Some of the items that slipped by while we were all taking a nice afternoon nap Sunday:

Sherbourn has added an external HDMI switcher to their PT-7010A pre/pro. It disappoints me that separates makers like Sherbourn and Parasound, who make desirable equipment, are not getting with the program and offering features that a $300 av receiver provides. Nobody needs external HDMI switching. People need av receivers and pre/pros that handle HDMI switching internally and process both video and audio. I understand that HDMI has been a moving target in the past, however HDMI 1.3 has been with us for a while now, and it's time for the separates manufacturers to catch up to the mass market receiver producers.

Loudspeaker producer Martin Logan introduced two new fairly affordable hybrid electrostatic loudspeakers. The $2000/pair Source is a 2 way design that uses an 8 inch conventional woofer coupled with one of Martin Logan's electrostatic panels, and has a wedge shaped base that allows the user to tilt the entire speaker to facilitate dialing in the sweet spot. The $3000/pair Purity utilizes two 6.5 inch conventional woofers and has an onboard 200 watt digital amp, allowing it to be driven by a preamp, audio component or even an iPod.

Lastly, German loudspeaker manufacturer Canton showed a new line of speakers designated Chrono. The Chrono line utilizes the same drivers as Canton's Ergo loudspeakers, but has specially designed enclosures will bring the price of the Chronos down as much as 30% from the price points the Ergo line occupies. Canton also refreshed their flagship Vento line. Ports are now downward firing instead of forward. Drivers and crossover have also seen revisions meant to further refine the excellent Vento series.

Not as much to report from CEDIA 2007 day 3 as there was the first couple of days, but a couple items did slip through the cracks.

Texas Instruments announced their new DLP chip, the Dark Chip 4. The Dark Chip 4 touts a native contrast ratio of 15000:1 and is 1080p. No word on whether or not it is a true 1080p or whether DLP will still have to resort to wobulation to achieve the resolution.

Denon showed two Blu Ray players. The DVD-3800BDCI and the DVD-2500BTCI are profile 1.1 players that support decoding of Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. No ethernet on either, and the DVD-2500BTCI is limited to HDMI audio, having no analog outputs. The DVD-3800BDCI has a Silicon Optix REALTA HQV for superior deinterlacing and upscaling abilities. Both are slated to hit stores in December, the DVD-3800BDCI at $1999 and the DVD-2500BTCI for $1199.

Cary adds a video processor to their Cinema line. The Cary Cinema 11V sports six HDMI 1.3 inputs that can pass 1080p video sources at 120 Hz. The nifty feature here is that the 11V will strip the video information from incoming HDMI sources and pass just the audio portion of the signal to a pre/pro. No word on video chip, other features or pricing.

Lots of music servers from many manufacturers. Blah. That's it for day 3.

Day two is in the bag at CEDIA 2007. Some of the items not posted due to lack of interest or information:

NAD has some relatively inexpensive new gear on the way. Look for an HDMI 1.3 compliant receiver and pre/pro in the $2k ballpark.

Sherwood also has an HDMI 1.3 receiver in the works.

Integra announced a forthcoming high end HD DVD player, the DHS-8.8. Not much of an announcement, as it's a rebadged version of the announced Onkyo HD DVD player, which is a rebadged Toshiba HD-XA2. The Integra does add Wolfson and Burr Brown DACs and RS-232. The unit will sell for $1099.

Marantz showed a mock-up of a Blu Ray player, but as to whether or not it was a design slated for production is anyone's guess since no details are available.

The computer component manufacturers see how much fun the Format War is and are picking sides. Acer is throwing it's weight behind HD DVD, and ASUS is picking Blu Ray.

Lastly, the Blu Ray camp claimed they have surpassed HD DVD in stand alone player sales. Toshiba fired back stating that 3 weeks don't paint the whole picture, and that Sony can stick it because since inception, HD DVD is mopping the floor with Blu Ray in stand alone player sales. (I'm paraphrasing here)

And that's about it for days 1 and 2.

Tomorrow marks the 25th anniversary of the day the first consumer compact disc was produced.

On August 17, 1982 production began on compact discs intended for delivery to consumers. The first cd produced? ABBA's The Visitors. The compact disc replaced vinyl records (some would argue that point) and cassette tapes. Initially derided as a "rich man's 8 track" (credit Steve Albini for that moniker), compact discs had become the dominant storage medium for audio content by the end of the eighties. Mp3 failed to replace the compact disc. SACD and DVD-Audio failed to gain a significant foothold in the marketplace, even though they offered superior sound. New audio storage mediums loom on the horizon, but it will take a while to convince people they need anything more than what the compact disc offers.

Here's to ten more years of the compact disc.