Best AV REceiver, finally a website dedicated to AV receivers

Best Value, Solid Product.

Audi World says:

I was originally shopping for a sub-$1k receiver that had 7.1 PCM/True-HD/DTS master capabilties with HDMI switching but after finding out the great pre-order pricing for this new Onkyo, I couldn’t turn it down. It lists for $2100 but I managed to grab one of J&R’s first arrival units for $1449 with free shipping. I’ve had this receiver for about a week now and so far it has delivered everything as advertised. The Silicon Optix HQV ReonVX video processor does as stellar job of upscaling all sources including SD from analog sources to 1080p outputed to a single HDMI cable to the display. The only strange thing I noticed is that when the Wii 480p component source is processed by the HQV chip and upconverted to 1080p, it turns out a little blurry, so I guess too much processing can sometimes be a bad thing. In this situation, I simply change the receiver’s HDMI output mode to “pass through” via the OSD and the Wii’s 480p looks just as sharp as if it were connected directly to the display. On the other end of the spectrum, 1080i sources from the DirecTV HR20-700 unit like Discovery HD is upscaled to 1080p and looks beautiful. Similarly, the DVD-upconverting capabilties of the Onkyo appear to be on par with the acclaimed Toshiba HD-XA2, since I think it uses the same ReonVX chip the Onkyo does. For this reason, I no longer have use for the Toshiba in my HT set up and have since moved it to the bedroom (not like I ever watch HD-DVD movies there to begin with). So I have nothing but praise for the Onkyo’s video processing capabilties. The mere presence of the HQV chip makes the Onkyo a truly amazing package for the price because even the latest comparable but more expensive Denon 4308 still uses an ‘inferior’ Faroudja DCDI chip.

Setup of the device was cake except for the fact that it was little tricky to maneuver a 60+ lb receiver with care into a small cabinet. All the connectors in the back are gold plated including the speaker posts which are ready to receive banana plugs. There are 4 HDMI inputs (and believe it or not, I’m actually short one so I had to plug in the Apple TV via component) and the 2 HDMI outs are nice in case I needed a zone 2 display to mirror or even a smaller monitor dedicated to the OSD for that extra dope wow factor. Once all the inputs and speakers were connected, I plugged in the included set-up microphone and the Audyssey MultiEQ XT automatically kicked in via the OSD. This sound and speaker calibration scheme was fairly intuitive and measured up to 8 listening areas. It was even able to detect which speakers in the room had enough frequency range to be THX certified (the receiver itself is THX Ultra2 certified) not that it really means anything. After about 20 minutes of doing the guided calibration in a silent room, the resulting sound from various sources was excellent…more