Yamaha AVENTAGE 2021 AV Receivers Bulk Up on Power and 8K Features

[Replicant 7]

My RX-A2A does not seem to have a "Hi-Res Mode" or I just can't find it. Maybe the RX-A2A lacks a lot of features the A4A and up have.

No it doesn't have (Hi-Res Mode) you have to step up to A4A. It does have ,(Enhancer). How long have you been having your A2A?

 

[little wing]

My RX-A2A does not seem to have a "Hi-Res Mode" or I just can't find it. Maybe the RX-A2A lacks a lot of features the A4A and up have.

Is there an Option button on your remote? On my 3060, Hi Res functionality is under Options.

 

[MR.MAGOO]

No it doesn't have (Hi-Res Mode) you have to step up to A4A. It does have ,(Enhancer). How long have you been having your A2A?

had it about a month, got from Accessories for Less, refurbished, $200 off regular prices I've seen for 'new' ones elsewhere.

 

[Replicant 7]

had it about a month, got from Accessories for Less, refurbished, $200 off regular prices I've seen for 'new' ones elsewhere.

Nice, I had the RX-A2A, liked it had no issues, no audio or video issues. Excluding 2.1, I sent mine back for refund wanted the A4A which I had been eyeballing since May when the new Aventage line was announced. I had been bugging Andrew every week for months, he couldn't find one none of his distributors had any. So I went with the A2A, than a week after Andrew texted me saying his distributor could get the A4A. So boxed up the A2A sent it back to Amazon for full refund. You do get a lot more with the A4A, it's supposed to be ready for the 2.1 firmware update when Yamaha releases it. It also will not need the board replacement. But as of now I don't have 2.1 anything (source) now my 4K tv has 2.1 input but only for 4K 60 Hz. I may get a PS5 next year maybe. I should mention the A4A has Parametric EQ, YPAO:Low Frequency, just to mention. Of course the A6A and A8A has the Pro ESS chips, A4A has ESS 9007 chip, A4A and up has Qualcomm chip (hypersonic) what ever that means.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Any opinions on Denon AVR-X8500HA vs the Yamaha RX-A8A? Take out the money factor, just unit vs unit primarily. Sound quality, picture quality, etc.

SQ: in Direct mode, they will both sound equally great.

PQ: I would say toss up also. But most of us would never let an AVR process the video - most people would let either the Blu-ray player or the TV/PJ process the video.

As for measurements, if you're using Room EQ Digital Processing, who knows how bad those THD+N numbers will be after all that Processing.

 

[AVR Enthu]

I think SU was working still within the framework of their First-Gen chipset. The new lower-tier Denons slated to release this month are likely 2nd-Gen or possibly even 3rd(?). Yamaha is 2nd-gen on these new AVRs and Onkyo is most likely the same.

First gen chipset is only on 2020 faulty boards, both SU and Yamaha. First gen implementation was AV disgrace.
Second gen chipset is in adapter box for those 2020 units, in multi-input adapter box, new HA boards and new low tier models. Second gen is also in 2021 models of Yamaha and new swap boards.
Third gen chipset is in development. No rumours have been spotted as of now. Release in H2 2022-H1 2023.

Here is everything we know about all HDMI 2.1 chipsets in AVRs and AV processors.

HDMI 2.1 AVRs and AV processors; issues with chips...

www.avsforum.com

 

[AVR Enthu]

Nvidia shield is the best streaming device. It's can do anything,play every audio format and video format. Plex is amazing if you have a blu ray digital library

Nvidia Shiled is good, but it needs a serious update in 2022. Firstly, CEC is broken a bit. Secondly, it has a dismal storage of 16GB. New Shield will need to allow for NVMe or SATA SSD drives to be added by owners, so that Plex server, media libraries and other bigger apps can be installed and run natively from within. SMB transfer of files from PC to Shield will need to work much better, faster and smoother. AV1 codec needs to be supported too, as it is being rolled out by Netflix, Youtube and others.

By the way, I have not heard that any new AVR supports pass-through of AV1 video codec, which is more efficient than HEVC and will dominate streaming soon. If I play AV1 file on PC connected to 2021 AVRs, will it pass this video codec onto TVs that support it (LG 2020 and 2021 models)?

 

[OldAndSlowDev]

I played a little bit with my new toy yesterday and tried YPAO with height and angle measurement : it's accurate.
But it only measures the front, front presence and surround speaker positions. Not the back surround, don't really understand why. Speaking about front presence, I am still not sure it brings a lot. If someone can provide a good way to test the benefit... I have watched the same scenes with and without front height speakers enabled, and I can hear a small difference but not sure about if it's worth it to add these speakers on the wall which doesn't look nice in my living room (I don't mean that on some other setups it could sound amazingly good...)

The fact that my living room got a slope with beams ceiling prevent me to install some ceiling speakers which from what I am reading is the way to go to have good 7.x.4 Atmos but it's not something easy to achieve without a too big visual impact.

I still have a lot to test, to learn. I was trying Surround AI decoder but right now I am not experienced enough to know what to listen to in order to compare straight vs surround AI DSP decoder..

If you want me to try things, to check stuff, feel free to ask

 

[diablo676]

I played a little bit with my new toy yesterday and tried YPAO with height and angle measurement : it's accurate.
But it only measures the front, front presence and surround speaker positions. Not the back surround, don't really understand why. Speaking about front presence, I am still not sure it brings a lot. If someone can provide a good way to test the benefit... I have watched the same scenes with and without front height speakers enabled, and I can hear a small difference but not sure about if it's worth it to add these speakers on the wall which doesn't look nice in my living room (I don't mean that on some other setups it could sound amazingly good...)

The fact that my living room got a slope with beams ceiling prevent me to install some ceiling speakers which from what I am reading is the way to go to have good 7.x.4 Atmos but it's not something easy to achieve without a too big visual impact.

I still have a lot to test, to learn. I was trying Surround AI decoder but right now I am not experienced enough to know what to listen to in order to compare straight vs surround AI DSP decoder..

If you want me to try things, to check stuff, feel free to ask

Seems like your height measurements work better than mine. It measures my rear heights correctly but gives the front ones at 3 feet high when they are above my projection screen at around 9 feet.

Maybe test the effect of the front presence by playing some music and switching between 'standard' (which uses heights) and straight (which doesn't). Makes quite a difference I find.

Though some Atmos material makes little use of the heights. Auro-3D should make more use of 'second layer' height speakers when it arrives - at a 30 degree angle. Many say Atmos sounds better through Auro, but I obviously can't comment until it arrives.

I can't use overhead speakers as my cinema setup is in my unused dinng room, which has a fancy ornate ceiling. I have two over the screen and for the rear constructed a stand-on-stand thing which can be altered between Atmos and Auro.

Height speakers are PSB Imagine XA Atmos ones by the way.

Not suggesting you do the same. But the bounce off the ceiling speakers work - but work better if higher I find.

As for Surround AI, I don't usually use it but have watched three series recently which it worked really well for. They were all Scottish crime dramas which were very muffled with standard Dolby but much clearer with AI. Maybe they all used the same deaf Scottish sound engineer.

 

[OldAndSlowDev]

Up firing with my ceiling would be a disaster for sure

 

[VASKION]

Guys, have you checked this blog:

Simple Home Cinema - Bringing Your Entertainment to Life

I will show you how to tweak YPAO R.S.C. manually.

simplehomecinema.com

It has some very nice articles and guides on setting up Yamaha's receivers and YPAO usage.
I also read somewhere recently that even Atmos is better when the front presence speakers are firing directly in the room as Auro-3D specs suggest (just like the setup on the picture from @OldAndSlowDev above) and not tilted or firing at the ceiling.

 

[diablo676]

Up firing with my ceiling would be a disaster for sure

View attachment 51389

Haha, yes I see the problem. Maybe some eight foot speaker stands!

When we get Auro-3D I'll be adjusting the height speakers to point just above my ears, that will be about the 30 degree recomendation. They'll be six feet above the floor then.

 

[Replicant 7]

Up firing with my ceiling would be a disaster for sure

View attachment 51389

Dude! That's a very nice home you have!

 

[OldAndSlowDev]

Dude! That's a very nice home you have!

Thank you, I like it a lot (and this is why I didn't wanted to sell this house when my ex wife and I separated). It's beautiful actually (if you like wood ) but wiring a home cinema is challenging. This extension to the house (which is from 1934) is built on stakes so no basement under the floor so no wiring per under, the walls are woods so no wiring in walls. I had to wire under the hard floor...
But I am not complaining. Living in such a house in a town is really a privilege. And where is the fun if wiring is too easy

 

[dsavage30]

I think SU was working still within the framework of their First-Gen chipset. The new lower-tier Denons slated to release this month are likely 2nd-Gen or possibly even 3rd(?). Yamaha is 2nd-gen on these new AVRs and Onkyo is most likely the same.

I'm very interested to see this play out and resolve. It is a dark time for us in the Audio Hobby right now. Plus, I want to upgrade, myself, but won't until this sh!tshow of bed-wetting is resolved.

Well, I can report back that I am extremely happy with the Denon AVR-X8500HA. The way it calibrated the subs, was awesome...Yamaha was never able to do that (Although the new A8A) is suppose to have that feature now. I am extremely happy with the way the Denon plays the voices, even in loud action scenes. So far, so good. Can't wait to get moved into the new home, with the new setup, and get it all calibrated and dialed in! PS- Damn this receiver is heavy!

 

[OldAndSlowDev]

Well, I can report back that I am extremely happy with the Denon AVR-X8500HA. The way it calibrated the subs, was awesome...Yamaha was never able to do that (Although the new A8A) is suppose to have that feature now. I am extremely happy with the way the Denon plays the voices, even in loud action scenes. So far, so good. Can't wait to get moved into the new home, with the new setup, and get it all calibrated and dialed in! PS- Damn this receiver is heavy!

Nice amp. I had a look to this one but 2250 CAD more expensive than the A8A here (6000CAD vs 3850CAD)

 

[ryanosaur]

Well, I can report back that I am extremely happy with the Denon AVR-X8500HA. The way it calibrated the subs, was awesome...Yamaha was never able to do that (Although the new A8A) is suppose to have that feature now. I am extremely happy with the way the Denon plays the voices, even in loud action scenes. So far, so good. Can't wait to get moved into the new home, with the new setup, and get it all calibrated and dialed in! PS- Damn this receiver is heavy!

If you like tinkering, the Audyssey App can be well worth the $20. It allows you greater controls over the correction protocol such as setting a curtain, turning off The mid range “correction,” and more. Better on a tablet than phone if you get into tinkering with the curve, but either way, still nice.
There are a few threads where users have gone much deeper into taking full advantage of Aud XT32… worth checking out.
Cheers!

 

[Replicant 7]

Well, I can report back that I am extremely happy with the Denon AVR-X8500HA. The way it calibrated the subs, was awesome...Yamaha was never able to do that (Although the new A8A) is suppose to have that feature now. I am extremely happy with the way the Denon plays the voices, even in loud action scenes. So far, so good. Can't wait to get moved into the new home, with the new setup, and get it all calibrated and dialed in! PS- Damn this receiver is heavy!

Congratulations on your new AVR! It is a very nice one. You went for Denon's Flagship.

 

[jakkedtide]

Nvidia Shiled is good, but it needs a serious update in 2022. Firstly, CEC is broken a bit. Secondly, it has a dismal storage of 16GB. New Shield will need to allow for NVMe or SATA SSD drives to be added by owners, so that Plex server, media libraries and other bigger apps can be installed and run natively from within. SMB transfer of files from PC to Shield will need to work much better, faster and smoother. AV1 codec needs to be supported too, as it is being rolled out by Netflix, Youtube and others.

By the way, I have not heard that any new AVR supports pass-through of AV1 video codec, which is more efficient than HEVC and will dominate streaming soon. If I play AV1 file on PC connected to 2021 AVRs, will it pass this video codec onto TVs that support it (LG 2020 and 2021 models)?

Agree a new shield needs to come out! Maybe with hdmi 2.1??!!!??

 

[AVR Enthu]

Agree a new shield needs to come out! Maybe with hdmi 2.1??!!!??

Unlikely, unless new SoC has some serious bump to ouput games that need such bandwidth.