The Legend of Chad B
"The Babyfaced Audiophile"

My audiophile taste buds were wetted in my pre teen years when I picked up a Stereo Review magazine at the library, back when subscriptions were $4.99 a year! I quickly learned all I could about my new hobby, from building speakers to PA systems, acoustics, and video. I started subscribing to Stereophile around the time of Dick Olsher's speaker cable roundup, back when the magazines were in the smaller Reader's Digest size format. While in high school, I acquired a volunteer DJ shift at a low power college radio station, and I also was a member of the station's engineering committee for a couple of years.

My first full time job was at Sound Waves, a car stereo/home theater chain in Ohio. While at Sound Waves, I attended a seminar by Rockford Technical Training Institute that covered such topics as subwoofer enclosure design, car stereo crossover design and equalization, etc.

I had to leave Sound Waves to further my education at Circleville Bible College, where I honed my skills as a sound technician. As a student, I initially volunteered to run sound equipment for various occasions. I was soon recruited by college staff to be the sound tech for most college events, including banquets, chapel services, and concerts. I went on tour with their traveling singing groups and choir, setting up and running sound systems. While in college, I worked part time at Radio Shack.

After a couple of years at college, I left to pursue education in professional audio at The Recording Workshop in Chillicothe, Ohio. I attended the Recording Engineering and Music Production classes and two more advanced classes. The Recording Workshop features in depth recording studio training with extensive hands on experience to equip students to work in the recording studio/music production industry, and I greatly enjoyed my time there.

I then spent more time working at Radio Shack and Sears, where I worked in the home theater/electronics department. In 1995 I was hired at WQRP-FM in Dayton, OH as a production assistant (helping to record commercials and announcements) and DJ. In 1996, while still working at WQRP part time, I was hired as the assistant manager of The Home Theater Store in Dayton, OH, but that was cut short by the store going out of business. I then returned to full time work at WQRP as Music Director, Producer, DJ, engineer, and web page designer.

My interest in video had been sparked back in my teenage years, but it wasn't until I got my Mitsubishi VS-60803 (1st generation HDTV) that I really dove in head first. I learned a tremendous amount of info at the Home Theater SPoT!, and I spent so much time tweaking my TV that my wife Kaureen suggested that I do it for a living. Making a living doing something you consider a hobby is always a good thing; so in the summer of 2002 I received my training from the Imaging Science Foundation and got my test equipment together. I started out part time in 2002 while still working at the radio station, but I knew I had found the job I loved.  Home theater calibration has been my full time profession since New Year's day, 2004, and in April of 2010 I achieved THX Certified Professional Video Calibration status.

My home theaters are continuously evolving, but the primary components consist of the Sony KDS-R60XBR1 TV and Electrohome 8500 Ultra projector (with Lumagen Vision HDP), Pioneer VSX-82TXS and JVC RS-20VBK receivers, Sony PS3 Blu-Ray player, Toshiba A1 and Xbox 360 HD-DVD players, Pioneer DVD/LD player, Dish 622, Snell Type D speakers, KEF Uni-Q and DIY center speakers, Mirage Omnipolar surround speakers, and Dayton Audio Titanic 15 mkIII and DVC12 subwoofers.