The "Official" Denon AVR-3808CI Thread - Page 13

Anyone have the 3808 paired with b&w 604's? If not, how well does Denon mate with b&w floor standing speakers?

Regards,
Jose

All DVI cables are not the same, I had issues with this on my HTPC (8800 GTS). Some cables will not work.

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...s-11-2004.html

How do I know if my TV Samsung LN-T5265F (1080p) is doing the up converting or if the Denon 3808 is upconverting. And which way is the best way to handle up converting. It seems that the non HD channels look worse when added the Denon 3808. Please let me know if I have it setup correctly. Thank you so much.

Just set up the 3808 , Does anyone know how to get the Receiver to display Dolby TRUE HD. I am pretty certain it is playing in Dolby True HD because the quality is amazing but it just displays Multi Channel In. Any ideas?.

You can't currently. There aren't any playback devices that output those signals over bitstream connections. If you're player is decoding it internally you will be fine.

You need to check the upscale settings on the Denon. If it is set to passthrough, your TV is doing the work, if it is on 1080p then the Denon is doing the work.

I am sure that the Denon video processing is superior. Therefore I would recommend setting the Denon to do 1080p upscaling for the best picture quality.

Hope that helps!

Where do I check on the Denon to see if it is set to passthrough? Under HDMI Setup I have resolution set to 1080p but I do not see a passthrough option. Thanks

It is suppose to show Multi Channel because there is no HD DVD or Blu-Ray player out there that sends the original DTHD audio track to your receiver. It decodes it in the player to 5.1 LPCM and sends it out to your receiver. Until there is a firmware update sometime in the future you will not see Dolby True HD or DTS-HD MA displayed on your receiver.

This is definitely going to be my new reciever.

Where can I order this from? I only see it on Crutchfield's site for way too much money.

Is this correct or can someone point to the place to figure this out? The 3080 can do the following:

480i/p>1080P
1080i>1080p

but not (the manual confirms this):

720p>1080p
1080p>720p

Do I have this correct?

Thanks.

According to 3808ci Manual (I assume it's 3808ci you're talking about) Page 30, the following format conversions are not possible:

1080i to 720p
720p to 1080i

Digital Craze talk to ed

Check this in the manual, If the scaling is set to OFF (blue box) then no scaling!

Each time I run auto setup, it claims a front or rear speaker is out of phase. I do exchange only that speaker wire, then it comes up with another.
I have done this about 6 or 7 times with varied results.

I am really sure my speaker wires are in fact wired correctly. I have large red and black banana plugs and the front speaker wire are only 6 feet.

Anyone else have this issue?

I also don't think this sounds anywhere near what my older stereo amp sounded like with just the front JBL speakers. If I did not have a sub, there would be very little bass.

And I have the bass adjustments all the way up?

I've been checking the color space and bit depth on my HD DVD player and PS3, my ps3 has full RGB 4:4:4 and a bit depth of 8 bits with an arrow to 8 bits? What does the arrow mean? Dopes it mean my PS3 is only capable of 8 bit color depth?

I also tried this on HD DVD player and that was 4:2:2, I used digital video essentials and it didn't display its bit depth, it just showed a few dash's, what does it all mean?

Hello all, these may be stupid questions but I got to ask.
1)What is the 1080p output (example 1080p/24 or 1080p/60)
2) I only get sound form my sub when playing an DVD or Blu Ray, if I play music or watch TV (Digital signal) or XBox 360 (Digital signal) no sub no BOOM BOOM no walls shaking.
My old Integra 7.4 I had sub all the time

I also want to know which DSP setting will give me 2.1 or just have the sub on all the time.

Magnolia in Best Buys in the mid-atlantic region now can order the 4308 and have them in less than 5 days. 3808 is still a no show.

OK, does that mean that the following are possible:

480i/hp to 780hp/1080hp
720hp to 1080hp

Come on, for you VP guys, this should be an easy question! Help us VP challenged out! Thanks.

This should answer the question. The output resolutions are stated clearly.

Thanks bwclark!

I just figured it out, you have to go into subwoofer setting and choose LFE+MAIN

The manual says to ignore the phase if its on correctly because some speakers just do it( I don't understand why ) read my post before this for the bass and can someone please help me with the auto set-up. The parameters its giving me is so off. This is the only AVR with auto-setup function that has done this to me.

Is this true? If so, what would be the rationale behind THAT decision ?

I took the plung and bought the 3808ci at my local Magnolia (Palo Alto, CA). I decided to go with them paying full price and tax because I wanted the convenience of getting their help and potentially returning it without hassle in 30 days.

So here are some first impressions:

The Good:

1. Not to heinously expensive.
2. It looks good.
3. It matches my Denon 3930ci DVD player.
4. I'll have a full HDMI setup.

The Bad:

1. The worst remote control I have ever used.
2. A web interface so bad that only the hideous remote control could make look good.
3. An insanely obtuse manual which fails to explain most terms.
4. A horrible default speaker equalization curve for "STEREO".
5. Several significant bugs that will absolutely require firmware upgrades.

I replaced a Yamaha VX-1400 which I never liked. I bought the Yamaha for $600 about three years ago when my old simple 1991 Rotel 50W integrated stereo AMP started having static in the left channel when the volume was changed. Overall the convenience of having a remote control and the ability to change the volume with the remote control were great but it never came even close to sounding as good as the old Rotel. I was very disappointed.

The Denon 3808ci had a low bar to exceed (the Yamaha) but a big legacy to live up to (the Rotel). Out of the box the Denon sounded a little better than the Yamaha but nothing spectacular. In fact, the music sounded "squashed" in the frequency domain. Disappointing. After playing around with sound processing modes for a bit (most of which I think are totally silly) I found that "Jazz Club" made the music sound a bit better but still not terrific. Finally I tried "Pure Direct" (with no clear idea what it was supposed to do) and things changed dramatically for the better. It almost sounded as good as I remember my old Rotel sounding. I learned later on that "Pure Direct" basically gets the AMP processing completely out of the audio/video path and "Direct" gets it completely out of the audio path. The "Direct" mode also sounded significantly better than the "Stereo" path. I'm guessing that the default speaker equalization curves for "Stereo" heavily rolls off the high end in order not to over drive poor speakers. Yeck is the only word to describe the sound.

I'm hoping that with some tuning I can get the Denon to sound as good as my old Rotel. I have yet to do the whole Audyssey speaker/room setup so that may improve the moderately week base and the congestion I hear on a few difficult passages. Of course the latter may be due to my speakers getting older (now 16 year old Vandersteen 2Ci's). We'll have to see.

On the remote: if I worked at Denon I'd be ashamed to admit that my company had anything to do with that incredible disaster. I had hoped to use it as a moderate universal for the system (especially considering that I already had a Denon DVD) but that is not going to be possible. (My Yamaha actually had a halfway descent remote that I was able to use to manage several different pieces.) So I bought a Harmony 880 and am hoping to get that working well. I'll also second what I've read several other people say: the "Alternate zone" second remote is actually much better (although it's difficult to conceive of anything actually worse than the primary remote).

The web interface is clumsy and tends to hang up. I'm hoping that several iterations of firmware updates will stabilize and improve on its functionality. But, it is cool to be able to change the volume, etc. via my laptop ... :-) Let's keep our fingers crossed for those firmware updates.

I'll write more when I've done the Audyssey setup and have done more critical listening.

Casey

Yep, so I was using some random DVI to HDMI cable before that came with my old Sceptre LCD. But now I'm using a MonoPrice DVI to HDMI cable.

I don't think it's the cable honestly.

My best guess is that the HDCP signal is getting messed up as it's being passed from the OCUR MCE to the receiver then to the TV. Since like I said before when I go OCUR MCE directly to the TV it works fine.

Calling Denon tomorrow though.

leedom thanks for the review. I look forward to more info before I take the plunge (another month or so). Do you have any thoughts on the video processing capabilities yet?

Brandon

Yep tried both settings, it's weird. I have a MiniVee sub has the blue light that comes on when it's getting a signal, everytime I get up to look the lights off and no sound all the bass is coming out my RTI 10's. I thought it might of been a setup issue, any way this unit sound soooooo much better then my old Integra 7.4 with a sub and without.
Does any know what the 1080p output is 1080p/24 or 1080p/60?
My panel will only except 1080p/24 if I set the output to 1080p the screen flickers all black.
Thanks to all of you for the post, love reading them.

I can across something interesting. I have my living rm LCD hooked up HDMI from the Denon 3808 and my bed rm LCD using the component monitor out. Over the HDMI connection when viewing non HD stations it does not stretch the pictures and keeps it at 4:3, however for the component video out it stretches the non HD images to make it full screen. I would like to not have it stretch the pictures. Can someone please let me know where in the Denon setup I can go to change that setting. Thank you so much.