The **OFFICIAL** DENON AVR-4520CI thread - Page 40

Hi guys,

I have been reading over the manual of the 4520CI as I decide between the 3313 and 4520. I plan on using 5.1 speaker configuration and only the main zone. I have monitor audio GS 60's in the front and GS 10's for surrounds that are all bi- wired. I also have GSLCR for center and a velodyne sub. My question is which option would work best in my configuration (5.1 bi-amp with zone 2 or 5.1 with zone 2/3) and why? Sorry if this is a stupid question, I'm new to setting up an HT system.

Joe, nice review, I just read it last night. I thought the Denon would prob have a similar affect on you as it did me in swapping over from the 80.3, it really exceeded my expectations all round- especially considering I was mainly just after the enhanced HDMI abilities and was hoping that sonically it wouldn't be a step back from the Integra. You might want to add into your review the Denon's ability to passthrough 4K as well and that it functions quite smoothly. Not sure if you have a HTPC there to test with (I don't think you do?) like I do. I think after your thoughts on how well DTS NEO-X works with it, I may be inspired to attempt to get height speakers into my system somehow. I'm definitely noticing more detail in reproduction as well, noting we are both using the 4520 essentially for it's capabilities as a processor into external amps. After having mine for a few weeks now I'm def noticing the sonic improvements you pointed out. I'm now also tempted to start checking out those video adjustments that I normally steer clear of in AVR's.

As you'll not likely gain any benefit from either bi-wiring or bi-amping that would leave 5.1 with Zones 2/3.

BTW Flint, the chaps over at the Expendables II thread are adamant it's not Discrete on the Sound Check... you might want to pop over and have a look...

< perk! >

cool, someone who can (and apparently has) tested 4k passthrough... been waiting for someone to pop up with that...

what 4k device are you using? have you done any testing (i.e. patterns) to check the scaling of the avr vs. the device? also, any testing to ensure nothing gets mucked up in the 4k conversion in the avr (specifically color errors)?

thanks...

Thanks.

I had in my final draft a sentence about 4K pass through working with the Oppo 103 and Sony 790 which then was sent on towards the Sony 1000ES... I will double check that and add it. Good catch.

Haven't seen that thread, but will look in.  As for discrete, I guess that comes down to how anyone uses the term.  As I said, the Sound Check uses each speaker independently and works discretely without bleed in NeoX.  That is probably because it correctly derives the signal being processed (matrixed) from the Neo X algorithm and steers them accordingly.  That is not necessarily the same as a discrete channel being sent to a particular speaker.  My understanding of Blu-ray is that it currently does not support more than 7 channels discretely and that the processing of Neo X is required to somehow derive the sounds for those extra channels and deliver them without bleed.  Effectively, this is 'discrete' but not really.  Hope that makes sense.

I might have missed it but has anyone checked the 4520 to see if it has low bass output when playing SACDs using the DSD setting? I just thought of this when posting in the 8801 thread on the same topic. If anyone is not familar with the DSD issue with Denon AVRs specifically the 4311 here is a link to a thread that discusses it.

Bill

Checked it out already, Bill--no change.

Jerry,

Thanks, I was pretty sure that you would do this not long after setting up your 4520 . Thats too bad that Denon has not addressed this issue. At least add DSD to the setup menu as far as being able to apply boost to the LFE signal.

Bill

Strange, as the AVP has this problem fixed via firmware.

That's crazy awesome! Thanks for the info, guys.

I'm okay with this. My room does not lend itself to any more speakers as it isn't very large.

Since I have been deluged by PM messages regarding choosing the Denon AVR-1520CI over the Pioneer Elite SC-68 and Onkyo 5010 and where I found the best prices, I thought I would report back.

The place where I bought the 5520 from shipped the same day I ordered it and it arrived within 3 days of placing the order. Excellent service and the Denon arrived intact.

I have been a long time customer of Pioneer Elite receiver as I own several of them with the oldest being 21 years old (and is still used daily). There were two reasons I switched to Denon: 1) due to over all feature set, ease of use, and flexibility (ability to reconfigure the amp assignments into almost any configuration), and 2) cost (none of the Pioneer Elite dealers I contacted would sell for less than MSRP and I think that's both uncompetitive and ridiculous). Of course, after I purchased the Denon someone PM'ed me with a authorized dealer willing to negotiate to a reasonable price point on the SC-68

I received the Denon on Monday of this week. It's working very well in my system and I'm happy with the purchase. It is indeed as flexible as the AVSforum postings have indicated. It sounds very nice, especially the surround processing which is a marked improvement over the 21 year old Dolby Prologic Pioneer Elite receiver I had in this system.

I'm really a perfectionist and quite picky since I keep and use good system units forever :-) So far the Denon lives up to my expectations.

However, I don't think there is any real differences in sound quality between the top units for most manufacturers. The choice ends up being be made based on user preference for feature set, and the reliability track record of the manufacturers. Folks will be happy with any of the top units in terms of sound quality ... really ... it's true (I'm donning asbestos underwear to prepare for flame throwers from those who also believe that running a green magic marker around CD's improves jitter performance of the player and reduces aliasing effects of digitization and from those that believe that high end HDMI cables sound better than standard cables. None of these things are true, but some folks still want to believe in something. Let the flame wars begin ).

Moving on to some details regarding personal observations and few technical features that I learned about.

My family room system now has a new Plasma TV (Samsung PN51E800) that arrived yesterday and the new Denon AVR1520CI. Audio is a 5.1 configuration: Emotiva ERM-6.3's for left, center, right front speakers, Paradigm ADP-12's (dipoles) for rear surround, and an SVS PB-12ND for the subwoofer in a ~8000 cu ft room (family room plus breakfast nook, plus kitchen ... there are 12 foot ceilings so the physical volume I have to deal with is massive), and a new dish network hopper system (1 hopper, 3 joeys, installed yesterday afternoon). Last but not least ... there is a newer model blu-ray player (Samsung D6500 2011 model) hanging around waiting to be used.

The raw video from the dish network video suffers from a number of artifacts due to dish network proprietary compression of the 1080i signal to save satellite bandwidth (it's really 1080i in name only). These artifacts were readily apparent when feeding the raw 1080i signal from the hopper to the TV directly (the worst artifact was a loss in clarity, things just were not as crisp visually). I then turned on the TV's upscaling and video processing. That helped, but it's still not super sharp. I disabled the TV processing and ran the video through the Denon instead. I can't recall the exact settings I enabled, but at a minimum I turned on the scaler and also the de-interlace capability (1080i --> 1080p). The video improved dramatically. Image detail is now close to blu-ray in apparent sharpness and clarity. Color rendering is also improved, with flesh tones now appearing realistic and not too pale (blue emphasis) or too yellow (red emphasis (or lower color temperature)).

Audio: Am currently running a 5.1 configuration with zone2 feeding the whole house speaker system (have not tried bi-amping the front speakers yet, but do not really expect that will really improve the audio in any readily apparent manner).

Audio is much improved over the Dolby Prologic in my 21 year old Pioneer Elite VSX-95. The Audessey room equalization (using 8 measurement points) really makes a big impact. Especially for compensating for the "near wall" bass and midrange enhancement that results from the front speakers having to sit in a cavity above the built-in entertainment center. The sound in the room now sounds much more natural. To stress test it, I used a blu-ray of the most recent Star Trek movie to get decent LFE and sound tracks. After disabling sound processing on the blu-ray player (e.g. bitstream output), the Denon showed Dolby True-HD on the display. The sound was simply astounding. My favorite effect was when the ships entered warp. The sound of warp entry was almost palpable. I kept wanting to reach out and touch the point halfway between where I was sitting and the entertainment center where my ears indicated the ships were departing from. Really, really cool. I've never experienced a 3D audio sensation before and it was amazing (the clouds parted, angels started singing, it was nirvana on Earth ).

Moving on to a technical item. At some point in this thread, someone was trying to get the whole house (main zone + zone 2/3) to play the same music on the 1520 (sort of like party mode on the Onkyo high end receivers). After not being able to get sound to emanate from zone two for several hours, I learned a few interesting things: 1) If most of the sources in your system are HDMI, only a few sources will be available for zone2 playback (HD radio Tuner, Ipod interface, etc). 2) There is a way to play what is on TV or what is being fed in in terms of music on all zones simultaneously. From memory (I'm at work now), you have to enable power to the main zone and also zones 2 (and 3 if desired). Once all zones are enabled, you go back to the main zone setting on the remote and hit the option button on the remote. Then select "enable all zone stereo" or something like that. At that point, whatever is playing on the main zone will be reflected as a stereo output in all zones. However, the main zone sound effects appear to change in an audible manner, but the main zone is clearly not playing in stereo mode since sound is coming from all speakers in the main zone. I haven't quite figured out what the main zone is doing in terms of audio processing in this mode. I'll have to play with it some more. I was just happy to figure out how to make this work initially.

Well, I do have to work for a living, so it's time to go back to work. I hope this was interesting/informative for others contemplating a holiday receiver upgrade or Christmas present.

- Steven

wise man, you are...

of course, once you apply the dsp in the unit, then the game changes...

I really wish the 4520 saved the Audyssey settings for Movie vs. Music mode within a given input.

I want to have Dynamic EQ on for movies but off for music.

Is there a direct command available in Harmony for DynEQ and DynVol as there is for the 4310?

Hi Chris. That's true to an extent.

For the standard decoders, they all have to conform to the ... uhh.... uhhh ... standard

So, with the same digital data flowing into the algorithm running on the DSP, they are required to produce the same digital output by definition independent of the DSP being used. I'm talking about the various Dolby and DTS standards, etc. The results should be independent of the DSP used for devices that are certified to conform to the standard. An analogous situation would be running a spreadsheet calculation on an Intel pentium and pentium III cpu's. They both produce the same result with the same inputs running through the same calculations/algorithms. DSP's are nothing but cpu's optimized for the numeric computations that are common within signal processing algoriths, Basically, they are math coprocessors (I know this because I have designed many cpu's, mcu's and dsp's myself over the last 27 years or so (and still do)).

Where the novelty comes in is any proprietary surround modes that are offered. That's where the manufacturer has an opportunity to do better (or worse ).

- Steven

4520 is in tha hooouuuussse! I will get the two set up in the next couple of days to do some comparos and keep the thread informed. Half of me hopes there is a difference so I can feel that warm and fuxxy of having something a little "extra" than just an avr(that is the fool half of me:D), and the other hopes there is no difference and I can sell the outlaw and spend the money on more subs:eek:

Congratulations!
I hope that my buying the 4311 over the 4520 wasn't false economy. I figured they'd sound the same and the new features were one's I didn't need, like 4K. Needless to say, I'm envious.

we are in agreement, and i should have been more specific, since we haven't conversed much... when i refer to dsp, i'm generally referring to room correction, unless specifically noted...

edit: i'm firmly in the camp of "if it ain't broke, and it's run within spec, modern ss equipment is essentially indistinguishable until dsp (specifically rc ) is applied"...

hey chop... long time no see...

start sub shopping...

[At that point, whatever is playing on the main zone will be reflected as a stereo output in all zones. However, the main zone sound effects appear to change in an audible manner, but the main zone is clearly not playing in stereo mode since sound is coming from all speakers in the main zone. I haven't quite figured out what the main zone is doing in terms of audio processing in this mode. I'll have to play with it some more. I was just happy to figure out how to make this work initially.[/quote].

It sounds like the main zone went to "matrix" surround? Essentially stereo produced using all speakers?

Oh I am....I suspect my sub order will be placed by Monday at the latest:)

The best part is that once I get the family room done and setup, it will be time to get going on the dedicated room:D

I am sure you will love the 4311! I had one is use very temporarily and thought it was great. The only reason that I got the 4520 is because the deal was so good...after recoup cost on the 4311, I came out of pocket like $500 to move to the 4520. I also chose based on the new features. I will be putting the VW1000 in the dedicated room and wanted to be able to to use this is there if I find that its the better selection over things like the Integra, etc. I have turned into a bit of an electronics addict:D I just keep buying things whether I need them or not just to try them out.

Hi

I am considereing upgrading my 5 year old 4308 to something else. Went to a local store and listened to 4520 against many others. Sounded better than anything in the price range and below) but they hada different setup, sources erc.

My primary use is watching blu-ray movies with sound being important element. Current setup has 7 mirage omnisat v2 (centers, towers and the small surround speakers) and a mirage subwoofer. Due to need to retain also the family harmony it is quite difficult to change the speakers :-). Was looking for to add two heights speakers and a TV with 3d in near future.

Has any of the forum participants here done an upgrade from 4308 to 4520. What is your experience on sound and video quality compared to 4308.

The other option would be to replace the front and center speaker with something 'better' but still family harmony retaining (have to look 'good') add the heights and go with some other 9.1 amplifier.

Listened to Yamaha's and Denon 33xx and 23xx with the same setup mentioned above than 4520 and liked the sound of 4520 clearly more.

Thank you for the reassurance. I'm a CE addict too. Does the 4311 get hot like my Onkyo pre-pro does?

As any of former XT model owners in the 4311 will attest to, upgrading to XT32 was a noticeable improvement so as the 4308 uses XT, you should expect to hear that improvement as well with the 4520 especially after running Audyssey.

Both Denon models listed above use the same version of Audyssey MultEQ XT as does the 4308, so lateral move at best.

Sorry for the off topic question-

I'm thinking of either the 4311 or 4520 and am following this forum for info. However, with this new tapatalk app, i cant seem to find a way to save my "subscribe". Every time i subscribe, when i go into another forum or topic tapatalk doesn't save my subscription.

Any thoughts? Sorry if there is another place i should post this question that I'm not aware of.
Thanks!