Hmm, no thanks... I really don't want an LCD or other display in my equipment rack. I'd much rather use my TV for displaying and have a minimalist 2-line character display on the front of the unit, at most. Touch screens belong on the optional remote, not on the unit face where they just clutter the rack and never get used. Also, no embedded PalmOS; I don't want this thing crashing as much as my computer does. And card bays almost always add more cost than worth.

If you want more specialization and expandability, I'd rather see it done by chaining devices together, perhaps with fire wire. Need more analog inputs? Buy an eight-channel ADC and use it as for stereo pairs. Want balanced outputs? Get a six channel balanced DAC. Want 7.1 with stereo subs? Buy a second DAC. The pre/pro becomes a processor, and just takes digital data from an input side and sends it to the output side. Give it enough extra MIPS and a flashable ROM for future decoding formats.

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Matthew J. Hill
matt@idsi.net