[rocky1]

Was wondering if anyone has any experience/info on the Melody.As opposed to one of the NR slimline recievers . Also maybe the nr1200 which just came out.

 

[danielrg]

Was wondering if anyone has any experience/info on the Melody.As opposed to one of the NR slimline recievers . Also maybe the nr1200 which just came out.

I just picked up the M-CR611 because it was half off retail, otherwise I would have purchased one of the slimline receivers. It's for a living room setup where I just have stereo bookshelves and a small 43" television.

I'm still tinkering with it, but I like it quite a bit. I have found it to be a bit flaky (it doesn't like to show up consistently as an airplay device on our Apple devices) when on the wireless network. On the wired network where I tested it the first day I didn't have any of those types of issues.

But for full price - I would not have bought it. You get so much more with a slimline, especially if you have video in your setup. With this I have to plug my DVD and UHD bluray players into the television then digital out from the TV to the M-CR611 unit. With a slimline, it could do all the switching and I could use HDMI ARC from the TV for smart TV functions, that would be a little slicker - and I'd have the option of upgrading to surround sound in the future.

Oh, one more nit - the clock is really quite nice on the front of the unit. But you cannot set it manually, it sets it across the network. You tell it which time zone you are in and whether DST is being observed. But when turned off it actually displays the nice clock, and "DSTn" in the upper right corner! That's super lame. Why do I need to be reminded DST is on whenever I look at the clock? And it messes up the clean look. It should have a DST auto setting too, if it is getting time from the internet anyway, with an option to force off. But displaying it? Weird. Anyway I got so annoyed I just told it I was in the next time zone over and that DST was off just so it wouldn't display "DSTn" whenever in standby. Really. Engineers sometimes... and I am one.

But it is really the pricing and no video thing - makes it not really worth it in my opinion compared to their slimline - maybe just a little smaller. I think that's why this isn't talked about much around here... anyone else have opinions on this?