Yamaha YHT196 vs Onkyo HT-S3400

Hi, I recently purchased the Yamaha YHT-196 and I have had it for less than a day now and so far it seems to be good. This is my first home theater system.

I could not find any reviews online for the Yamaha YHT-196, but I did find a lot of reviews for the Onkyo HT-S3400 and it was a mixed response. A lot of people found the Onkyo system to be amazing while others complained it either sounded worse than previous home theater systems they owned or the Onkyo speakers started to sound staticky after 2 weeks of use. Some even said their Onkyo HTiB died after less than one month of use.

I also went in store to hear the Onkyo HT-S3400 and it sounded very dull to me. No matter how loud I put the volume up, it still sounded very bad and such I decided to buy the Yamaha YHT-196.

Which one is better? The Yamaha YHT-196 or the Onkyo HT-S3400? The only difference I found was the Onkyo receiver supported Dolby TrueHD while the Yamaha one did not.

What do you think? Should I return the Yamaha HTiB and buy the Onkyo one or should I stick with the Yamaha one?

Okay so it's been around 3 days now since I purchased the Yamaha YHT-196 and so far, it hasn't blown me away like I expected it to. I'm using it for watching movies on my PS3 and playing PS3 games. I did setup the speaker distances and volume, but the only thing that's different from my tv speakers is the bass; the Yamaha HTiB delivers a relatively good bass.

Am I doing something wrong? I was sure that a HTiB would blow away any TV speakers.

Also, I think the Yamaha receiver isn't able to decode 5.1 PCM. Using my PS3, I was not able to hear 5.1 audio from the XMB menu and from the videos that play when you are selecting a game to play. After I disabled 5.1 PCM and kept Dolby Digital and DTS on, I could hear 5.1 audio from the XMB menu which is weird because even with 5.1 PCM on, the Yamaha receiver displayed 5 speakers on its screen. By the way, I have my dsp mode set to straight.

Another thing, when I go to the options menu and display the input info, it shows 3/2/0.1 in the channels part. Why is this?