amp/pre amp vs receiver

[cdn guy]

i have a denon 1603 receiver which i'd like to upgrade however i am unsure if i should purchase another receiver or take the plunge into the world of separates. a receiver would be the easiest choice due to its simplicity and its all-in-one convenience factor. i have no clue where to start with separates.

i have a pair of older b&w 220s to which i will be adding a centre and surrounds from the dm600 series. system will be used 40% music, 60% movies. only interested in 2 channel stereo for music and dd for movies. 6.1, 7.1, dsp modes, video switching, ect, are of no importance to me. due to budget limitations, i will be looking for used gear. any advice and recommendations? thanks.

[topspeed]

Separates will offer you more flexibility and better sound quality versus an AVR, however they are definitely more complex and if WAF is a factor, this could be huge. A lot of today's AVR's sound pretty good and really, how much better a separate amp will sound will depend on your speakers and your hearing. For example, my speakers will dip to below 3 ohms and can present fairly large impedence swings to an amplifier. Hooking 5 of those suckers up to my Denon revealed the limitations of the power supply fairly quickly. A good, dedicated amp most likely wouldn't have encountered those problems, which is exactly why I added one :).

If you're looking for used pre/pro's and amps, a great place to start is audiogon.com. The site is populated by audiophiles and gear geeks and is far safer than ebay, IMO. Rotel, Adcom, B&K, and Parasound all make excellent equipment and won't break the bank. You should be able to find something that tickles your fancy.

Hope this helps.

[Mr Peabody]

What budget do you have for your upgrade? With not wanting the latest features you should be able to pick up a good deal on either direction.Separates will give flexibility and better performance as mentioned. Receivers by brands like Rotel, B&K, Arcam or NAD will generally give you better sound over mass market brands while in most instances foregoing some of the bells & whistles. Those brands also offer good value in separates. Depending on budget, for separates you might also look at Anthem, Primare or Classe'. Going beyond that for the likes of Bryston or Krell is still going to relieve you of a large portion of coin.

[cdn guy]

I stumbled across a denon 5600 for $500. It looks like $500 will be my budget which may be too low for seperates. Should I settle with an AVR? WAF will not be an issue...she just wants me to finish our home theatre setup so we can start watching movies again.

[topspeed]

The 5600 was a great AVR...about 10 years ago. It doesn't have DPLII, which is far superior to DPL, and pretty much a necessity if you're going to watch anything other than DD or DTS encoded material.

At $500, it's going to be pretty tough to do a pre/pro & amp. You're better off getting a nice AVR such as this Denon 1708. (http://usa.denon.com/ProductDetails/3637.asp[/url) It has all the power you'll need, HDMI 1.3, Audessey auto eq, and all the decoding and/or processing you'll need for your HT. You might also check into AVR's from Yamaha, Pioneer, and Onkyo.

Hope this helps.

[Mr Peabody]

Notice the Cambridge, NAD & other Denon deals here:
http://www.spearitsound.com/specials.htm

ah, forget Denon
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?miscrcvr&1197174348

I agree, the DSP is gimmicky. I had that in my Sony ES car stereo and never used them. It could even throw the sweet spot off to one side if you were driving alone.

[cdn guy]

so i purchased a denon avr3300 for $190 off of ebay. i have very simple needs and this unit seems to satisfy them...has dd, more than 2 digital inputs, and decent power for my needs. it also has pre outs which are much appreciated. i've heard some people use the avr as a preamp and this is something which i may consider if needed. will this increase the sound quality substantially?

thank you all for your help!!

[topspeed]

WOW! That B&K is a KILLER find! Forget Denon indeed! :thumbsup:


To the OP,
Whether or not you need an external amp will depend a lot on your speakers. I'm unfamiliar with the 220's so I don't know what their load characteristics are like. If they are easy to drive, you may or may not notice a difference. My B&W's were notorious for their fickleness with amps and sure enough, once I plugged 5 of them into my Denon well...Houston, we have a problem. The 3803 simply didn't have the cajones to deal with the load. To the casual listener, it was fine for sure. However, to nutjobs like us, it wasn't hard to hear the degredation in sound. I added a 2 channel amp for music and once again, the sky was blue, rainbows arc'd across the horizon, and a little bluebird sat on my shoulder and sang Disney songs.

Hope this helps.

[pixelthis]

Get the B&K, use it as a receiver, then, when money allows, get a preamp to plug into it.
Even tho it has nice amps, a lot of preamp features are obsolete(which is why the owner is selling it, probably)