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Hi-Fi corner: Rock pedigree makes Riva’s Turbo X the Bluetooth beauty to beat

riva turbo x bluetooth speaker
Image used with permission by copyright holder
What do Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Rod Stewart, Tom Petty, Bob Marley, Miles Davis, The Who, RUSH, and Guns n’ Roses all have in common? They’ve all worked with Rikki Farr, the man behind the Riva Turbo X Bluetooth speaker. And if you’re thinking that kind of musical background might result in a portable speaker with a sonic pedigree that stands above the rest, then you’d be right.

Where other portable speakers fail to deliver on their bold claims of superior sound, the Riva Turbo X delivers … and then some. In the same class as Bowers & Wilkins’ luscious T7 and Bang & Olufsen’s spritely Beoplay A2, the Turbo X delivers rich bass with surprisingly deep extension, a smooth and clear midrange that adds realism to vocals and instrumentation alike, and the kind of treble response that high-end home audio speaker manufacturers chase after for years. It’s the sort of speaker a that impresses musicians as well as audiophiles, with all of the modern conveniences we’ve come to expect from a high-end portable.

Related: Outfit your home in style with the W7 multiroom speaker

Riva says the Turbo X can play at about 75db (which is louder than you think) for up to 26 hours. That’s some incredible battery life. It can use that big battery to charge your device, too, but more importantly, it supports a 45-watt amplifier that powers a total of seven drivers.

The Riva Turbo X will power your party, indoor or outdoor, thanks to a Turbo EQ switch which boosts bass and treble just enough to help cut through the din of outdoor noise. Plus, if you want to use it as a mini home theater speaker (there’s nothing mini about how it sounds), it packs a virtual surround processor which expands the sound stage without adding a bunch of out-of-phase mess.

We’ve heard loud speakers before, but rarely with such incredible fidelity. That’s really where the Riva Turbo X surpasses its high-end competition. It offers the brute force needed for a big sound, but avoids sacrificing balance and nuance in the process. You can find a speaker that sounds different, but you can’t do any better — especially in the bass department. We can’t overstate how great the bass is.

Oh, and a high-quality travel bag is available for just $30.00. Not sold yet? Pick one up here at Amazon and give it a shot for yourself. We don’t think you’ll be returning it.

How long should you let new cigars rest in a humidor?
Cigar humidor

Looking at those beautiful, oily cigars you've just unboxed or unwrapped, the calling to light up is real. I get it. I always want to smoke my cigars right away, too. But you shouldn't. Mail day is always exciting after you've ordered a slew of new cigars. When they arrive, the real fun begins. You'll probably need to organize your humidor to make the new sticks fit or arrange them for optimal humidification. As you're handling them, it's difficult to resist the temptation to crack open the cellophane or boxes and smoke one right away. While you can do that in most cases, I would recommend against it. Depending on where those cigars came from, where you live, and how they traveled, they might need a little time to rest in a humidor. They'll need to replenish some humidity and moisture or dry out a little.
How long should you let your new cigars rest?

When you put cigars in a humidor, especially one that's filled, they'll soak up and release humidity over time until they reach the average RH (relative humidity) that you have set inside your humidor. If you have a device like a that does this automatically, it will produce moisture and humidity to keep the levels optimal. You can also achieve the same thing with in smaller humidors, which release and soak up the humidity to match the levels on the label. Boveda packs come in a range of RH levels, from the low to mid-60s to the mid-70s.

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Kevin Costner in Dances with Wolves

An all-American, blue-collar working man turned Hollywood essential, Kevin Costner has lived a life full of experience and dreams that some can only imagine. Starting out as a small kid -- 5'2" at high school graduation -- who moved around a lot, Costner was fond of things like poetry, writing, and singing in his Baptist choir. Outside of the arts, he was also very interested in sports of all kinds, which is reflected in his film career to this day. Also a man of the outdoors, Costner built his own canoe at 18 and paddled it through sections where Lewis and Clark ventured. Fun facts aside, Costner had a full and interesting life before the world got to know him as the charming and eloquent movie man we know him to be today.
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Of all the contemporary film auteurs, perhaps no one’s work has permeated pop culture as thoroughly as Quentin Tarantino's. This director’s hyper-stylized, retro fantasy worlds have come to define cinematic coolness. His clever mashups of genres, exquisite sense of aesthetics, impeccable editing, uproarious suspensefulness, and impossibly quippy dialogue have been endlessly imitated.
Given the current political landscape, Tarantino’s work has undergone a serious critical re-evaluation from Black and feminist critics and scholars who point toward both his allegedly abusive behaviors and the offensive politics and rhetoric of his films. It’s true that in this new light, for many, there may be nothing redeemable about his entire oeuvre. 
However, to discard all Quentin Tarantino movies would discount the impossible talent of his frequent collaborators and stars, such as Sally Menke (who edited all of Tarantino’s movies until her death in 2010), Uma Thurman (who not only played the protagonist of Tarantino’s most iconic movies but was also credited as a co-writer on Kill Bill), Samuel L. Jackson (a frequent Tarantino star), and many more.
With that in mind, here’s our (subjective!) ranking of the greatest directed Quentin Tarantino movies of all time.

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