All posts tagged: Sound

Universal remotes sound perfect until you actually live with one

Universal remotes sound perfect until you actually live with one

Published by skeptic

The more streaming, gaming, and audio devices you add to your TV setup, the more remote controls you’ll inevitably have to manage. Eventually, it becomes too much. Your TV screen has its own remote to kick things off, and you might have a gaming console or streaming box with its own remotes. Add a Blu-ray player, turntable, or AV receiver to the mix, and you’ve doubled the number of remote controls in your setup already. If you have a particularly extravagant home theater or listening station, a CD player or a Chromecast could further convolute the experience. The answer might seem like a universal remote — one device to control everything in your media room. However, finding a great universal remote solution is easier said than done in 2026. Many of the once-flagship universal remote brands, like Logitech and Sony, are no longer making new models. That forces those interested in a new universal remote to pay for uber-premium options, like the Sofabaton X1S universal remote, or cheaper and less-functional options, such as Best Buy’s …

Mysterious giant sharks that outlived the dinosaurs lurking in Puget Sound

Mysterious giant sharks that outlived the dinosaurs lurking in Puget Sound

Published by Jenni Sidey

Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. Most sharks have five gill slits on either side. But Hexanchus griseus, a giant and mysterious shark species, has an even six gill slits. These fish, appropriately called the sixgill shark, live in both tropical and temperate waters around the world and can reach up to 14-feet-long. They’ve existed since before the dinosaurs, and yet marine biologists still don’t know very much about them.  One of the problems—for researchers, anyway—is that sixgills usually live in deep oceanic waters, at depths of up to 9,800 feet. It also doesn’t help that they usually favor extremely low-light environments. Among other reasons, these aspects make sixgills difficult to study. Sixgill sharks (Hexanchus griseus) are older than dinosaurs and are typically found in the deeper parts of the ocean. Image: Seattle Aquarium. However, these ancient giants have been spotted in Washington State’s Puget Sound year-round, and in water as shallow as 20 feet. Scientists at Seattle Aquarium believe that female sixgills are giving …

When AI Headlines Sound Apocalyptic or Miraculous, Time to Slow Down

When AI Headlines Sound Apocalyptic or Miraculous, Time to Slow Down

Published by Jenni Sidey

This story is republished from NewsMax. Most media content about AI today read like supermarket tabloids . . . sensational, shallow, and often misleading. They can confuse more than they clarify. The reasons are many: clickbait incentives, genuine ignorance, and biased enthusiasm from those selling AI products. Image Credit: StockPhotoPro – Adobe Stock Most of the authors of these articles have never taken a foundational computer science course, have never written code, and have never run AI software. Here are a dozen tips for detecting fake and misleading articles about artificial intelligence. Outrageous Claims When AI headlines sound apocalyptic or miraculous, it’s time to slow down. Sensational claims are often inflated to grab attention, sometimes by writers who genuinely believe their own forecasts or are laying out clickbait. History shows that dramatic outlandish predictions routinely miss the mark, making skepticism and evidence essential companions to examining technological wonder. Hedging Writers often use qualifying language to avoid being wrong while still suggesting dramatic advances. Words like “developing” and “expected” can imply progress that hasn’t actually occurred …

Vocal fry is more common in men, actually, find scientists

Vocal fry is more common in men, actually, find scientists

Published by skeptic

You may find vocal fry irritating, but don’t automatically attribute it to women Cavan Images / Alamy If you have listened to a podcast or watched a video on TikTok lately, you will probably be familiar with vocal fry, even if you didn’t know it had a name. Vocal fry describes the creaky sound that occurs when we speak in our lowest vocal register. It is often considered irritating and is typically associated with young women, but new research suggests there is no good-quality evidence for this stereotype. Vocal fry occurs when our vocal cords are relaxed but not a lot of air is pushing past them, which naturally happens when we come to the end of an utterance. But it becomes more complicated in the context of popular culture, where it is often presented as a negative – or, more specifically, annoying – characteristic of young women’s speech. Now, Jeanne Brown at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, and her colleagues have found that this idea ought to be interrogated. First, they analysed the speech …

Sony Bravia Theater Bar 5 Review: Basic Bar, Big Sound

Sony Bravia Theater Bar 5 Review: Basic Bar, Big Sound

Published by skeptic

Most folks will want to connect via the HDMI port, which syncs up with your TV’s HDMI eARC/ARC input for high-quality sound transference and the ability to control power and volume with your TV remote. The optical input is a backup for (much) older TVs, or even a CD player, but there’s no spare HDMI port for connecting a Blu-ray player or game console directly, let alone an analog input for legacy audio gear like a turntable. You won’t want to go much further without downloading the Bravia Connect app, which walks you through the full setup process and is the only way to access to settings like Bluetooth pairing so you can stream music from your phone. A single power button at the bar’s left flank is the sole onboard control key, while a two-dot LED system up front provides a basic visual display. The Bar Necessities Photograph: Ryan Waniata Sony’s app picks up where the hardware leaves off, including a handy function that identifies your current sound format and resolution quality. The app’s …

Sound baths are supposed to help relax and ‘soothe’ your nervous system. But do any of these claims ring true? | Donna Lu

Sound baths are supposed to help relax and ‘soothe’ your nervous system. But do any of these claims ring true? | Donna Lu

Published by Sam Flores

I, for one, am partial to a bath: what’s not to love about a dim room, candles and nary an electronic device in sight? But a wellness trend that has emerged in recent years makes soaking in tepid water seem quaint: increasingly, people are paying to be “bathed” in sound. Social media is awash with clips of sound baths, where participants – for a fee – lie on yoga mats, hang in cocoons or float on inflatable pool loungers while berobed practitioners gently ring chimes and bang gongs for relaxation. Online interest in these experiences has risen exponentially in the last decade. Some are available outside in places such as Sydney Harbour, where you can be “rocked gently by the tide” while blindfolded. High-end wellness clubs, meanwhile, boast of surround-sound chambers complete with subwoofers. The purpose, according to the marketing copy for such classes, is to “soothe and calm your nervous system” with sounds that will “penetrate every cell in your body”, while specific frequencies are purported to promote “healing”. Singing bowls – metal or …

How John Coltrane Introduced the World to His Radical Sound with His Recording of “My Favorite Things” (1961)

How John Coltrane Introduced the World to His Radical Sound with His Recording of “My Favorite Things” (1961)

Published by José Betancourt

John Coltrane released “more sig­nif­i­cant works” than his 1960 “My Favorite Things,” says Robin Wash­ing­ton in a PRX doc­u­men­tary on the clas­sic rework­ing of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Broad­way hit. “A Love Supreme” is often cit­ed as the zenith of the saxophonist’s career. “But if you tried to explain that song to an aver­age lis­ten­er, you would lose them. [“My Favorite Things”] is a defin­i­tive work that every­one knows, and any­one can lis­ten to, and the fas­ci­nat­ing sto­ry of its evo­lu­tion is some­thing every­one can share and enjoy.” The song is acces­si­ble, a com­mer­cial­ly suc­cess­ful hit, and it is also an exper­i­men­tal mas­ter­piece. Indeed, “My Favorite Things” may be the per­fect intro­duc­tion to Coltrane’s exper­i­men­tal­ism. After the dizzy­ing chord changes of 1959’s “Giant Steps,” this 14-minute, two-chord excur­sion pat­terned on the ragas of Ravi Shankar announced Coltrane’s move into the modal forms he refined until his death in 1967, as well as his embrace of the sopra­no sax­o­phone and his new quar­tet. It became “Coltrane’s most request­ed tune,” says Ed Wheel­er in The World Accord­ing to …

11 Very Odd Ways AI Is Making Everyone Think & Sound Pretty Much Exactly The Same

11 Very Odd Ways AI Is Making Everyone Think & Sound Pretty Much Exactly The Same

Published by Jenni Sidey

The rise of AI has changed society drastically in the span of just a few years. AI programs have been available to the public since 2022, and in those short four years, they have had a dramatic impact on how we do just about everything, from homework assignments to daily work tasks. At first, it may not feel like AI has impacted the way you operate. Sure, you may ask ChatGPT or Grok a question every now and then, but for the most part, you feel the exact same way you always have. Still, while you may feel the same, there’s no denying that there are some very odd ways AI is making everyone think and sound pretty much exactly the same. Here are 11 very odd ways AI is making everyone think and sound pretty much exactly the same 1. We’re less and less comfortable with uncertainty Kmpzzz | Shutterstock Let’s face it, nobody likes to be uncertain. Fearing the idea of looking dumb, most people will do whatever it takes to protect their …

How I customized my Sonos speaker to make my home theater sound truly immersive

How I customized my Sonos speaker to make my home theater sound truly immersive

Published by skeptic

TV and Music Level: In this settings folder, you can adjust the audio level of your surrounds when playing TV audio or music. You can adjust these levels on a 30-point scale, plus or minus 15. I keep these settings neutral Surround Distance: Ensure your surround distance is as accurate as possible, as this feature serves as a balancing measure for your surrounds. This distance refers to how far your Sonos surround speakers are from your preferred listening position. However, Sonos only provides three vague distance options for this option, so if you don’t plan to move your room’s furniture or speakers anytime soon, let TruePlay gauge this distance for you. Music Playback: This feature changes the loudness of your rear speakers’ output. Your options are Ambient or Full. I prefer listening to music when my rear speakers are set to Full. I noticed that this setting improves balance when listening to stereo music. In Ambient, I felt that my soundbar was doing too much of the heavy lifting, and I could only hear vocals …