It's hard to put a good man down. I've received a series of emails from a 65-year-old ("plus") reader whose doctor has given him 12 months to live. Best emails all year. He's a retired headbanger into Metallica, Nightwish (me too), Status Quo, DragonForce and "heaps of electric guitar", playing through quite a respectable soundbar. He wanted suggestions for something better, and nominated a max of $3000.

I recommended a couple of products but I really hoped he'd stretch a bit further. “Could you go to $4K?” I asked. “Sennheiser's Ambeo would be just the thing. It reproduces music wonderfully, goes awfully loud and has a ton of bass.” I further suggested he get onto Kanopy to stream a very funny metal movie out of Finland called Heavy Trip.

He replied that, yes, $4K was too expensive but he'd ordered an Ambeo anyway. And after it arrived he wrote again: “Perfect suggestion. Even when the YouTube clips are not great I know they ain't going to sound better on anything else. And that is exactly the feeling I wanted.”

I suspect it's going to be a helluva good 12 months at his place, if a little loud.