AV receiver advice

[bwspot]

To me the lack of preouts is the show stopper.

It is, but if the receiver is not that pricy and one does not plan to connect any external amp whats the point? Just to have it?

 

[PENG]

Same features, negligible difference in power, and the X2000 is cheaper.

Agree, your M60 could play very loud if you give them the juice but if you don't listen to insane average SPLs of 85 dB and sitting further than a few meters than you will not need much more than a few of watts average with peaks to 20 to 50W at the most. I use external amps but most of the time my amps output less than 1W on average.

To me, preouts offer some added flexibility in case one needs the extra juice down the road, likely not an issue for most people. Denon for some reason removed that feature a few years ago, except for their top two models and maybe down one or two models in Europe and Asia.

 

[bwspot]

Agree, your M60 could play very loud if you give them the juice but if you don't listen to insane average SPLs of 85 dB and sitting further than a few meters than you will not need much more than a few of watts average with peaks to 20 to 50W at the most. I use external amps but most of the time my amps output less than 1W on average.

To me, preouts offer some added flexibility in case one needs the extra juice down the road, likely not an issue for most people. Denon for some reason removed that feature a few years ago, except for their top two models and maybe down one or two models in Europe and Asia.

x2000 still has 2.1 preouts. I only have 2 speakers so no a big deal for me. Yes, the juice might be a problem but we will see. I dont listen to the music very loud but i noticed that sometimes when speakers are driven by high power amplifier they sound fuller and stronger even at the same spl level.

 

[bwspot]

Just FYI, spoke with Denon and they told me that new receivers will only have few new features but the sound quality wont be affected. So seems like that X4000 might be a steal at some point if the lower the price.

 

[bwspot]

I finally received the X2000 today. I hooked it up and played few of my favorite songs I am familiar with.
Receiver was set to direct mode. I must say that I am very disappointed. The sound quality is far away from what I am familiar with when I had SR5003.
When I was auditioning X4000 and X2000 I though there was not that much of the difference, although it was noticeable.
But at home Its like day and night when comparing X2000 and Sr5003. The X2000 sounds so bright and empty that it is hard to listen to the music through it for longer time.
Its either that bad or it is just bad combination of speakers and AV. The sound does not have any dimension. It feels empty and high tones are so strong that its gets on my nerves.
Its so bright that the details in hi tones are lost.
At low volume it is even worse. It feels like the sound is trapped and it has problems expressing itself.
The only part that feels good to me are low tones and lower mid range, but it lucks depth and dimension.
I need more time with that AV but my initial impression was to immediately send it back where it came from.

Am I missing something?

 

[PENG]

I need more time with that AV but my initial impression was to immediately send it back where it came from.

Am I missing something?

Try listen to some well recorded material. See post#242 here:http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/general-av-discussions/78328-high-quality-sound-albums-25.html

or download the demo tracks here:

Free High-Res Sampler | HDtracks - The World's Greatest-Sounding Music Downloads

There are other sites such as LINN's

Linn Records - The best recordings in Studio Master Download, Vinyl and SACD

In my experience, more accurate/transparent amp and/or speakers do make not so well recorded/mastered music sound worse but I doubt that is the case with the X-2000. I bet you will end up sending it back in the end. I think you won't be happy until you get the SR5008 (IIRC) that you said you like.

 

[bwspot]

Try listen to some well recorded material. See post#242 here:http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/general-av-discussions/78328-high-quality-sound-albums-25.html

or download the demo tracks here:

Free High-Res Sampler | HDtracks - The World's Greatest-Sounding Music Downloads

There are other sites such as LINN's

Linn Records - The best recordings in Studio Master Download, Vinyl and SACD

In my experience, more accurate/transparent amp and/or speakers do make not so well recorded/mastered music sound worse but I doubt that is the case with the X-2000. I bet you will end up sending it back in the end. I think you won't be happy until you get the SR5008 (IIRC) that you said you like.

The content I listened to is of very good quality. (CD RIPS FLAC)
I listened to few tracks in your "great list !!!" already.
Tried the HDTracks sampler too.

My intentions are not against X2000, but my ears tell me otherwise.

I ordered UMIK-1 so I can do some testing and compare.

 

[rojo]

I finally received the X2000 today. I hooked it up and played few of my favorite songs I am familiar with. Receiver was set to direct mode. I must say that I am very disappointed....

Am I missing something?

How's it sound with Audyssey Dynamic EQ enabled? Are you running pure direct for some philosophical reason? By running pure direct, you're keeping the best feature of that Denon disabled, IMHO.

 

[bwspot]

How's it sound with Audyssey Dynamic EQ enabled? Are you running pure direct for some philosophical reason? By running pure direct, you're keeping the best feature of that Denon disabled, IMHO.

I have not tried that yet. My thinking is that the pure direct can gives the purest stereo sound you can get as all unnecessary electronic components are bypassed.
In the past when I tried the Audyssey with Sr5003 it sounded terrible. I also noticed that with Marantz the pure direct was making huge improvement but with Denon i don't hear much of the difference between direct and pure direct mode. X2000 might just have better components and switching does not make that much of the difference as not much noise is introduced while not pure direct? I will test the Audyssey and let you know.

 

[bwspot]

So i did further testing and I tried the Audyssey. In short, it is useless and does not do much. At least nothing that I could hear.
The only option that makes dramatic changes is the Dynamic EQ, but the bass is so deep and strong that it feels like there is a sub woofer there.
Not a good option if you want to listen to the stereo music. Probably for bass lovers that would be great, but not for the great stereo sound.
To summarize, both in pure direct and stereo mode high tones are too strong and details are lost. With pure direct the bass is too weak and lacks dimension and with Dynamic EQ is just too much.
The part i don't get is why the sound in pure direct mode is so bad? When listening to Marantz it was day and night when switching between pure direct and stereo.
I wonder how new Marantz wound sound with my speakers. It might be the same as I got a feeling that pure direct is not pure direct anymore and part of its beauty was moved to Dynamic EQ.
Next, is to test Marantz and if I am still not happy I will start looking for solid network dac (player) and good simple integrated amplifier.

 

[PENG]

So i did further testing and I tried the Audyssey. In short, it is useless and does not do much. At least nothing that I could hear.
The only option that makes dramatic changes is the Dynamic EQ, but the bass is so deep and strong that it feels like there is a sub woofer there.
Not a good option if you want to listen to the stereo music. Probably for bass lovers that would be great, but not for the great stereo sound.
To summarize, both in pure direct and stereo mode high tones are too strong and details are lost. With pure direct the bass is too weak and lacks dimension and with Dynamic EQ is just too much.
The part i don't get is why the sound in pure direct mode is so bad? When listening to Marantz it was day and night when switching between pure direct and stereo.
I wonder how new Marantz wound sound with my speakers. It might be the same as I got a feeling that pure direct is not pure direct anymore and part of its beauty was moved to Dynamic EQ.
Next, is to test Marantz and if I am still not happy I will start looking for solid network dac (player) and good simple integrated amplifier.

I Googled for the X-2000 reviews and have yet to find a bad one except from you (no pun intended). The British Whathifi, did say at loud volume there was some brightness in the treble but at moderate volume no issue. That is typical of what professional reviewers say about lower end amps regardless. This thing has been getting 4.5 to 5 stars in several reviews I read so far. As I said before, I have no use for professional reviews except for the test bench part.

For other reasons, I would never consider any Denon below the 3XXX (or X-4000 now) series. For Marantz, I would go as low as the SR6000 series but if you like the SR5008 imo it should be fine too. If you still don't like it then I think it is time to shop for better speakers. There are no shortage of the so called "warm" sounding speakers that could also tame some of the receivers/amps you may end up getting, psychologically.

For the time being, try DEQ with offset of 5 or even 10 for stereo music listening. That will tame the bass the treble somewhat. As for the Pure Direct, that is a myth especially for the lower end AVRs such as the models you have been considering. If that even makes any significant difference for you then you really need to do some real blind tests, and I won't say more or repeat some of the stuff I said before, to risk getting you upset.

 

[bwspot]

I Googled for the X-2000 reviews and have yet to find a bad one except from you (no pun intended). The British Whathifi, did say at loud volume there was some brightness in the treble but at moderate volume no issue. That is typical of what professional reviewers say about lower end amps regardless. This thing has been getting 4.5 to 5 stars in several reviews I read so far. As I said before, I have no use for professional reviews except for the test bench part.

For other reasons, I would never consider any Denon below the 3XXX (or X-4000 now) series. For Marantz, I would go as low as the SR6000 series but if you like the SR5008 imo it should be fine too. If you still don't like it then I think it is time to shop for better speakers. There are no shortage of the so called "warm" sounding speakers that could also tame some of the receivers/amps you may end up getting, psychologically.

For the time being, try DEQ with offset of 5 or even 10 for stereo music listening. That will tame the bass the treble somewhat. As for the Pure Direct, that is a myth especially for the lower end AVRs such as the models you have been considering. If that even makes any significant difference for you then you really need to do some real blind tests, and I won't say more or repeat some of the stuff I said before, to risk getting you upset.

I was thinking the same when looking at the reviews. They look pretty good and that leaned me towards the X2000. My mistake might be that I am looking at the lower class equipment and expecting too much so I agree with you that probably going below 3XXX might be just too low. That got me thinking and you point regarding Sr6000 might be well considering.
At this point I am not considering replacing the speakers as I have heard them before and I was very pleased, so I know exactly what sound am i looking for.

DEQ with offset of 5 sounds little lighter, but all the things that bug me are still there.

I dont know if this make sense, but even if I connect the headsets to X2000 and compare the sound with the same headsets connected to the iphone I can tell right away the difference.

As for pure direct I cannot tell the difference between direct and pure direct with this amp. Once i witch to DEQ i noticed the difference right away.

I am not upset at all. Maybe I just need the ear replacement surgery, but the tests of my hearing show I can hear pretty good, so I will stay in the believe I am ok and continue to have fun with my AVR selection.

 

[PENG]

I was thinking the same when looking at the reviews. They look pretty good and that leaned me towards the X2000. My mistake might be that I am looking at the lower class equipment and expecting too much so I agree with you that probably going below 3XXX might be just too low. That got me thinking and you point regarding Sr6000 might be well considering.
At this point I am not considering replacing the speakers as I have heard them before and I was very pleased, so I know exactly what sound am i looking for.

DEQ with offset of 5 sounds little lighter, but all the things that bug me are still there.

I dont know if this make sense, but even if I connect the headsets to X2000 and compare the sound with the same headsets connected to the iphone I can tell right away the difference.

As for pure direct I cannot tell the difference between direct and pure direct with this amp. Once i witch to DEQ i noticed the difference right away.

I am not upset at all. Maybe I just need the ear replacement surgery, but the tests of my hearing show I can hear pretty good, so I will stay in the believe I am ok and continue to have fun with my AVR selection.

I never doubted your hearing and am sure you heard a difference between the x2000 and the Marantz. My blind test comment will only apply if you hear significant difference between direct, purr direct, and stereo, with Audyssey and all DSP off, obviously. I guess we are in agreement again.

 

[rojo]

I think you ought to invest in a UMIK-1 and use REW to quantify and visualize what you are hearing. Even if you just use it temporarily, it should be very easy to resell on eBay.

Sent from my LG-VS980 using Tapatalk

 

[bwspot]

I think you ought to invest in a UMIK-1 and use REW to quantify and visualize what you are hearing. Even if you just use it temporarily, it should be very easy to resell on eBay.

Sent from my LG-VS980 using Tapatalk

Not planning to sell it. Nice to have it. I wonder how this plays out, if the difference I hear is measurable.

 

[rojo]

Not planning to sell it. Nice to have it. I wonder how this plays out, if the difference I hear is measurable.

Oh yeah, you said you ordered one. The memory is the first thing to go. Or is it memory that goes first? I can't remember.

 

[bwspot]

This is probably completely bad test but I wonder if any of you can hear how bright the high tones are here.
This was recorded with iphone mic just to show how strong it is. Two files: one with Pure direct on and other with DEQ 15DB.
I wonder if you can hear anything unusual.

deq
http://www.sendspace.com/file/qdfcm5

pure direct
http://www.sendspace.com/file/jf49bw

The song played was from hd tracks sampler.
Another Country by Cassandra Wilson

 

[rojo]

Inconclusive. I ran both tracks through Audacity's (edit: Sorry, I said Audyssey earlier, but I meant Audacity) frequency analysis. The deviation could be explained by a difference in recording position just by a couple of inches.

Your primary listening position could be in a null, making high frequencies stand out above mid to upper-mid. Is the brightness you describe apparent if you turn the volume down and put your ear close to a speaker?

 

[cpp]

Inconclusive. I ran both tracks through Audyssey's frequency analysis. The deviation could be explained by a difference in recording position just by a couple of inches.

Your primary listening position could be in a null, making high frequencies stand out above mid to upper-mid. Is the brightness you describe apparent if you turn the volume down and put your ear close to a speaker?

rojo that is really interesting data noted between DEQ and Pure Direct. Thanks

Did you use REW or ?

 

[rojo]

LOL no, I just loaded the m4a files that bwspot recorded on his iPhone into Audacity, screenshot both analyses, then overlaid one on top of the other using GIMP. It's by no means scientific. That was a typo. Sorry about that. Edited.