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Help with first receiver selection

post #1 of 8
1/6/12 at 8:22pm
Thread Starter 
Hello, I am in the process of upgrading my home theater from an old sony htib. I have already purchased my speakers, 2 Polk M70 SII towers, 2 Polk M40 SII bookshelfs, and a Polk CS2 SII center. No sub...yet! I am using this with my old non-HDMI Sony 5.1 Receiver currently. I have been learning alot about AVR's on here. My question Is what kind of receiver would properly power my Polk speakers to their best audio quality. Would a Pioneer 1121 or a Onkyo 709 be overkill for my setup. I dont necessarily need a network receiver unless Pandora is gonna sound better coming strait from the receiver rather than my Blu-ray player or something. Would a Yamaha 667, Pioneer 821, 921, 1021, Onkyo 609, or Denon 1712 be plenty for my setup? I planned on Bi-amping(or wiring, not sure of the correct term) the towers to get them closer to their 275w peak with the two extra channels from a 7.1 receiver. Is this a good idea, or necessary? Any input would be awesome thanks!
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post #2 of 8
1/7/12 at 1:37am
Those speakers should be fairly easy to drive so select the AVR that meets your feature/input/output requirements and is within your budget. Also note that passive bi-amping with an AVR will not add any additional power and is generally not considered to be beneficial. If you want more power, get an AVR that has preouts so you can add an external amp to it.
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post #3 of 8
1/7/12 at 10:32am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by jdsmoothie View Post

Those speakers should be fairly easy to drive so select the AVR that meets your feature/input/output requirements and is within your budget. Also note that passive bi-amping with an AVR will not add any additional power and is generally not considered to be beneficial. If you want more power, get an AVR that has preouts so you can add an external amp to it.

So if by amp-ing is not beneficial should I just look for a 5.1 receiver?
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post #4 of 8
1/7/12 at 10:42am
If that's all you need .. then yes. However, a 7.1 AVR offers the option of adding two more speakers in your main zone down the road, or possibly even adding a Zone 2. The Zone 2 can be nice if there are others in the house so you can listen to independent audio in another room or via wireless headphones while someone else is using the surround speakers in the main zone. A good rule of thumb is the AVR should cost about 1/2 that of the total cost of the speakers/sub. Choose an AVR that offers the features/inputs/outputs you need. The Denon 1712 with Audyssey MultEQ XT is likely to provide the best audio fidelity if you plan on adding a sub as none of the other models you are considering will EQ a sub.
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post #5 of 8
1/7/12 at 11:30am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by jdsmoothie View Post

If that's all you need .. then yes. However, a 7.1 AVR offers the option of adding two more speakers in your main zone down the road, or possibly even adding a Zone 2. The Zone 2 can be nice if there are others in the house so you can listen to independent audio in another room or via wireless headphones while someone else is using the surround speakers in the main zone. A good rule of thumb is the AVR should cost about 1/2 that of the total cost of the speakers/sub. Choose an AVR that offers the features/inputs/outputs you need. The Denon 1712 with Audyssey MultEQ XT is likely to provide the best audio fidelity if you plan on adding a sub as none of the other models you are considering will EQ a sub.

The Pioneer 1121 or the onkyo 709 wont EQ a sub?

Also will a receiver with a good video chip like the marvel video chip convert my 1080i cable box to full 1080p? Also I have heard these help with noise reduction which I could use.
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post #6 of 8
1/7/12 at 1:47pm
The Onkyo 709 has MultEQ XT as well.
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post #7 of 8
1/7/12 at 2:21pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by lance77 View Post

The Pioneer 1121 or the onkyo 709 wont EQ a sub?

Also will a receiver with a good video chip like the marvel video chip convert my 1080i cable box to full 1080p? Also I have heard these help with noise reduction which I could use.

Yes, the 709 will however, it's likely overkill for you (unless of course there are any features/inputs/outputs that it has that you need). The others .. including the 1121 cannot.

Yes, any AVR that has a video chip will likely upscale the input audio to 1080p; you're not likely to see much if any improvement going from 1080i to 1080p, especially if you're sitting farther than 8' from the display.
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post #8 of 8
1/7/12 at 3:21pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by jdsmoothie View Post

Yes, the 709 will however, it's likely overkill for you (unless of course there are any features/inputs/outputs that it has that you need). The others .. including the 1121 cannot.

Yes, any AVR that has a video chip will likely upscale the input audio to 1080p; you're not likely to see much if any improvement going from 1080i to 1080p, especially if you're sitting farther than 8' from the display.

Ya I think im sitting too close to my 60" sharp at around 6ft away thats why I think im seeing some digital noise.

I think I'll go with the Onkyo 609 as it has the featues I like and can be found for a good deal unless somebody has any major objections ha.
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