Just before I bought my last receiver, my Yamaha RX-V659, I bought a Sony AVR (Didn't have it for long enough top remember the model #) for about $400 on sale, and it was a disaster. In a small room running my SVS 7.1 setup, the amp went into protection at normal movie volume, and ran very hot. A replacement did the same thing, and I ended up selling the Sony to a friend for $200 with it being a "gift" if it died early. It ended up in his kid's room for a while, then it went into the garage. I didn't even look at Sony stuff for a long time, but a couple of months ago, I did look at Sony AVRs, but I ended up with the Yamaha TSR-7810. I hope Sony learned it's lesson. My old Sony ES CD "lazy susan" still works great.
The only thing I kept from my purchases that weekend was the Sony Subwoofer I still have that was mispriced at $49.99 for a 12" powered sub! It's not horrible actually, but it's soon going to be put on this PC