Marantz AV7005 7.2 Channel Preamplifier First Look

[admin]

If you were looking at the new Marantz SR7005 and thinking to yourself, "Boy, I might get that and add an amp later," you're in luck. The new AV7005 Preamplifier has all the same features as the SR7005 except without the amp section and with balanced outputs. The hardest part for interested consumers will be the wait. The Marantz AV7005 Pre/Pro won't be available until October. But at $1500 for a Pre/Pro with just about every feature on the planet and drop-dead styling to boot, it's a wait we're betting a lot of people will be willing to suffer through. All the latest decoding, top of the line processing and room correction, dual subwoofer outputs, GUI overlay, networking, streaming, HDMI to HDMI scaling... the list goes on.

Discuss "Marantz AV7005 7.2 Channel Preamplifier First Look" here. Read the article.

 

[Warpdrv]

Sweet, put me on the waiting list for this one...

Should more then suffice for me, plus the ability to add Audyssey Pro to the mix I'm pretty much sold...

If the 8003 is good enough for TLS, I'm hoping that the 7005 will follow up in the ranks with the same SQ and performance.

 

[XEagleDriver]

As pleased as I am to see pre/pro features reaching parity with same generation AVRs, and the respective costs dropping in to the same neighborhood, other than the "sex appeal" factor of separates, why would anyone not want the additional flexability of the AVR's seven x 125W amps for a mere $100 more?

IMHO from a cost/benefit POV the SR7005 still makes more sense, and it's 7.1 pre-amp outs enable adding any external amp the AV7005 might be matched with. I guess if balanced inputs are a must, that might justify the difference, but in my case I just don't see it.

Cheers,
XEagleDriver

 

[Warpdrv]

True, but if you have been sitting on the fence for as long as I have (3+ years), with an old receiver serving as prepro to my existing external amp, then its nice to have something that will fit into the mix at a reasonable pricepoint.

XLR's are just a bonus for me, since my amp has them.... Is it truly necessary - no but I'll still use them.

 

[krzywica]

Would something like this be a worthy investment for me given that this is 4x the cost of my L/R speakers? I would be curious to think what I would gain going to something like this from my current AVR.

 

[3db]

As pleased as I am to see pre/pro features reaching parity with same generation AVRs, and the respective costs dropping in to the same neighborhood, other than the "sex appeal" factor of separates, why would anyone not want the additional flexability of the AVR's seven x 125W amps for a mere $100 more?

IMHO from a cost/benefit POV the SR7005 still makes more sense, and it's 7.1 pre-amp outs enable adding any external amp the AV7005 might be matched with. I guess if balanced inputs are a must, that might justify the difference, but in my case I just don't see it.

Cheers,
XEagleDriver

Because of the rapid developments in audio/video processessing, it would much more sense to seperate amp from audio/video processessing. You only need to buy one mulitchannel amp and it will keep you through countless upgrades that are always going on in the audio/video processessing world. Save that hundred dollars a few time and you can get a good multichannel seperate amp that will live on forever. Or until the cows come home..which ever comes first.

 

[3db]

If you were looking at the new Marantz SR7005 and thinking to yourself, "Boy, I might get that and add an amp later," you're in luck. The new AV7005 Preamplifier has all the same features as the SR7005 except without the amp section and with balanced outputs. The hardest part for interested consumers will be the wait. The Marantz AV7005 Pre/Pro won't be available until October. But at $1500 for a Pre/Pro with just about every feature on the planet and drop-dead styling to boot, it's a wait we're betting a lot of people will be willing to suffer through. All the latest decoding, top of the line processing and room correction, dual subwoofer outputs, GUI overlay, networking, streaming, HDMI to HDMI scaling... the list goes on.

Discuss "Marantz AV7005 7.2 Channel Preamplifier First Look" here. Read the article.

Any news from Marantz on a mulitchannel amp that is not in their reference line?

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Will someone at Marantz please walk over to the Denon house next door, knock on their heads (or b!tch slap them), and tell them to get off their butts and release a Denon Pre-Pro based on the Denon 4308/4810???

 

[jostenmeat]

True, but if you have been sitting on the fence for as long as I have (3+ years), with an old receiver serving as prepro to my existing external amp, then its nice to have something that will fit into the mix at a reasonable pricepoint.

XLR's are just a bonus for me, since my amp has them.... Is it truly necessary - no but I'll still use them.

I agree, in terms of general affordability. How long have we been waiting on Outlaw? So we've had Integra/Onkyo for a few years+, and perhaps very recently the Emo. After that, I think we are in the territory of your Anthem.

Would something like this be a worthy investment for me given that this is 4x the cost of my L/R speakers? I would be curious to think what I would gain going to something like this from my current AVR.

IMO, no. Unless you need more power to feed your speakers, and that you would benefit from the Audyssey tech. Still, getting to multiply speaker budget by 4 is pretty big IMO . . .

Because of the rapid developments in audio/video processessing, it would much more sense to seperate amp from audio/video processessing. You only need to buy one mulitchannel amp and it will keep you through countless upgrades that are always going on in the audio/video processessing world. Save that hundred dollars a few time and you can get a good multichannel seperate amp that will live on forever. Or until the cows come home..which ever comes first.

This only makes sense under the assumption that your pre/pro was less money than the receiver (acting as pre/pro) to begin with. I chose my 805 over the Integra 9.8 because it saved me $1,000 or more at the time. I don't get XLRs (amp doesn't have em anyways), no Reon (I don't care), nor Audyssey Pro capability (but at least MultEQ XT32 is on the horizon). I still got my XT, separate power supplies for video/audio, and the ability to matrix advanced codec bitstreams and PCM.

Will someone at Marantz please walk over to the Denon house next door, knock on their heads (or b!tch slap them), and tell them to get off their butts and release a Denon Pre-Pro based on the Denon 4308/4810???

I asked around months ago. Word/opinion on the street is that Denon threw it on the backburner when they saw Onkyo releasing a slew of feature packed performers for affordable prices. They would likely lose money on it. The above opinion was even shared by Batpig IIRC via PMs, months ago. Anyways the last time I think I talked about the slim chance of this Denon was in this post:

http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=701573&postcount=2

 

[aszatk01]

I've been watching for info on this as well as its matching 5 channel amp verse its SR7005 receiver sibling.

So there are no real differences in processing between the AV and SR? Aside from the assumption of better processing and SQ because of the amplification separation and the additional 15 watts gained...there aren't any differences?

Hard to justify the additional $1k for 15 watts a channel...

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

why would anyone not want the additional flexability of the AVR's seven x 125W amps for a mere $100 more?

I would NOT want the AVR even if the AVR is $100 LESS, and so would every single audiophile who loves the idea of the pre-pro.

Denon made the AVP-A1HDCI for $2,000 more than the equivalent AVR-5308CI, and A LOT of people still bought the AVP-A1HDCI.

I would have bought the AVP-A1HDCI in a flash if it were the SAME price as the AVR-5308.

I like the Marantz's thinking on this one!

 

[lietuvis91]

I'm a newb, and I guess I really am missing the point of why you would buy the pre and not the receiver if you only save $100 by giving up the ability to power speakers by going with the pre. I mean, if you ever upgrade the receiver, you can still use the old receiver to run some speakers in another room, your garage, bathroom or whatever. The pre is useless without an amp, so... what's the point of the pre if both have all the same functionality?

 

[cmryan821]

I'm a newb, and I guess I really am missing the point of why you would buy the pre and not the receiver if you only save $100 by giving up the ability to power speakers by going with the pre. I mean, if you ever upgrade the receiver, you can still use the old receiver to run some speakers in another room, your garage, bathroom or whatever. The pre is useless without an amp, so... what's the point of the pre if both have all the same functionality?

Well, for me personally, if they're identical I'll still buy the av7005 b/c of the xlr outputs. My satellite dvr produces a 60hz hum that REFUSES to be tamed no matter what I try(unless I unplug my dvr that is).

I think most everyone already has an external amp so most will view the receiver's amp as unnecessary. In addition, virtually everyone(myself included) feels any receiver's amp is inferior to even fairly cheap external amps(ex: emotiva xpa5 for $800). So all in all, if you've been into this hobby for any amount of time you're probably gonna favor the prepro over the receiver IF they are priced similarly. Up until this unit, I had never seen that to be the case.

Of course, if you are new into the hobby, don't have an external amp and the impedance of the speakers you've chosen doesn't dip too low then the receiver does make more sense.

 

[PENG]

I guess we all have our own reasons for our choices. In my case, I may still go for the SR7005 because I do not believe I need a 7 channel power amp. My Denon has no trouble driving my surround and even the center speakers so I am happy with a receiver plus a 2 or 3 channel amp. If the SR7005's prepro section is as good as the AV7005 then it will be good enough for me. Now if they are not better (I mean the audio specs, examples: S/N ratios, freq response etc.) than the prepro section of my 4308 then all bets are off as I can live without some of the latest features such as 3D.

 

[rick88]

I just discovered this and I cannot wait to check it out.

 

[95prelude]

Well, for me personally, if they're identical I'll still buy the av7005 b/c of the xlr outputs. My satellite dvr produces a 60hz hum that REFUSES to be tamed no matter what I try(unless I unplug my dvr that is).

I think most everyone already has an external amp so most will view the receiver's amp as unnecessary. In addition, virtually everyone(myself included) feels any receiver's amp is inferior to even fairly cheap external amps(ex: emotiva xpa5 for $800). So all in all, if you've been into this hobby for any amount of time you're probably gonna favor the prepro over the receiver IF they are priced similarly. Up until this unit, I had never seen that to be the case.

Of course, if you are new into the hobby, don't have an external amp and the impedance of the speakers you've chosen doesn't dip too low then the receiver does make more sense.

This is a no brainer. Pre all the way.

 

[swspiers]

For me, it's the AVR all the way. I can still use it as a pre/pro (though I wish I could shut the amps off). But with my situation, moving every 2 to 3 years, I never know what size room it will be in or even what size rack I'll be able to use.

My separates are sitting in the basement collecting dust (good time to take the amp in for service and cleaning) because all I can use right now is a TV stand for my equipment.

What I'm hoping is that in a blind test, I wouldn't be able to tell a difference between the SR7005 and AV7005 with my amp. In which case, the AVR is the no-brainer. I need maximum flexibility.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I'm a newb, and I guess I really am missing the point of why you would buy the pre and not the receiver if you only save $100 by giving up the ability to power speakers by going with the pre. I mean, if you ever upgrade the receiver, you can still use the old receiver to run some speakers in another room, your garage, bathroom or whatever. The pre is useless without an amp, so... what's the point of the pre if both have all the same functionality?

Either way is perfect.

This is a hobby, and a lot to times we do things beyond "practical" and "rational".

It's not about the money.

In fact, the opposite is usally true.

For example, my Denon AVR5308 is $5,500. But the Denon AVP-A1 is $7,500.

So the pre-pro actually $2,500 MORE than the receiver!!!

And, like you said, without the amps, the $7,500 Denon pre-pro won't even sing on its own.

So it's not about the money. A lot of times it's not about the performance either.

Sometimes it's about the aesthetics, brand/name recognition/prestige status, and the hard-core specs that the Spec-whores love.

They are not for everyone; they are just for the crazies.

 

[swspiers]

Hey Accu. Are those Orions in red in your Avatar?

 

[CrazyCanuck75]

Jumping on the band wagon!

At first I was against the idea of buying a mass produced preamp from Marantz, Denon or integra. I wanted my first real dedicated theater to be made up of high end separates from companies that most people never hear about.

But while doing research on preamps I kept hearing Integra and Marantz.....long story short, I want the AV7005!

It is now October 10th, where are they, when is the release date?