Hi All,
I've recently purchased the Panasonic Plasma TH50PZ800 and the 5.1 SBS-01 system from svsound. I now need to purchase a receiver and was hoping I could get some advice from all the experts out there. My concerns are:
- a lot of the amps that I've looked at (ie. Onkyo 805) tend to run very very hot. I have a toddler running around and wouldn’t want to get something that's so hot that it scorches him if he touches it
- I'm not that technically astute so would prefer the receiver had decent self-calibration
- ideally includes THX (the TV's got it so the receiver might as well also)
- and obviously, optimises viewing/listening experience with the TV and speakers..
- price wise, the cheaper the better, I'm also open to buying pre-owned amps if the new price point is too high (+$1.5k)
Any suggestions thoughts?
thanks rnatalli and jamie.. one more question is some amps have whats referred ot as night listening.. one of the key things i want to be able to do is watch movies and listen to movies when the wife and toddler are sleeping without cranking up the volume to get all the subtleties.. is this feature worth looking for or is it a marketing gimmick..
For your last question, I would try out a newer receiver with Audyssey Dynamic Volume. Supposed to work well with lower volumes. Make sure to disengage it for full blown viewing.
I have an 805. People say it runs hot. Tell ya what, if you want to run it cool, just neuter its manhood and set it to 4 ohms. It'll drop the rail voltage 40 watts or so, and runs at the same temp as most.
If you want your balls back, set it 6 ohms, it'll run hotter, but you'll have an Ultra amp that you can only get by spending more than 1k, and is spec'd to handle 3.2 ohms by THX. Of course, you can add a quiet $5 fan if you wanted, I don't see the need.
Audyssey Multi EQ XT and YPAO are in totally different leagues. This in of itself is worth any cost difference between the 663 and most Onkyos, IMO. I like what XT has done.
Depending on my mood, I will disengage the rolloff of the XT curve, while still using it. I was briefly researching pre/pro's with multiple curves, able to set as default, but when I saw that units that cost 3x more than the 805 didn't even have it, I stopped my search quickly.
In any case, if you do have 1.5k to blow, you can get a very nice receiver. Onkyo is the best bang for buck IMO, but Denons are arguably nicer. They just cost 2x more for any given amp and feature set. Manuals are tougher too.
Only issue with 805 is that when using 24p, blacks are elevated to PC levels. I would NEVER have known unless I visited AV forums on a daily basis. I only found out very recently. Guess what, I'm still keeping it. I figure I could probably upgrade color fidelity on my amazing JVC RS-1u before the blacks in fact. Even on a 159" screen.
663 has more limited bass mgmt, clips BTB/WTW, has only 2 hdmi inputs, cannot matrix bitstreams of new codecs (doesnt matter for 5.1 user). Its best asset is that its the cheapest receiver available that can be used as a pre/pro with HDMI inputs, IMO. I don't know why that is getting recommended when you can spend 1.5k. (no disrespect rnatalli).
JMO.
