Posted on: Tuesday, May 27, 2003
HyperSonic Sound may change the audio future
By Kevin Maney
USA Today
Rarely is an invention so unusual and so simple that in 15 seconds most people who experience it realize it could alter everyday life. But that's what happens to just about anyone who steps out to the back parking lot of American Technology Corp. (ATC) in San Diego for a demonstration of its HyperSonic Sound (HSS) system.
Essentially, HSS does for sound what the laser did for light — intensely focuses and channels it so it can travel great distances without dispersing. In the usual HSS demo, a technician points a cereal-box-size speaker at someone standing on the asphalt 100 yards away. Amid the din of the nearby freeway, the technician plays a recording of the sound of ice cubes clinking into a glass.
To the listener, the sound comes across as if it were through headphones. The effect is totally unlike a sound blaring from a distant speaker over oppressive car noise. Take two steps to the side, out of the sound beam, and you hear nothing at all. Step back in, and there it is again.
"It offers huge benefits over your standard speaker systems," says Sony executive Simon Beesley, who is working on building HSS into sound systems for commercial settings, such as stores or restaurants.
Though the technology is several years from becoming mainstream, HSS could be used to make laptop speakers that blare music to the person in front of the screen, while no one else could hear it.
It could allow a grocery store to play audio advertisements that seem to come from, say, the display of Duracell batteries, yet could only be heard by the shopper directly in front of the display.
An HSS-equipped car could play one CD for the parents up front and another for kids in the back, and neither would hear even a whisper of the others' music.
ATC plans to sell HSS for niche applications and other uses that don't directly challenge the conventional speaker industry. "Later, we'll go after mainstream speakers," says Woody Norris, who invented the technology for ATC.
Given the enthusiasm at Sony and other companies, HSS probably will make its way into products of all kinds.
