[nahtanoj]

Thanks in advance. This is for my family room which is not a dedicated home theater. I'm about to buy Goldenear Aon 2s and the X center or the Aon 3s and the XL center. I'm using a monitor audio dual firing sub. My set up right now is a 3.1. I'm buying the Aons to replace fairly small and weakfish sounding deftech satellites and an older Yamaha non HDMI HTR. I'd like to run my Roku through the HTR and my families various IOS devices via USB. The room is a fairly open family room , but we sit 12 feet away and even at low to mid volumes, it sounds loud enough, but the current Sats lack much midrange and I have to keep the crossover so high, and the dialogue isn't that good since the center is so small.

I have two small in wall speakers in my dining room but not a separate amp there so I want to use the two extra available amp channels (not just pre amp) for music . I'd also like to be able to watch a movie on the TV via the HTR while someone is listening to music in the dining room via front panel USB (true dual source). While most except the Onkyo don't seem to have a preamp section for phone, I may want to buy a hook up a pre amp and buy a new turntable so I'd at least want an input for a phono preamp. One last thing - as if not enough - I still have an old video camera so having one component and one composite would not offend me, although I may have to bite the bullet and pay to have my old movies upgraded to digital media.

It seemed that there was a Sony, a Denon and a Marantz that could do most of what I wanted but I wasn't sure about the second source and whether it could just power a pair of second speakers. Can someone please help?

 

[jdsmoothie]

Many 7CH AVRs can now power Zone 2 speakers to include the Denon X2100W (back panel image below) using the Surround Back speaker posts. It also has Zone 2 pre-outs, 2 Component video inputs, Composite video inputs, USB, and you can also use Airplay to stream iDevice audio to the AVR. Although it has no PHONO input, you can purchase a 3rd party phono pre-amp for ~$50 and plug it into any of the analog inputs. We have these in stock. Please call if you want more specific information and pricing.

 

[nahtanoj]

Great suggestion. So how does one choose between the similarly priced and seemingly similarly priced and featured $600 Denon, Marantz, Sony, and a Pioneer. I left off Onkyo bc I don't want to deal with the Onkyo heat issue. I have a high end marantz for my basement movie theater and think the Yamaha at 600 doesn't have something I wanted. Thanks!

 

[jdsmoothie]

The Marantz sister model SR5009 will cost about $200 more; however, you could also consider the slim-line Marantz NR1605 which although only 50W has similar features, however, the X2100W uses the more advanced version of Audyssey MultEQ XT, although both come with a 3 year warranty.