The "Official" Yamaha AVENTAGE RX-A1020, RX-A2020 and RX-A3020 Thread - Page 27

Hi guys .... so I am testing this RX-A2020 unit and comparing it to Marantz SR7005 .... so far few thins such as detail, surround, bass sound better than they did on Marantz.

Few issues/notes.

1) When using YAPO ... I didn't do multi positions ... I only did 1 position. Is this a big deal??? Those that compared 1 vs multi position ... big difference? Should I rerun it?

2) Marantz Audyssey saw that my room acoustics was not so great so it dimmed down the EQ to lower the tremble sound a bit. Yamaha YAPO didn't really care too much and probably because of that it seems like I hear more detail (sneakers screeching, sand falling on the ground, etc) because it still pushes through those tremble sounds.

3) I notice that sound for bluray movies is very, very nice, BUT .... regular TV programming sounded better on Marantz .... it just felt like it had more umph and mids and bass. Yamaha is a bit too thin on those regular channels.

how do I control Yamaha? How do I make it sound different (better) for regular TV programs? Will running YAPO multi position fix the issues?

thanks

Hey guys!

I just bought the RX-2020 and ran into a snag when trying to hook up my Xbox 360. I currently am trying to output all video from my receiver to my TV via one HDMI cable. My Xbox uses component video because its pretty much the first model of Xbox ever released, before HDMI output was standard. When I first hooked up the Xbox I couldn't get the receiver to send the signal to the TV at all, but after playing around with it for a while I noticed if I changed the setting on my Xbox component cable to "TV" as opposed to "HDTV" (as seen here and here) the receiver sends a 480i signal just fine to the TV. Once I switch it back to HDTV (Which I used to use hooked up straight from the Xbox to my TV, and was sending a 1080p signal) the video signal no longer gets transferred to the TV. I'm using an optical cable to send audio to the receiver, which is working fine in both instances.

Does anyone know why it might not be sending the HD signal through the component video input? Is this not something the receiver is capable of? I would hope so considering everything else it can do and it's price tag.

Any help would be much appreciated!

Your receiver should be able to output through HDMI from a component video input without any problem at all. Check your Xbox settings and make sure it's configured properly.

I checked that as well. When the switch is turned to "TV" and the receiver is outputting the Xbox signal, I am only able to choose 480i as an output signal. I need to change the switch to "HDTV" on the cable in order to choose 720 or 1080 options. Once I do this the Xbox restarts (as is normal), and the receiver no longer outputs the video from the Xbox. I don't believe there's much more I can do with the Xbox. I had no issues when it was previously connected directly to the TV.

Your receiver is similar to mine. I have the A3020. When your Xbox restarts and you don't see a signal other than black, turn your receiver off to allow it to re start as well. If that does not solve it, try checking your setting in the SETUP menu. There is an option there to turn on and off VIDEO CONVERSION. Try that if you haven't already.

When it restarts, or whenever its sending a signal higher than 480 it's not actually black, it just shows the wallpaper and menus as if I was on an input with nothing plugged in. I think I have played with the video conversion option as well, but I'm not positive. I'll definitely give those a try when I get back home, and post if it's successful.

The receiver can't convert 1080p over component to HDMI. You'll either need to lower the resolution, connect the Xbox 360 component video directly to the TV, or turn Analog to Analog Video Conversion off and hook the receiver to the TV using component cables.

If it doesn't work with 720p or 1080i then there might be something wrong with your component cable.

I just got home and checked the settings on the Xbox and you're right, all settings (480p 720p and 1080i) work fine, just not 1080p.

Why is it that the receiver can't transfer the 1080p data from component to HDMI but it can for all the other signals? And can you also explain what the analog to analog conversion option does? Is it normally set to on or off?

Thanks for all the info! I think I'm going to just leave the Xbox set to 1080i so I have less cables to worry about. I shouldn't have this problem on any future devices.

I have a question about this line of receivers. I am wanting to run a pair of speakers in my kitchen in Zone 2. I would like to play content coming digitally from my CD player to both the MAIN and ZONE2 speakers in stereo. I have read that there is a feature called PARTY for this. I have two questions about this.

1) Let us say that you have selected CD and stereo as your source and select PARTY. You turn off your receiver for a while, then a few hours later decide to turn it back on in the same mode. Will the receiver after powering it back on stay in PARTY mode or do I have to select it every time I want to use it when powering on the Yamaha receiver?

2) Now let us say I have been listening to a CD with PARTY mode selected, then I decide to watch a movie via BluRay. I suspect when I request this, the Yamaha will turn off PARTY mode and switch to say some DTS mode for the movie. Now after watching the movie I decide I want to listen to a CD again in PARTY mode so that I can hear it from the MIAN and ZONE 2 speakers. When selecting CD as the source for this does it remember that for this source I was in PARTY mode or do I have to reselect this mode to get ZONE 2 to play the content in both rooms?

Thanks!

When you turn off the reciever it will forget that Party Mode was enabled, and you will have to enable it again. You could hook up the CD player with both digital and analogue audio cables. This would let you use zone 2 normally, you'd turn zone 2 off and on and select its input seperately from the main zone like it was it seperate receiver.

Party Mode is not disabled when you switch inputs. The Blu-Ray soundtrack will be downmixed to stereo for all zones when Party Mode is used. If you'd prefer surround sound in the main zone and stereo in zone 2 then you'll need to connect the Blu-Ray player using analogue audio cables, not use Party mode, and select the Blu-Ray input seperately in both zones.

OK, Thanks. That helps with my decision on my setup.

1080p is at the limit of what component video cables and connectors can support, so it's not uncommon for AV equipment not to support this resolution over component cables. I'm not sure if there is any AV receiver capable of converting 1080p component video to HDMI.

The Analog to Analog Video Conversion option enables composite, S-Video and component video monitor outputs to use the video from any of the analogue video inputs. Otherwise the composite monitor output only outputs video from the composite video input jacks, and similarily for S-Video and component video. I beleive the option is enabled by default. I suggest turning it off if you connect your AV receiver to your TV using component cables because it might prevent the receiver passing 1080p component video straight through.

If you don't have anything connected to your receiver's analogue monitor outputs then the Analog to Analog Video Conversion option will have no effect.

So, tested Yamaha RX-A2020 and hooked my Marantz SR7005 back. Here are the differences I heard..........


For regular TV
Marantz is wayyyy better. Voices sound more natural, deep, full. Very, very nice.

For Blu-Ray movies
I got to admit .... surround, bass management, sound detail and overall feel ... Yamaha beats Marantz. It just feels like it's on a different level.
One thing that Marantz did better however is ... dialog is more natural. Yamaha makes dialog sound kinda weird. If you don't use their Dialog adjustment (magnify) it's OK ... if you use Yamaha's Dialog level increase (1, 2, 3) you hear dialog better but it just feels amplified ... not so natural.

For FLAC/WAV/MP3 music through CD Player (Analog)
Seems like Yamaha is brighter and thus it feels as if there is more detail and sound is just nicer. Yamaha's option to play ALL CHANNELS music is great. I know many don't like that option on other brand receivers but it just works nice with Yamaha. They know how to make it still sound right. Marantz is not so great ... I use 2.1 Stereo on it. Today what I'll do is ... I'll try to come close to sound Yamaha had by turning EQ OFF (it dimmed down my tremble due to poor room acoustics) ... thus maybe it made it sound toooo dark and bassy. Maybe if I turn Audyssey EQ off I'll get my tremble the way it should sound and add a little more level increase to my sub to make sure it doesn't feel tooo bright.


RESULT.

I wish I could merge these 2 units together, pick things that are good from each one and have 1 awesome receiver.
I was surprised but for movies .... Yamaha felt like it's a big step up receiver ..... it did however bombed on dialog ... but sound effect management and detail..... nice.


NEXT STEPS.
maybe Yamaha RX-A2010 (previous model) will do good. Anyone know what the difference is between them?

 

I had a Yamaha RX-A3000 and Marantz SR7007 (SR6007 too) in my dedicated room and I found basically the same result. For me the Marantz (Denon AVR-1913 and Onkyo TX-NR818 included) have more presence. Simply more thump across the board. The Yamaha has a clearer sound (again across the board) and the surrounds really come alive. I used the opening scene of the latest Bond flick and the motorbike jumps around the room with the Yamaha. Where the office building blowing up rattles the floor with the others.

 

It's not just the lows or highs rather all of the frequencies are colored as such. In my case the dedicated room has two powered subs and more speakers than I know what to listen to so I prefer the increased dynamics of the Yamaha. Now in my den I use 2.0 and I settled on a Marantz SR1603 in there. The Marantz grounds the audio nicely where the Yamaha (I find Pioneer to be very similar) comes across as TV speakers... well you know what I mean.

 

In the dedicated room once I found out the newer Yamaha's support Dialogue Lift I grabbed a RX-A820 and I'm very happy. Sound wise it appears identical to the RX-A3000 outside of Dialogue Lift which works great in my room. Up until now vocals have always appeared to be coming from underneath the screen. Enough so that it would take me out of the movie at times... I would find myself scaring at the center speaker.

 

Not to say I wouldn't want a little more presence in the dedicated room although I haven't spent any time tweaking (yet). I don't think I can get them to sound the same but I'm sure tweaking wise I can throw a little more thump in there...

Any time you hear a big difference like you describe you can be sure it's in the setup, not inherent to the receiver. You have to be prepared to spend time setting it up to sound the way you like it.

I agree. Its not the amplifier or the brand. Its the settings.

 

 

So when the Yamaha sounded better the Marantz wasn't set up properly. 

Using the same speakers and no other changes other than the receiver I would say yes. If the difference was Waaaayyyy better.

Big differences in dialog intelligibility, or one sounding brighter than the other, etc. can be addressed by changing settings. What you get by just running the auto-setup certainly might sound different between the two.

I'm not convinced this is true. I had a Denon 3313ci in my main setup for several months, and the only negative thing I can say about it is I was never able to get the dialogue to sound very clear. After constant tweaking the only thing I found that helped was to turn up the center channel volume. It didn't make it any clearer, but it did make it a bit easier to hear.

I installed the Yamaha, and out of the box dialogue was crisp and clear. It sounded a bit thin and took a little tweaking to make it sound fuller. Aside from dialogue I can't hear any big differences, overall the sound between the two is very similar....

I can't believe Denon has an inherent problem with dialog (unless your 3313 was defective). But there are a lot of potential things to tweak and it's not always obvious which ones to try.

Could it be a problem that I placed Yamaha's mic pointing the other way? :-)
the shape of their mic looks like it's supposed to point one way but the cord comes out of it the other way. I may have screwed up there. Either way ... 2020 is too expensive, and big. If anything I would try the RX-A2010. Not a big difference in sound from what I know.

The mic should be pointing at the ceiling. Thats why the bottom is flat and it has a screw hole for tripod mounting.