I recently sold my Sony TA9000es pre/proc on ebay. I'm considering either a new receiver or a new pre/proc to go with my ATI 1505 power amp. Many of the pre/procs i've seen are in the $2000 plus range, but it appears that there are several highly rated receivers that are in $1000-1500 range that many are willing to use as a pre/proc. What am i missing here!!
Why are most pre/procs so damn expensive!!!
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Nothing. Emotiva will likely be more in your range once they ship. That may be a while...
An AVR with pre-outs may be quite an acceptable solution for you.
Nothing. Emotiva will likely be more in your range once they ship. That may be a while...
An AVR with pre-outs may be quite an acceptable solution for you.
I wonder if there might be a connection between the high price of pre-pros and the fact that no receiver manufacturer puts main-in connections on their receivers anymore. Clearly prepros have become luxury white van items, while receivers are mass market commodity consumer items. The way to take advantage of this situation seems to be simply ignoring the amps in a receiver and treating it like a prepro.
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Which is exactly what I'm doing with my HK AVR 247. I'm still debating disabling the amp section at least temporarily. I can't see having it sucking electricity when I'm not using it. It provides a very clean signal to my amp, does the video switching I require, decodes audio codecs adequately and is very easy to configure, unlike the HK AVR 520 that it replaced. The 520 does have the main amp input jacks. The 247 does not.
As for the higher prices for dedicated pre/pros, I think part of that is due to economy of scale. There is so much more market for AVRs than pre/pros. I don't know what the ratio is, maybe 1 pre/pro sold for 100 receivers?
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Which is exactly what I'm doing with my HK AVR 247. I'm still debating disabling the amp section at least temporarily. I can't see having it sucking electricity when I'm not using it. It provides a very clean signal to my amp, does the video switching I require, decodes audio codecs adequately and is very easy to configure, unlike the HK AVR 520 that it replaced. The 520 does have the main amp input jacks. The 247 does not.
As for the higher prices for dedicated pre/pros, I think part of that is due to economy of scale. There is so much more market for AVRs than pre/pros. I don't know what the ratio is, maybe 1 pre/pro sold for 100 receivers?
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If you can wait a few months, Emotiva will have their UMC-1 ($699) 7 channel pre/pro on the market. Outlaw is developing their 997 7 channel pre/pro ($999) based on the latest Sherwood Newcastle AVR that is supposed to be very good. The Outlaw is still vapor ware, the Emotiva is on its way. I don't know of any cheaper solutions available.
http://www.outlawaudio.com/products/997.html
http://emotiva.com/news.shtm
Emotiva also has another pre/pro coming in mid summer as best I can tell. It will be a bit more. They also have what sounds like a very good group of speakers and subs also in the works, due in early spring.
If you can wait a few months, Emotiva will have their UMC-1 ($699) 7 channel pre/pro on the market. Outlaw is developing their 997 7 channel pre/pro ($999) based on the latest Sherwood Newcastle AVR that is supposed to be very good. The Outlaw is still vapor ware, the Emotiva is on its way. I don't know of any cheaper solutions available.
http://www.outlawaudio.com/products/997.html
http://emotiva.com/news.shtm
Emotiva also has another pre/pro coming in mid summer as best I can tell. It will be a bit more. They also have what sounds like a very good group of speakers and subs also in the works, due in early spring.
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Yep.
And worth every penny!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ChicagoTC /forum/post/15511322
The Anthem D2 is expensive??![]()
Yep.
And worth every penny!
You aren't missing anything. the gap between today's receivers and pre-pro's is closing rapidly. If you don't think so just look at companies that just made pre-pro's a few short years ago and are now offering receivers now. The high-end boutique makers have to be hurting with all that today's receiver's bring to the table. Is the Anthem's, Cary's, and others really worth the big difference in price that you can get with a very good receiver for thousands less? I don't know for sure about all of them, but the Anthem I listened to from where I shop sure as hell wasn't worth the price difference, not by a long shot. Heck I 'm even a major Paradigm fan and I would not purchase that piece of gear over a lot of receivers I've listened to along with a good amp and still get both of them for a lot less. All this stresses is that most of of your money needs to be spent on very good speakers and less on what is powering them. Nearly all the main receiver makers put out very good receviers that can be used as pre-pro's, get a good powerful amp and your good to go.
You aren't missing anything. the gap between today's receivers and pre-pro's is closing rapidly. If you don't think so just look at companies that just made pre-pro's a few short years ago and are now offering receivers now. The high-end boutique makers have to be hurting with all that today's receiver's bring to the table. Is the Anthem's, Cary's, and others really worth the big difference in price that you can get with a very good receiver for thousands less? I don't know for sure about all of them, but the Anthem I listened to from where I shop sure as hell wasn't worth the price difference, not by a long shot. Heck I 'm even a major Paradigm fan and I would not purchase that piece of gear over a lot of receivers I've listened to along with a good amp and still get both of them for a lot less. All this stresses is that most of of your money needs to be spent on very good speakers and less on what is powering them. Nearly all the main receiver makers put out very good receviers that can be used as pre-pro's, get a good powerful amp and your good to go.
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You make some very interesting points here. I would add to that the fast changing world of audio and video and what we expect from a pre/amp or receiver. This puts immense pressure on pre/pro manufacturers to come up with new solutions faster than ever before. This costs them money.
It used to be buying a receiver 'future proofed' you for a good many years as long as you bought the features you needed at the get-go. I owned a single receiver for 15 years and never thought it was outdated for most of them! That was a Kenwood KR-4070. This is no longer the case. I did own my last AVR 8 years before it could no longer keep up.
It seems like the upgrade craze has hit home audio like it did home computers back in the late 90s. Not sure what we can expect in the next few years, only that the manufacturers will bust a hump to get you and I to view our AV gear as being out of date as quickly as possible.
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You make some very interesting points here. I would add to that the fast changing world of audio and video and what we expect from a pre/amp or receiver. This puts immense pressure on pre/pro manufacturers to come up with new solutions faster than ever before. This costs them money.
It used to be buying a receiver 'future proofed' you for a good many years as long as you bought the features you needed at the get-go. I owned a single receiver for 15 years and never thought it was outdated for most of them! That was a Kenwood KR-4070. This is no longer the case. I did own my last AVR 8 years before it could no longer keep up.
It seems like the upgrade craze has hit home audio like it did home computers back in the late 90s. Not sure what we can expect in the next few years, only that the manufacturers will bust a hump to get you and I to view our AV gear as being out of date as quickly as possible.
I have asked myself that same question. Why the huge cost for a preamp or for a flagship receiver? I'm sure some of the cost is operational overhead of the company, but at some point their products should go down in cost once they are in production. But I only see price drops after a replacement product is about to hit production. I don't like paying for things I don't use, like that 3rd zone. I don't even use my second zone. Oh wait, I really don't need all of those analog inputs anymore, so drop that and drop the price accordingly.
I would really like to see Classe produce a SSP-400 at half the price of the SSP-800. Like I said, no analog input is required. No video processing is required, make it like a Cary 11a or give me video switching and not processing. I think lots of SSP\\AVP companies could do something like that and drop their unit cost.
Very good question.
I would really like to see Classe produce a SSP-400 at half the price of the SSP-800. Like I said, no analog input is required. No video processing is required, make it like a Cary 11a or give me video switching and not processing. I think lots of SSP\\AVP companies could do something like that and drop their unit cost.
Very good question.
AVM20 with Anthems 5 channel amp at the time(don't remember amp model #) against Yamaha 2600(what I have right now) with same Anthem amp. AVM 20 $3200 + ~$1800 for amp. $ 5000 plus tax for that combo. Yamaha 2600 $1100 + amp= $2900. Also must mention that these two combinations where running the Paradigm Reference40's(2) for front Reference cc and Reference 20's for rear. Did I hear the dollar difference. No, not by a longshot. I ended up purchasing the speaker system from them, the 2600 off the internet for several hundred cheaper and a Parasound HT2205AT amp. I would not consider trading my set-up for that one I listened to and saved a lot of money to boot. Granted if I could have moved up to Anthem's other models I problably would have noticed a difference but at what cost and would it actually have made a huge difference for the money involved. I doubt it. I've discovered in this hobby many times you don't always get what you pay for. I still feel the difference between a dedicated pre-pro and a very good receiver used as a pre-pro is not worth the difference in price. Emotiva is proving that right now. You don't need to spend thousands of dollars for a "boutique" pre-pro and amp combo to get great sound. That's why I stressed spend more of your hard earned money on the best speakers you can afford, then get the electronics after shopping around with different combinations of gear. Most people will be surprised at how little you actually have to spend on the source gear.This is just my honest opionion, sure you can spend a lot more money on your gear but is it justified in the end.
AVM20 with Anthems 5 channel amp at the time(don't remember amp model #) against Yamaha 2600(what I have right now) with same Anthem amp. AVM 20 $3200 + ~$1800 for amp. $ 5000 plus tax for that combo. Yamaha 2600 $1100 + amp= $2900. Also must mention that these two combinations where running the Paradigm Reference40's(2) for front Reference cc and Reference 20's for rear. Did I hear the dollar difference. No, not by a longshot. I ended up purchasing the speaker system from them, the 2600 off the internet for several hundred cheaper and a Parasound HT2205AT amp. I would not consider trading my set-up for that one I listened to and saved a lot of money to boot. Granted if I could have moved up to Anthem's other models I problably would have noticed a difference but at what cost and would it actually have made a huge difference for the money involved. I doubt it. I've discovered in this hobby many times you don't always get what you pay for. I still feel the difference between a dedicated pre-pro and a very good receiver used as a pre-pro is not worth the difference in price. Emotiva is proving that right now. You don't need to spend thousands of dollars for a "boutique" pre-pro and amp combo to get great sound. That's why I stressed spend more of your hard earned money on the best speakers you can afford, then get the electronics after shopping around with different combinations of gear. Most people will be surprised at how little you actually have to spend on the source gear.This is just my honest opionion, sure you can spend a lot more money on your gear but is it justified in the end.
You noted the Outlaw 997 was going to be $999. It is going to be $1399.
Here's some info from Outlaw's forum:
http://ubb.outlawaudio.com/ubb/ultim.../t/000001.html
You noted the Outlaw 997 was going to be $999. It is going to be $1399.
Here's some info from Outlaw's forum:
http://ubb.outlawaudio.com/ubb/ultim.../t/000001.html
Since I sold my Sony pre/pro, I'm dead in the water and getting some grief from wife and kid. I've been considering the following three receivers:
Pioneer Elite SC-05
Marantz 6003
Sony 3400es or 4400es
I love the look of the new rotel 1570 pre/pro, but the price makes it a non starter and I've read here that there are some software bugs.
My system currently consists of:
ATI-1505 150/ch five channel amp
Samsung 58PNA650 58" Plasma TV
B&W 805 Nautilus front and center channel speakers
Pioneer 51fd Blu Ray DVD player
Nintendo WII
No need for multiple zones.
Right now I'm leaning towards the Marantz receiver. I'll be going today to do some more shopping.
Pioneer Elite SC-05
Marantz 6003
Sony 3400es or 4400es
I love the look of the new rotel 1570 pre/pro, but the price makes it a non starter and I've read here that there are some software bugs.
My system currently consists of:
ATI-1505 150/ch five channel amp
Samsung 58PNA650 58" Plasma TV
B&W 805 Nautilus front and center channel speakers
Pioneer 51fd Blu Ray DVD player
Nintendo WII
No need for multiple zones.
Right now I'm leaning towards the Marantz receiver. I'll be going today to do some more shopping.
I'm a firm believer that when deciding on home theater equipment everyone should go with their ears and with their wallet. Not everyone will prefer the sound and not everyone can afford the higher priced equipment.
I can only speak of Anthem because that's what I've heard in my environment. The difference between the Anthem Statement D2 pre pro and the Denon 3808ci AVR is night and day. The D2 (with ARC) is so much better it wouldn't even be fair to compare the two. And why would I? The 3808ci cost me 1300.00 and the D2 cost me 5000.00.
Not everyone can afford or could be bothered to spend additional thousands but that certainly doesn't mean a good AVR is the same as a good pre pro. The OP asked why most pre pro's are so much more expensive. The honest answer is most pre pro's are much better at everything they do.
That doesn't mean everyone will agree that it's worth the extra money. That really is up to the individual. But saying a good AVR is just as good isn't true.
I can only speak of Anthem because that's what I've heard in my environment. The difference between the Anthem Statement D2 pre pro and the Denon 3808ci AVR is night and day. The D2 (with ARC) is so much better it wouldn't even be fair to compare the two. And why would I? The 3808ci cost me 1300.00 and the D2 cost me 5000.00.
Not everyone can afford or could be bothered to spend additional thousands but that certainly doesn't mean a good AVR is the same as a good pre pro. The OP asked why most pre pro's are so much more expensive. The honest answer is most pre pro's are much better at everything they do.
That doesn't mean everyone will agree that it's worth the extra money. That really is up to the individual. But saying a good AVR is just as good isn't true.
Of course I only want to pay for what I desire. But on the other side of the coin both Classe and others, including Anthem, could produce a much better product by decreasing some of the feature sets such as mulitple zones. I want a tuner in my preamp as well, but I understand why some vendors don't put them in their preamps. Due to noise from the tuner section. What I'm saying is some of the expense is due to features that a large number of buyers may not use. I love both the D2 and SSP-800, but I bet they could make a lesser expensive preamp by dropping zones, dropping all the analog inputs, and in some cases dropping video processing for video switching. I'm not asking for them not to produce and ship a SSP-800 preamp, I'm just asking for a SSP-400 at half the price. While Anthem may sale a lot of D2s, I bet they sale a lot more cheaper AVMs.
In the case of the SSP-800, the rumor says this preamp was initially at a 12k price point. Then Classe decided to drop the price by 4k, just because they could. I bet the D2 at 7.5k had a lot to do with their new price point.
At the end of the day, companies like Emotiva are getting more looks from people like me, because a balanced 250 to 500 watt monoblock at 1k is hard as heck to ignore.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ~Ohdee~ /forum/post/15514710
So in a nutshell you're saying you want a Classe product but you only want what you need and at a price point you're willing to pay.![]()
Of course I only want to pay for what I desire. But on the other side of the coin both Classe and others, including Anthem, could produce a much better product by decreasing some of the feature sets such as mulitple zones. I want a tuner in my preamp as well, but I understand why some vendors don't put them in their preamps. Due to noise from the tuner section. What I'm saying is some of the expense is due to features that a large number of buyers may not use. I love both the D2 and SSP-800, but I bet they could make a lesser expensive preamp by dropping zones, dropping all the analog inputs, and in some cases dropping video processing for video switching. I'm not asking for them not to produce and ship a SSP-800 preamp, I'm just asking for a SSP-400 at half the price. While Anthem may sale a lot of D2s, I bet they sale a lot more cheaper AVMs.
In the case of the SSP-800, the rumor says this preamp was initially at a 12k price point. Then Classe decided to drop the price by 4k, just because they could. I bet the D2 at 7.5k had a lot to do with their new price point.
At the end of the day, companies like Emotiva are getting more looks from people like me, because a balanced 250 to 500 watt monoblock at 1k is hard as heck to ignore.
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