The "official" Yamaha AVENTAGE RX-A710/810/1010/2010/3010 thread - Page 11

I think this is very dependent on number, types and quality of speakers, etc.

I'm running 7 speakers at the moment, the usual 5.1, plus two front presence speakers.

For sports like football, the Sports setting does work well for me.
For movies, in order of preference: SciFi, Spectacle, Adventure. Some movie DSP's are better than others for dialogue clarity, depending on the source.
For music: 7 Channel Stereo really makes it pop. Music Video also works, but doesn't have the same in-your-face quality.

Sorry to be so long responding. Pressed for time at the moment.

I have both OTA/direct cable feed Hi-Def and Standard Def. cable box TV sources at present. This obviously needs to be upgraded, along with getting a Blu-ray player. So that's all I have at present to base judgments upon.

I see little if any improvement with processing on, but I don't think I'm seeing degradation either. In any case, upscaling standard def. in no way makes it look anything like hi def. Nevertheless, it is very watchable - for now.

No pro calibration. No break-in slides, none of that. I was careful the first 150 hours or so and have had zero retention problems. It's a June build, which scared me when I received it a few weeks ago, but I have seen absolutely none of the issues posters over at the VT30 thread are obsessed with.

I don't want to turn this thread into another VT30 thread, but I'll get my Custom settings and PM you when I get a chance.

Well I have a vt30 myself,and i just use pass through with my Yami 3900 ,but it has the ABIT 2010 processor anyways.I did for awhile use my Denon realta processor but saw little improvement over the VT30 processing for cable signal.Mind you I only watch HD these days now.
I really think with the new technologies being used by cable companies in general improving,better quality processing with in TV,s that unless your are stuck with SD signal quality, that seperate Video processors are going to become of little value to the average user.
Yes there is always room for improvement but most that have come over to see watch cable at my place on my 65 inch do not see a differance with or without processing,mind you I have not tried a 3010 yet, and I do use a OPPO 93 for movie playback direct to the vt30.

You might want to try running just two speakers just to see if your overloading the receiver with the additional load. Have you checked to make sure that your wiring is correct and intact, that the speakers actually work or that they are connected to the proper terminals and you are not running presence speakers correct? I know very basic questions, just trying to think of a the little stuff as sometimes it is the little stuff that bites us. I had an issues with no sound looked high and low couldn't figure it out then it dawned on me after looking at it seemingly forever that I had a plug in the wrong port. The back of these units are so tight it is easy to overlook something.

If you look at p. 69 of the manual it also says only analog signals may be passed to zone 2 and if you want to listen to other sources they must be independently connected to the appropriate ports on the back of the unit. This info is on p. 69 of the manual.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

RTROSE

I have a Pioneer Elite VSX-50 (same price as a Yamaha RX-A710). So far I like it, but one thing that bothers me is that occasionally AirPlay cuts out while listening to Pandora. AirPlay can be flaky, I know from previous experience, and the only way to play Pandora on the VSX-50 is through AirPlay.

I'm a big Pandora fan and am wondering if Pandora would be more reliable on the RX-A710, since Pandora plays directly from the receiver via ethernet, and no AirPlay is involved. Can someone comment on the reliability and quality of Pandora on the Aventage receivers? Thanks.

I have the 1010. You are correct Pandora plays directly on the receiver. I listened to it yesterday for several hours with nary a hiccup. It was silly simple to set up too. As for quality? Well it is as good as streaming audio from the net can be. I did use the enhance feature on the 1010 and it did clean it up a touch, very subtle though. Overall very easy and intuitive to use.

Regards,

RTROSE

I currently have a Denon 3311 that is now headed for its third repair for the hdmi board. Needless to say im done with Denon for a while. These Yamaha's look interesting but there doesnt seem to be a lot of talk about them. Do any of you current owners regret your purchase? Why dont these seem to get more love?

There is a lot more "love" on the forum for the xx00 line as they have been around longer. Not too many xx10's out yet to get a lot of responses here. I for one do not have any regrets at all regarding my purchase. I'm still learning what this unit can do but so far I'm very happy with it's performance. Knock on wood, there does not seem to be the HDMI issues with the Yammies as there has been with the Onkyo's and Denon's.

Regards,

RTROSE

One month in I have zero regrets. In fact I'm very pleased.

My 1010 is giving me what I wanted - very musical for music and very punchy for movies/video. I can detect no distortion at the loudest levels I can tolerate. Very pure sound. I am hearing movie sound highlights I never heard before, although some of that is undoubtedly the new Polk TL3's I am using for surrounds and presence. Amazing little speakers. The 1010 seems to be able to go from smooth, rich rendering of classical, jazz, rap, blues, etc. music to gut-busting, earth-shaking, room rattling explosions of the most horrific screen carnage imaginable - all without a hiccup. My neighbors must hate me. Oh well.

Hookup was plug-n-play (lots of plugs) with all the other new gear and no issues, HDMI or otherwise.

Some have complained that the Yammies don't seem to have audio output that matches their rated wattages. It is true that I have to crank up the 1010 to higher volume settings than I had to with the old Pioneer, but there is more than enough output, and that's with 7 speakers working, plus the two ancient monster front mains I have for now are 16 Ohms! If I pushed it to the max I would become an E.N.T. doctor's permanent meal ticket.

The 1010 is built like granite and imparts the feeling that it's a tough piece of gear. Even pushed, it seems to run with very little heat. Side note, I had actually wanted the 2010, but it's too deep for the TechCraft 72" stand I needed. The 1010 seems more than adequate. Time will tell how it holds up.

The only improvement I would like to see so far is with the remote, which is not even remotely user friendly in a dark room. I am getting used to it though.

+1 on Pandora. 3010 streams like a champ. And sounds great doing it.

I just want to know if I'm doing this right. This is my first YPAO system with my 810.

It looks like if I set all my speakers to "small" and set the "bass cross over" to 80Hz, that means all speakers are at 80Hz...right?

So there doesn't look like there's a setting for the Sub. So is that handled by turning the sub freq. to max as the manual says?

One more thing, when I go into the PEQ manually, is the "center frequency" adjustment for each speaker another way of setting the Hz?

I doubt nussman, who only made three posts, is still here, but these quotes gave me quite a scare today. I wanted to see if anyone had further info, and impart what I found myself.

Today was my 1010's last day in the return window, so I thought I'd better check for a dedicated AVS thread to uncover any issues. (Been somewhat busy.) Previously the only thing that bugged me was the stingy bass management; one global crossover setting and no EQ treatment for the sub. But every competitor has an achilles heel of some kind, and they don't have the RXA's emphasis on sound quality.

But I do game a lot, and consoles tend to run natively in RGB (0-255 color values) so nussman's charge that the Yamahas were clipping blacker-than-black and whiter-than-white to the 16-235 video standard had me testing frantically as the hours counted down on my return window.

Besides, I feel that good equipment should pass BTB rather than chop it off, no matter how silly the notion. It's there. Don't discard it.

Using AVS HD 709 on my Xbox 360 S, I could not get the Yamaha to clip the signal. I tried every mismatch I could think of to replicate what nussman reported, with video processing on and off in the receiver, using random HDMI inputs as well as the suspiciously designated "BR/DVD" input, even strange non-standard resolutions, and still blacker-than-black seemed to pass through to the TV intact. Even if I ended up with total blackness, such as calibrating senselessly to 16 in RGB then switching the Xbox to YCbCr 709, raising the brightness would show that everything had still made it through, all the bars below video black present.

Eventually I lugged down a Mac and hooked it up to the 1010, looked at black level calibration screens (all passed) and even got hands-on, drawing black boxes in Photoshop with RGB values of just 1/1/1 or 5/5/5 over true black 0/0/0 backgrounds, and could make them out distinctly. Far as I can tell, everything up to 16 should have been the same flat black if the Yamaha was clipping BTB.

Lastly, this series of Samsung TVs (LNA650) has a useful quirk: feed them YCbCr and they disable/grey out the "HDMI Black Level" option in the settings menu, because the sets know what has to be done with 16-235 video levels — 16 has to be "black"; feed them RGB and the option becomes available, because from an RGB source like a PC you could be playing back full range (0-255) or limited range (16-235) material — toggling the "HDMI Black Level" settings makes sure black is black, not gray, in either case.

With the Xbox 360 set to RGB, routed through the Yamaha 1010 to the TV, indeed the option is available; a sign that the receiver is passing RGB. With the console set to YCbCr 709, the option disappears as expected.

With the equipment I have, I can't think of another way to test the receiver's integrity here. Unless it's doing some crafty conversion of RGB that I haven't figured out, everything points to proper passthrough of a full 0-255 signal. All i can think of is that nussman, writing in October, possibly had older firmware, while I'm running the latest.

Keep in mind the 3010 and the 1010 have different video processors which might account for different outcomes. I offer this as speculation as I'm more an audio than a video "perfectionist". Just a thought.

In any event, it seems you made a good choice for your particular video needs. Let the games begin (cue Roman trumpet music).

@ Ayton

So, are you keeping your A1010?

I love my 710 because it doesn't have the permanent on-screen volume display that the 700 did. Don't seem to be many in circulation (Amazon says they'll be back in stock in 1-3 months) but I got a good price on a display unit and have no regrets. Love it.

I apologize for my gaff in advance. I purchased an A710 and love every bit of it, especially controlling two zones from any android device in the house. Unfortunatley I thought Sirius and XM were now the same company and interchangable in technology..... I am a long time XM subscriber. Any chance I can adapt the XM home reciever to work with the sirius ready control through the reciever or am I stuck becoming a Sirius subscriber?

Anyone running 4 ohm speakers with the 810? I want to swap my Pioneer vsx-1121 for this receiver to get better music quality. I have always been a fan of the Burr Brown DACs.

I will need to run the 810 without an external amp for about 2 months. Just wondering if anyone else is running 4 ohm speakers on a Yamaha 810.

BTW, the speakers I have are Emotiva 6.2 L/R, 6.3C, and ERD-1 surrounds in a 5.1 config. Pioneer vsx-1121 and Onkyo 809 had no problem playing these relatively loud with no audible distortion that I could hear.

I'm thinking of replacing an older Denon AVR with the A810. One thing I'd like to see are the display overlays for the volume and menu items, etc. Is there anyplace I can see what those look like? I've tried searching google images and I have not found anything that looks like screenshots of the interface.

And are new models likely to be out in April/May? I'd hate to buy an A810 now and have it replaced with something new in two months.

Thanks!

Download the 810 manual off the Yamaha site. That has pic's of the on screen overlays.

Up and running. Awesome receiver..

Q1/ Re the pure direct mode for multichannel 5.1 analog input from an SACD player (via it's 5.1 Analog out). Does pure direct bypass the ADDA chips and run an analog signal straight thru to the analog output stages on the receiver? Or does it just isolate the video signal? I guess I want to ask how to set this receiver out with minimal (ie none) digital processing. I don't want it to go thru the DAC chips on the receiver. Can't seem to find any info on how to set this up in the manual...Do I just leave everything on the "straight" setting? I just want to leave everything as pure as I can from my SACD player...

Q2/ When the input labels are "re-named" via the receivers GUI, they are not reflected on the web browser. They just remain AV1. AV2 etc. Is this correct? Or do I have a setting wrong in the web browser or somewhere else...

Q3/ Is there pure direct control via the web browser?

Q4/ Is there any way to get an info display of the playing movie soundtrack codec up on the main LED screen or even within the browser? I'm used to seeing this "light up" on previous receivers...

Cheers

Can the on-screen volume level be disabled on the 3010?

Hi Jacksmyname, yes ... menu -> Function -> Display Set -> Short Message -> Off (default is "on").

Using the MCH analogue input bypasses all processing in the AVR. There is NO A/D/A conversion, no EQ and no bass management/time alignment.

Can't speak to web questions as I've not yet hooked up my A1000 to my network.

Technically you already are a Sirius sub since it's all under one roof now.

From my experience, I think the easiest and best-sounding way to go is to utilize the SiriusXM Internet Radio built-in app in the Yamaha itself. If you are an old-time XM sub you should already have some kind of "free internet listening" package in your account (you can create one if you haven't used it already at siriusxm.com, just log in and it's listed under your account options. It's something that came with my lifetime subscription, not something I paid extra for. Note this is different than the "premium online listening" service which carries a monthly fee and is required to use SiriusXM apps on certain multimedia devices like the Squeezebox).

However, to my surprise (and delight), you don't need that "premium online listening" account to access the built-in SiriusXM Internet Radio app in the Yamahas. Click on the NET button on your Yamaha remote and cycle through to the SiriusXM app -- I was shocked that my username/password from the free-online listening worked right away. IMO the sound is even better streaming from the web than plugging in an external dock and hooking my XM radio up to the stereo inputs (probably an indictment of how far the quality has gone, sadly). You might want to go that route unless you have a different home receiver kit than what I'm thinking of (sorry for any confusion

AFAIK the on-screen volume can be turned off on any of the X10 models. Don't know why they didn't issue a firmware update to do it on last year's models but it drove me crazy enough that I sold my 700 and bought a 710 instead.

I have the 710, and other than having slight regrets about not stepping up to the 810 (larger amp/power), am very satisfied with the unit.

I have a question though: Previously I had a Sony DA555ES, which allowed me to have different simultaneous outputs (listen to tunes while watching/playing a separate video). As a specific example, how would play audio from a separate input (squeezebox player), while viewing something else (playing a [PS3] video game?

I was able to do this with the Sony but have yet been able to figure this out for the Yamaha. Does anyone know if this is possible?

Way to go!! I guess what me got a bit confused was that when the multichannel input is selected, all "7.1" speaker indicators light up on the front GUI...even though I only have 5.1 analog input plugged in..

The web control is incredibly cool..as is the power off timer, and this thing even power up's via the web browser!!

I'll explore the "scenes"..maybe can set a pure analog scene happening, that sets pure direct on automatically.
If I use the"straight" setting for movies, I can play bitstream soundtracks without decoding... Am I correct on this?

Cheers.

Does it have some "scenes" settings. Maybe you can use those to do what you want to do..

When I play back SACDs that are fewer than 5.1 via HDMI, but on the MCH layer (like a 3.0 RCA Living Stereo classical disc), all 5.1 lights come on my A1000 (I don't have more than 5.1 hooked up, so I don't see the other lights). Appears to be quirk of the front panel display.


Looking forward to trying my iPhone app for the receiver once I finish running the wire to the router (have to run it above the drop ceiling panels to another room and I've been too lazy to do so).


I believe you can set a scene up to do so, but I've found setting up scenes to be the most frustrating aspect of this AVR, by far. Once it is done, it works very well--but it is not user-friendly in terms of programming. I'm no designer and I could think of half a dozen ways to significantly improve the scenes programming. Oh well, nothing's perfect.

Yeh. Your not wrong!! scratching my head how to even edit a scene..I go into one of the default scenes, "load", then "detail", scroll down to 'input", then it doesn't allow you to arrow across and change the input!

Similarly, editing a new scene..what the?..how do you even load it to add anything? How do you edit scenes??

This is ridiculous...