, all killed by an onslaught of the mountain pine beetle.

The losses are staggering. In each of the past two years, the beetles killed up to 80 percent of the lodgepole pines on almost a million acres in the northern Rockies. Some of these trees are 70 to 80 years old, so it will take a hundred years to get things back to where they were. "There have been insect outbreaks as long as there have been trees, but the outbreaks we're seeing today are unusual," says Bill Romme, Ph.D., of Colorado State University's forestry department. "The beetles' life cycle has sped up, which means there are many more beetles emerging. They've spread farther north and to higher elevations. It's all being driven by the increased temperatures."

The impact goes well beyond the unsightliness of dead trees. As more pines are felled by the beetles, ski slopes at Rocky Mountain resorts will find their runs unprotected from wind. Wildlife could be decimated by a loss of habitat. And, of course, there's the risk of fire. "If someone is trying to sell you a mountain cabin, and 80 percent of the trees around it are standing dead, I think you'd ask yourself what would happen if a lightning bolt hit nearby," says McCarl, of Texas A&M. Indeed.

The IPCC's 2007 report made headlines around the world because it stated "with 90 percent certainty" what the pine beetles in Colorado and vineyard owners in Napa Valley have known for some time: Global warming is a reality, and it's playing havoc with the pocketbooks and investments of ordinary people all across the country. The only uncertainty is how quickly the world will respond to the warnings and what the planet will look like in the end. "If the warming is held in check, on the lower end of the range that we think is possible, good things are going to outweigh the bad, by and large," says Mendelsohn, of Yale. But if nothing is done and the warming is allowed to become more severe, "it's clearly going to be very harmful."

By: Nancy F. Smith for Best Life

One Night Stands

In our modern dating society, the term ‘one-night stand’ is used loosely. Millions of people are getting together for a one-time romp in the sack. I don’t know about you, but I’m a little confused as to what a one-night stand really is.

In my opinion, one-night stands occur when people meet for the first time, experience an instant sexual attraction, and in a few hours (or maybe at the end of the night) are having sex. After it’s done, they say ‘sayonara’ and never see or hear of each other again.

But when I talk to men and women and tell them I have never had a one-night stand, no one believes me. And usually, men and women have different takes on what a one-night stand really is.

One guy told me that a one-night stand is a fling. He said that a one-night stand occurs when you meet someone, have sex with them for a short period of time (in his case a few weeks), and then you split up and never talk to each other again. I told him that’s no one-night stand, because he talked to her after the fact and continued having sex with her for the next couple of weeks. In my book, that’s a full-out fling. A one-night stand is a one-time deal.

Let’s get it straight, a one-night stand is exactly what it states: one-night of sex with a relative stranger, and the next day you go your separate ways. Let’s not get it confused with a fling, where you have sex with someone repeatedly, even if you then cut it off and never see each other ever again.

The majority of single men and women I know have had at least one one-night stand in their lives. I do find this is more common with men than women. However, more women have likely had one-night stands than care to admit it. Meanwhile, men are often known to brag about their one-night affairs. Regardless, here are some tips and warnings about one-night stands.
Don’t Forget the Condoms
Bottom line: If you’re going to have a one-night stand, make sure you have condoms on hand, because you probably don’t want a cold shower to replace a night of drunken sex.

Check your one-night stand list
We all have our standards; in dating, the clothes we wear, and even with the food we eat.
So why not have standards when it comes to one-night stands? It’s wise to choose someone whose name you will have a hard time remembering, have nothing in common with, and who has the cash for their own cab fare.

Don’t give out your phone number
Imagine having sex with someone you barely even know, then asking for their number so you can “keep in touch”. Kind of late to be getting to know each other, don’t you think? Sure, we all want to be polite after a one-night stand, but let’s face it, it’s only out of courtesy. So forget it. Save the courtesy for your acquaintances and just leave without a phone number; your one-night stand has been accomplished.

Truth or Dare?

By Eric J. Leech

Up for a game of Truth or Dare? We certainly don’t play as often as we should now that we’re adults; so let’s play a few rounds for old time sake. You might just remember what used to be so fun about it:

Truth or Dare?
Truth- 70% of all men who earn over $60,000 a year cheat on their partner, while only 16% of men who make less than $5,000 a year cheat.
Dare- Send your partner into a strip club with $60,000; if they come out with less than $50,000, you can probably assume they weren’t faithful.

Truth or Dare?
Truth- The bedroom has been found by surveys to be the most creative room in the home for the truth to be stretched.
Dare- Give your partner permission to party all night with their wildest single friends. Upon stumbling drunk into bed wearing a condom on their ear, ask them where they have been and then ask them the same question in the morning at the breakfast table. It’s guaranteed the two stories won’t be the same and the yarn around their cereal bowl will probably be the most truthful.

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Per capita, there are said to be more twenty year old virgins today than there were back in the late 1950’s.
Dare- Find one of them… I dare you… I double dog dare you!

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Statistically it’s been found that both men and women have their first orgasm while alone.
Dare- Define ‘alone’ using today’s sexual standards? Probably somewhere along the lines of three midgets, a donkey, one shaved hamster, a cardboard toilet paper roll and three web cams… just to name a few!

Truth or Dare?
Truth- An unnamed British doctor was quoted as saying an Olympic athlete’s peak performance should occur within 90 minutes of sexual intercourse. He further hinted that this practice should follow every event for maximum gold medal achievement.
Dare- Convince your current boss to initiate a similar standard to your own work/office duties, stating that it would boost your current performance output by ‘leaps and bounds’ or more appropriately by ‘shrieks and wobbly office equipment sounds.’

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Statistics show that 67% of men prefer women who shave their pubic region. The Brazilian (everything goes) bikini wax was the most preferred method of hair removal.
Dare- I dare any man to get a full fledged Brazilian bikini wax… there are two kinds of people that touch a man there and a man wouldn’t want anything to do with either of them!

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Dr. Nicolae Adrian Gheorghiu of Romania has developed an electric pulsing device that is capable of giving a woman as many as 16 orgasms a minute. He boasts its inevitable replacement of the human male within the next several years.
Dare- I dare Dr. Nicolae to walk outside of his office building after hours, even with as many as five stout bodyguards protecting him. These bodyguards would then proceed to kick the living crap out of him once they got him outside the door (assuming they were all men of course).

Truth or Dare?
Truth- A man’s appendage is proven to shrink in the presence of watching sports; especially when their team is victorious.
Dare- I dare any man to get laid while watching a winning hockey game naked on the couch with a beer in one hand and a bowl of chili in the other!

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Sir Isaac Newton, the brain tank who theorized about earth’s gravitational pull, is claimed to have died a virgin at the age of 85.
Dare- Abstain from sex for anything over a year and see if you can even vocalize the word ‘gravity’, much less theorize about it.

Truth or Dare?
Truth- Statistics show that 40% of all people at house parties, who use the restroom, snoop around the inside of the medicine cabinet for any signs of personal/sexual artifacts.
Dare- At your next party, dump out your medicine cabinet except for a cucumber, banana, carrot stick, bottle of hot sauce, ear of corn and a jar of K-Y Jelly. Throw a cattle prod underneath the cabinet to really get the rumors flying…

Source: umm.ca

Five Tips For Buying a Home Entertainment System

By Ross MacIver

Looking for a new home entertainment system? Here are five tips for choosing the best model for your home environment.

1. Choose a system that can be expanded. Most of your music collection may be on CDs, but with the growing popularity of DVD audio you don't want to be left behind. Even if you are only interested in stereo sound make sure you buy a system that can be adapted to new technologies. This includes video as well as audio mediums. Buy a stereo system for now, but make sure it has surround sound capabilities.

Also consider whether you want your home entertainment system accessible in different parts of the house. An expandable system allows you to place speaker systems and playback modules in different rooms so that you can enjoy home entertainment throughout the house.

2. Buy a system with enough power. This goes hand-in-hand with the previous tip. Don't buy a unit which has just enough power for your current needs, but rather, think about how you will be expand it in the future. Surround sound speaker systems require more power than stereo, and satellite speakers systems installed in other rooms also require extra power.

Dedicated power amps for different parts of your home entertainment system can make a vast difference in the quality of sound. For example, a subwoofer amp can take the load off the rest of your system will providing massively deep bass sounds.

3. Choose a system that matches your entertainment preferences. If you are mainly interested in DVD video a surround sound speaker system can add amazing authenticity to your viewing experience. On the other hand, if you mostly listen to classical music, divide your budget so that you can get a good set of stereo speakers. If you like rap or hip-hop you should choose speakers designed for bass heavy music -- a subwoofer is a necessity.

4. Make it backwards compatible. Many people still have a sizable collection of VHS tapes and vinyl records. Rather than throwing out these valuable sources of entertainment, make sure your new entertainment system can handle them. 5. Buy the best you can afford. It's a waste of money to buy inferior components for your home entertainment system. You will quickly become dissatisfied with them and end up ditching them. If you have a limited budget, divide it up wisely. Rather than starting with a full-featured audio and video home entertainment system, concentrate on a few components. As long as your system is expandable, you can continue adding new features as your budget allows.

About the Author
Ross MacIver is an audio enthusiast and author of the Audio How To Section of the http://www.selected-audio-reviews.com/.

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