Looking at buying a Receiver

Better to buy seperates

How big is your room?

How much are you willing to spend?

There are other brands more reliable than Onkyo.

I agree with AFROGT with the exception of reliability. ALL brands have issues with the receivers due to the complexity they bring to the table. I've had nothing but exceptional results with my last three Onkyo receivers. All with the last 4 Pioneers and 2 Yamahas (I upgrade every 12-18 months)

With that said, Onkyo gives some of the best bang for the buck receivers right now. I love the way they sound with my Emotiva speakers. I love the way Pioneer pairs with my Def Tech setup in my main HT.

I would advise you to come up with a budget (receiver, speakers, and sub) decide if you prefer towers or book shlef speakers (room size MAY dictate which route you should go) and then we can give you some suggestions. Nice thing about going individual components versus a HTIB (home theater in a box) is that if you ever want to upgrade the receiver, sub, or speakers in the future, it will be easier to do because the other components are of better quality. I've learned from being in this hobby 25 years or so, once you're in, it's very addicting. Of all the hobbies I've had, this is the only one that I've never gotten tired of. I don't think I ever will.

Everyone will have different opinions regarding the AVR's. I prefer Denon, they've done very well by me, but i've also used onkyo without any problems.

The biggest mistake i made was going HTIB (home theatre in box) to try and save money. Yes, you'll spend more on separates, but what a difference in sound.

Figure out your budget, what you want in a receiver, what kind of speakers you want to fit your space, bass wants and then come ask us. All the mainstream receivers have good options. Speakers are easy to come by for any budget, though you'll get a lot more if you spend at least a few hundred dollars, better yet at least a grand. Personally, I recommend starting out with a 3.0 setup to get started, or better yet 3.1 if the budget allows. Upgrading to .2 or more and getting surrounds are very easy to integrate into any system, low end all the way to no holds barred budget.

butter and jelly please.

See if you can find a denon 3312 within your budget. I would go no less than an 818, if you want onkyo, but that is a couple hundred above budget. Or get the best Yamaha you can with your budget. Start looking at last years models to get the best deal. I am up in the air about pioneer. The limited listening time I've had with any pioneer was underwhelming in very bad environments. But out of all these mentioned, perhaps try and get a Yamaha 1010.

butter and jelly please.

To be honest, you're not going to have "movie theater replica sound" with a $600 reciever.

Buy a good reciever that has just what you need, don't spend more to have unnecessary stuff, and spend the rest on speakers. Good speakers are the best way to even come close to movie theatre sound.

The Onkyo looks good. You can get the Denon 1613 for under 400. Then spend every other penny on speakers. Since you want good bass, expect to put a lot towards the powered sub.

This is the reverse of what is generally recommended (ie. better to have a lower end AVR with better quality speakers) as the audio comes from the speakers. The Onkyo 515 uses the lowest version of Audyssey 2EQ, so you're better served with a lower level Denon (eg. 1612 or 1613) which has 2x the speaker filters as does 2EQ and can also EQ the subwoofer which 2EQ cannot do.

If you want good bass, get this..
http://www.outlawaudio.com/products/lfmEX.html

It's on sale until sept 4th for $599 with free shipping. It's an awesome sub for the price.

I agree you should spend much more on speakers than the receiver. All receivers more or less sound the same. Speakers don't. Having said that, whatever receiver you buy should have room correction software, Audyssey for Onkyo, Marantz and Denon. YPAO for yamaha. MCACC for pioneer. Audyssey is better than the others at the higher end (XT and XT32).

It's actually the reverse in reference to both audio fidelity and QC on the lower/mid level models .... as Onkyo 717 and lower only use the lowest level Audyssey 2EQ which cannot EQ a sub, while all but the lowest Denon model (1513) use at least Audyssey MultEQ which has 2x the number of speaker filter resolution than does 2EQ and can also EQ the sub.

Also whether you expand from 5.1 to 7.1 depends on whether you are adding front heights, front wides, or surround back speakers and if surround backs, whether there is sufficient room behind the main listening position.

With as frequent as the HDMI specification is changing (and whether it will continue at all), it's tough to say an AVR purchased today will still be usable 5 years down the road. Your best bet is to pick up one of last year's models on clearance. Better yet, you may be able to get a refurbished unit for even less. Accessories4Less is an authorized Denon and Onkyo refurb reseller and most units come with a 1 year warranty.

http://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/item/DENAVR1612/DENON-AVR-1612-5.1-Channel-A/V-Home-Theater-Receiver/1.html

http://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/item/ONKTXNR515/Onkyo-TX-NR515-7.2-Channel-Network-A/V-Receiver/1.html

If the dam don't break and the creek don't rise, you should be good for a couple more weeks.

As long as you don't go and change any of your gear, the gear will be good until the wheels fall of but if the formats change and obsolete your DSP, then you're SOL. Future casting here, I suspect that soon, rationally, Blu-ray will be obsoleted by SS chip technology. You'll buy movie content on a thumb drive. Soon there will be a cross over as the price of SS, flash memory chip technology overtakes the likes of Blu-ray. Maybe one day you'll just plug into the wall and download content from the web. Oh, wait, that's already happening. The point, even the days of Blu-ray are numbered. The clock is already ticking. Tick-tock Blu-ray.

The best way I can suggest to future proof your 5.1 system, is to buy "DECENT" speakers and marry them with a sound system consisting of separates. The Amp will be with you always or until it goes up in smoke as in; that's not good. As to the pre-pro, one can regularly replace the unit as one finds need, making the swap out cheaper to keep one's self current as pre-pros are rudely obsoleted out from under their poor, unsuspecting, innocent, I don't want this to happen, feet.

The above is the long way of saying, no matter what one chooses to do, manufactures are going make sure to hose everybody equally and there's not a darn thing anybody can do to stop the reality of the issue.

Oh boo-hoo!



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You need to decide which is more important ... features (Onkyo) or audio fidelity (Denon).

Denon. Even though I like and prefer onkyo overall, denon is a better choice with lower tier models. Onkyo isn't a good choice unless you jump up to at least the 818 or higher model. Yamaha is a good brand also with any budget.

butter and jelly please.

With these lower level model Onkyo AVRs that only use Audyssey 2EQ, most likely yes.

Denon or Yamaha. I considered Yamaha but really wanted bass eq and it surpassed my expectations. I had a hard time believing bass could get a lot better because of some fancy schmancy algorithms with room correction but it does help. Why don't you research Yamaha some and figure if you could do without audyssey in favor of ypao.

butter and jelly please.

Consider the Denon 1712 which has 6 HDMI inputs and not likely much more than the 1612.

Pukemon and Joeyvaz - wanted to get your advice on the following: I'm planning on purchasing a Panny VT 50 plasma and wanted to set up a home theater system with Def Tech 8060 floor speakers that have built in subs, 8060 center channel also with built in subwoofer along with 8040 rear speakers. Which of the following receivers would you both recommend to power the system:

Pioneer Elite SC-65
Denon 3313
Onkyo 818


I am very new at this and just started doing a bunch of research and any advice you both can give me would be great.

Actually the 515 is only 80W, however, you're not going to likely notice a difference of even 30W let alone only 10W.

Are those speakers with powered woofers or passive? If they don't have their own amp built in, chances are you're better off getting an external amp and using an avr as a pre pro. I could be wrong though. Might want somebody with more experience to give a recommendation. But for an answer, if I was in the market for a comprehensive eq, I'd choose the 818 or pioneer. If music was my first priority, the denon. All are good choices though. I ended up passing on the 818 and got an onkyo 3009 for the better amp section.

butter and jelly please.