Who could have foreseen the metamorphosis of the home theater marketplace? Just a few short years ago, a home theater was comprised of a VCR, a large, heavy projector cantilevered down from the ceiling and a screen on the far wall---a screen viewable only after dark by the way. To get around the 'after dark' syndrome, the home theater was often relegated to the basement, hard by the pool table and the carefully stored boxes of Christmas ornaments.

Nowadays it isn't unusual to see a purpose built room, with theater seats and risers no less, and the very best audio, video and A/V playback equipment money can buy. Line doubling DVD players, Kilowatt---average, not peak power---surround sound systems and theme-based decorations are the norm. Projectors are small and extremely bright or the homeowner may opt for a 6-foot rear screen projection TV instead.

Whatever the case, the centerpiece of the system will be an HDTV capable display device. And the family and/or guests will accept nothing less than being able to count the individual hairs on the head of the leading lady.

Which brings us to TV One's AVT-3700 imageMAX Video Scaler.

'How 'ya gonna keep 'em down on the farm after they've seen Pareeeee?' as the old song goes. Meaning, in this context, how can you ever stand to watch a VHS movie on your big screen once you've become accustomed to progressive scanning and 8 Mbit/sec MPEG-2 DVDs?

The answer is you can't stand it. The image is blurry, the colors not brilliant.

What to do?

How about we take that VCR's output and convert it to 480p or 576p or 720p or maybe 1080i HDTV resolution by scaling the available video up a notch or two? While we are at it, lets stabilize the output of that ratty old VCR and give the user some handles on the Brightness, Color Saturation, Color Hue and Contrast.

How about we design it to handle 3:2 pull down so those 24fps films don't flicker and also have the highest possible image quality?

Now: lets provide inputs for Composite or S-Video and, just for grins, YCbCr as well. Make it NTSC or PAL-B/G capable, control it with an IR remote control, give it an easy to navigate menu and guarantee the whole thing for 2 years, parts and labor.

But maybe someone might want to watch the output on a computer screen. No problem. We'll also make VGA, SVGA, XGA and SXGA outputs available.

For the money you also get a Composite Video Input cable, an S-Video Input cable, a HD-15 Male to Male cable, an YPbPr cable, the remote control and the power supply.

Now, lets be clear on one thing: you can't make a 200 line resolution VHS tape look as good as a top quality DVD. But you can definitely improve it with the imageMAX and make the action of viewing it something you enjoy---instead of the root-canal-like experience of watching the direct output of your VCR on your HDTV.

TV One's AVT-3700 imageMAX is the magic decoder ring for salvaging old format videos and extending their lives a few more years. With it, you can enjoy watching Monte Walsh or High Road to China again, (two of the hundreds of good movies that will probably never be converted to DVD).

And how much does all this magic cost? $395.00!