Guy Incognito - I am not sure where you heard that digital signals don't travel as far as analogs do. Both are in the same VHF/UHF spectrum. In terms of RF, they both travel the same distance. With the error handling algorithms in ATSC, the digitals actually can be tuned in farther than analogs will ever be. In fact, I live in Lees Summit - a suburb of Kansas City. I am about 12 miles from the towers. I can pick up all digital signals with a $7 rabbit year. But with the same antenna and the same TV, I cannot even pick up half of the analog channels. The only places where people pickup analog and not digital is when they have a crappy early generation ATSC tuner (from an old HDTV for example) or the Effective Radiating Power (ERP) of the digital signal is actually lower than the analog one.

Ridgecity!

iPod uses open technologies like

1) MP3
2) WAV
3) AIFF
4) AAC (MPEG4 audio)
5) MPEG4 Part 2 for video
6) MPEG4 -Part10 (aka H.264) for video

The only proprietary technologies they use in addition to this are

1) DRM'd AAC
2) DRM'd MPEG-4 Part 10
3) Apple Lossless

The music sold through the iTunes store now is plain AAC.

So, before you start saying everything is proprietary, get your facts.

I auditioned receivers from Denon, HK, Onkyo and Yamaha and the HK won out by a big margin. I don't know where you get that the HK is falling behind. It is true that they have not updated their flagship receiver in 3 years but they are coming out with it this year.

For audio quality, HK is hard to beat. I have tried Denon, Onkyo and Yamaha and I have a warm and fuzzy feeling when I listen to my HK. The latest receivers have good upscaling also. Try the AVR 254. I recommend trying everything in your own home. Return the ones you don't want.

May be Apple thinks that HDMI is a bag of hurt - nevermind that is what they told about Bluray.

But honestly, I have heard that DisplayPort is going to be better in the long run.

Actually, it is you that is mistaken. GE exited the electronics market a while ago, but now they are trying to get back into making TVs. I don't know why though! They really don't have the skills, but here is a link.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601080&sid=aLpdkFMNs5.Y&refer=asia

It is a joint venture.

It does everything under the sun save for HD-DVD.

They don't work for PC or Mac. Only AppleTV. I submitted a bug report several months ago, and still no response from Apple!!

I have owned two 2xxx series Denon receivers before, I also auditioned an Onkyo 804 at my home. I have Klipsch reference quality speakers. Then I tried out the HK 247/645 and 745. The HKs basically killed the other receivers. The music quality was phenomenal. Crystal clear music that made voices just jump out. I currently have the 745 and it works great! Got it at a great deal through the harmanaudio refurb store in eBay with full 2 year warranty.

The newer 254/354 are great too after the firmware updates.

I would be greatly surprised if the monoprice solution integrates the USB audio into HDMI output. HDMI does not have separate lines for audio as far as I understand. They multiplex the audio and video together. That is pretty hard to do for a $15 adapter.