Jim85IROC
03-09-2004, 12:39 PM
I'm sure you've heard it a hundred times, but let's make it 101. I may be in the market for a new receiver. I have two considerations that outweigh all others (assuming I can achieve both while staying in my very limited budget):
1. Sound quality
2. Reliability
I've owned HK and denon, and sold those as well as jvc, onkyo, and sony, but this was a few years ago and things change so fast.
Anyway, I had an HK AVR-300 and liked the sound quality. The reliability was garbage and after my replacement receiver was DOA out of the box, I moved on. I bought a Denon AVR-1801. Sound quality was good, but the sq from the sub pre-out didn't seem to be quite right. No problem, I never used it other than just fooling around at the beginning. It worked nice for a couple years, but last year one of the surround channels went out, and the other day all of the pre-outs weren't working, then suddenly they started working again.
I want something that sounds good, but I don't want unreliable junk anymore. I'm also on a budget, and want (need) to stay under $500. Here's what I'm looking at:
Sony STR-DA1000ES. I've never been a huge sony fan, but frankly the 5 year warranty looks pretty damned appealing.
Marantz SR4400. I don't know much about the marantz, but those who have it seem to like it. How does it stack up against the mainstream stuff like Denon, Onkyo, etc? From what I've seen, Marantz seems to have an awful lot in common with Denon. Marantz lists a bunch of the denon stuff on their own website under the pro line. Is it just a denon with a different appearance?
Nad T743. People seem to rave about the amplifier quality, low ohm stability and overall sound quality, but people also seem to have major complaints of reliability. Plus, to get this into my budget, I'm looking at refurbished stuff or used.
Onkyo something or other. I haven't heard onkyo since I sold it back in 2001, but back then their amps didn't sound good at all. The midrange was a bit off.
Yamaha, denon, Sony ES, Nad, Marantz. Opinions? what else should I be looking at? I don't need massive amounts of power. My denon has had MORE than enough power to satisfy my listening tastes, and once I add a powered sub, I'll be using even less of the available power. Bells and whistles don't really matter. If it would do video switching between various video input formats and output all of it through the same format (i.e. take rca, s-video, composite, blah blah blah and feed it all to my tv through the s-video cable) that would be nice, but not essential. Beyond that I don't really have any other requirements. I just want it to sound good and not to break.
One final possibility is to buy a really cheap ($200) receiver for my home theater, and use the rest of the money on a nice used vintage 2 channel integrated amp for my 2 channel, but I would really prefer the convenience of 1 amp.
1. Sound quality
2. Reliability
I've owned HK and denon, and sold those as well as jvc, onkyo, and sony, but this was a few years ago and things change so fast.
Anyway, I had an HK AVR-300 and liked the sound quality. The reliability was garbage and after my replacement receiver was DOA out of the box, I moved on. I bought a Denon AVR-1801. Sound quality was good, but the sq from the sub pre-out didn't seem to be quite right. No problem, I never used it other than just fooling around at the beginning. It worked nice for a couple years, but last year one of the surround channels went out, and the other day all of the pre-outs weren't working, then suddenly they started working again.
I want something that sounds good, but I don't want unreliable junk anymore. I'm also on a budget, and want (need) to stay under $500. Here's what I'm looking at:
Sony STR-DA1000ES. I've never been a huge sony fan, but frankly the 5 year warranty looks pretty damned appealing.
Marantz SR4400. I don't know much about the marantz, but those who have it seem to like it. How does it stack up against the mainstream stuff like Denon, Onkyo, etc? From what I've seen, Marantz seems to have an awful lot in common with Denon. Marantz lists a bunch of the denon stuff on their own website under the pro line. Is it just a denon with a different appearance?
Nad T743. People seem to rave about the amplifier quality, low ohm stability and overall sound quality, but people also seem to have major complaints of reliability. Plus, to get this into my budget, I'm looking at refurbished stuff or used.
Onkyo something or other. I haven't heard onkyo since I sold it back in 2001, but back then their amps didn't sound good at all. The midrange was a bit off.
Yamaha, denon, Sony ES, Nad, Marantz. Opinions? what else should I be looking at? I don't need massive amounts of power. My denon has had MORE than enough power to satisfy my listening tastes, and once I add a powered sub, I'll be using even less of the available power. Bells and whistles don't really matter. If it would do video switching between various video input formats and output all of it through the same format (i.e. take rca, s-video, composite, blah blah blah and feed it all to my tv through the s-video cable) that would be nice, but not essential. Beyond that I don't really have any other requirements. I just want it to sound good and not to break.
One final possibility is to buy a really cheap ($200) receiver for my home theater, and use the rest of the money on a nice used vintage 2 channel integrated amp for my 2 channel, but I would really prefer the convenience of 1 amp.