What is an Entertainment Center?
In the 1930s, families gathered around the Motorola to hear serial comedy routines of radio personalities like Burns and Allen. By the 50s, the Motorola was replaced with a boxy black and white television that could tune in about half a dozen local stations. Today, families gather around the entertainment center — a conglomeration of electronic equipment made to stagger the senses and cater to our every whim from music to television, movies to gaming. So rich are the audiovisual effects that one can practically feel images come off the screen and circle the room. Entertainment centers can be highly diverse and customized, but the modern entertainment center generally features a combination of audiovisual equipment, centered around a big-screen high-definition television (HDTV). In most cases, this is a large flat-panel display with a 16:9 aspect ratio — rectangular like a movie screen rather than square. The HDTV might be LCD or plasma and can have any number of connections, which to
