Newbie ? Reciever upgrade.

localnet

I recently upgraded my Polk RM5500 home theater pkg. to the below listed Polk speakers. The sound improvement is incredible, of course. My question is how much would I benefit by upgrading my Sony STR DE845 to the Denon AVR 3802? If so, how much of an improvement should I expect. The Sony 845 worked great with the little Polk set-up that I replaced. I just feel that there is something missing with the new Polks, perhaps in the power area. I wish I could explain, I just don't think that the Sony is cutting the mustard. I know that an amp would help, but I really don't want to use the Sony (You get what you pay for) reciever. I have played around with the Sony's many settings to no avail. I still am not happy. Will the Denon make the difference? I can purchase it for $825 delivered to my door.

Here is what I have currently:

CS1000p Center
RT2000i Fronts
FX500i Rears
PSW 250 (will be upgrading to PSW 650 shortly)
Sony STR DE845 Reciever
Monster Cables on all components including all subs and speakers
Monster Power HTS2500 Line Conditioner

Thanks,
Mike

George Grand

I don't recall ANYONE that has had positive remarks regarding the Sony 845, or for that matter, ANY of the receivers in THAT Sony line-up.

Some of these guys swear by the Denon's and B&K's, so for the info you seek, it's just a matter of time till they see your post.

George Grand (of the Jersey Grand's)

jcaut

(Here's one of them now.....George beat me to it)

I switched from an older Kenwood DPL receiver (KRV8070, which was actually not too bad) to a Sony STRV333ES which is really not much different than your DE845. I didn't like the Sony at all, so I bought a Denon AVR 3801 (which, again, is not much different from the 3802).

The Denon is, by a large margin, the best receiver I've personally used. It made a noticable difference in sound quality over the Kenwood and the Sony. It has very low noise levels and adequate power reserves, which gives it a much more "dynamic" sound than the other receivers I've had. I have RT800i mains, and it seems to drive them well. Not as well as a good seperates setup, of course, but pretty good for a receiver.

If you can get that receiver for $825, then I would say that's a pretty good deal and would be a worthwhile upgrade for you. After all, you'd not only get improved performance, but DTS ES, 6.1/7.1 surround, DPLII, etc.

That's my .02
Jason

TroyD

I have a Denon reciever and am very impressed with it.....

Considering your equipment, I would consider going with separates but I think the 3801 is a great reciever, much better than a Sony.

Go listen to them and then decide.

Troy

wangotango68

why all the sony bashing? i have the da777es reciever that i have preamped out to my m4.0t. it works fine for me most people do not give a piece of gear a change to break in before they don't like it. they is to much he said she said in audio let your ears be the judge. i owned the denon 3801 and was not inpresed with it at all to much bells and whistles.

scott:cool:

rskarvan

I'm not too awfully impressed with the Denon 3801 either.
Stereo mode absolutely sucks.
Matrix is good.
Mostly, I use it in direct mode.

wangotango68

thats the way i use my 777es mainly for the dolby procesing i have also owned other sony recievers in the past and all of them have done what i asked them to without miss. i do not use the tuner much at all i just use it to watch movies. hay ron did you check out any of the drag racing at irp? for those of you not from indiana i.r.p. stands for indianapolis raceway park.

scott:cool:

JohanK

Mike, I'd consider the HK Sig 2.0/2.1 combo from www.jandr.com for $900. If the 845 has preouts, I'd consider just an amp but, IIRC, the DE series doesn't have preouts('cept for the sub, of course).

BTW, where in MI are you located?

jcaut

I wasn't Sony-bashing, really......My 333ES seemed to have a lot of background noise. It was somewhat quieter in Direct mode, but not much. Maybe I just got a bad one. I only had it for a couple of months, so no, it wasn't broken-in. To my ears the Denon sounds a lot better, and I'm rather happy with it.

You're right though; Trying to tell someone what sounds best is kind of like trying to tell someone what food tastes good.

TroyD

I have a buddy that has a Sony 945......my personal opinion is that there are way too many bells and whistles, personally I think all those DSP modes are worthless. It runs very, very hot even in the open and he has had nothing but problems with it. It is in the shop (they have replaced it twice) more than in his house.

Just my opinion on that reciever.

Troy

rskarvan

The Denon 3801 has a few weak points.
One, I really dislike a cooling fan running inside a receiver - its just a pet peeve.

The 3801 isn't really a bad receiver.... its just not nearly as great as its hyped up to be.

Its not whisper quiet and, its a bit muddied.
Yes, its amplifier is above normal for a receiver; but, that really doesn't say much. It is feature packed though.

I have a 10yo older Yamaha RX830 70wpc that I think sounds ok - much better than the Denon 3801. The Denon has a bit more power... but, the Yamaha is much, much cleaner sounding - powering my (now restored) Monitor 10's. Clarity ranks higher than watts - in my book. Of course, the Denon's biggest feature is the 7 channels - thats absolutely wonderful. The 3801 is a very useful piece to tide me over until I can afford seperate amps and a B&K 7-channel processer - a couple years off (fingers crossed).

Scott, Yes, I did make it out to IRP. Living on the west side of Indy is absolutely automotive nirvana. From my house, I can hear both the Indy 500 and IRP (when the SRS's aren't playing - of course). The rumble/roar of the brickyard is sweeter than that of any subwoofer. I think my favorite time of year is the Super Chevy Show.
Lots of super nice classic cars for sale around home all the time. When ya coming down to listen to my 3.1's - they really do sound impressive now that I've got some clean power behind them.

sgtgto

Hi:

You should look at the Pioneer Elite. I don't see anything posted here on these receivers and I believe they are a very good product. Especially the VSX 37 and 39 TX. Anything you would ever want in a receiver in that price range. The LCD remote that comes with the 39TX is really great, and cosmetically they really look good also.

Go to the Pioneer site and check out the specks. www.pioneerelectronics.com

Better yet, go to a dealer and listen. I have bought numerous car audio and home units without any problems to speak of.

Gary

localnet

Thanks all!

First off, I am near Chelsea MI. outside of Ann Arbor.

Well, I don't know what to think. I have heard some older Denon recievers and was impressed. Muddied, that bugs me, I want clarity. I have a muddy sounding reciever already. By muddy, do you mean Sony muddy, as in terminal? Or a muddy sound that an audiophile junkie would go through the roof over, that the average joe six pack would never pick up on? I am more towards the junkie side with a few beers in him that picks up his bottles, if you get what I mean.

My big concern, along with clarity, is the back side of the reciever. I have 2 sat systems, a 10ft dish with 4DTV and a Canadian system, StarChoice, similar to DirecTV, without all the movie channels. I also have the tape deck, the cd player, the DVD player and 2 vcr's and want to add a cd recorder. That is the reason I initially went with the Sony, all the needed hook ups were there. Also the reason I was considering the Denon 3802, it has all of the hook ups. And I have always been impressed with the OLDER Denon recievers I have heard. Is Denon on the slide in the quality side? I know that quality standards are not what is always advertised or USED TO BE, and sometimes not even on the radar screen. I know, I am sub-contracted to Ford MoCo.

Thanks again to all!

Mike

jdelan

I will second what Sgtgto said, I have a Pioneer elite VSX36TX and am very happy with it.
I bought it for $800 off of Ebay over a year ago, does run hot but that is expected.
If you are looking to upgrade check out Pioneer...Quality product in my opinion...

PETERNG

Originally posted by sgtgto
Hi:

You should look at the Pioneer Elite. I don't see anything posted here on these receivers and I believe they are a very good product. Especially the VSX 37 and 39 TX. Anything you would ever want in a receiver in that price range. The LCD remote that comes with the 39TX is really great, and cosmetically they really look good also.


Gary

Not just the LCD remote is awesome (very expensive to replace so don't loose it), the performances ont both music and video are outstanding. Get the Pioneer Elite VSX 39 TX and the Pioneer Elite DV-38A and enjoy...

jcaut

I think you'd be happy, performance-wise, with the receivers from Denon, Yamaha, or Pioneer Elite in the $800-$1000 range. They have their differences, and each has strong/weak points, but they are all quality products. And I don't mean this in a "Sony-bashing" way, but they'd all be an improvement over your DE-series Sony.

The local store where I bought my Denon let me take home and try out the receivers I was considering (one at a time). Maybe you should look into that.

tmorgan

I just put a Marantz SR-7200 with my RT800i's I think it sounds very good. The price was < $800.

localnet

I went out and listened to some different recievers. I settled on the Denon 4802. All that I can say, as the others that have heard it, is AWESOME!

The sound is incredible. I am hearing things in my dvd's and cd's that I never knew were there. The same goes for my two sat systems, the sound is crisp and the bass is nice and tight, need that psw650 though.

Overall I would highly reccomend the Denon 4802 or 3802. I chose the 4802 over the 3802 because of the higher quality inards and the added component inputs on the back, plus extra wattage. I looked at the Yamaha, Pioneer and Onkyo. I basically chose the Denon not only because of the sound but for the ease of use. The Yamaha looked incredibly complicated, the Onkyo didn't really compare to the Denon in features and my percieved ideas of quality. The Pioneers were nice, but I have never had good luck in the past with Pioneer home or car audio products. When I say, "my percieved ideas of quality", I wanted the best possible reciever I could get for the money to go with my AWESOME Polk speakers, no more Sony. The Denon 4802 fit the bill in quality, sound and ease of use. The remote control, the touchscreen one, is totally awesome. I can control all of my gear, including my 4DTV sat box, now that really impressed me.

As for the Sony reciever, it took a dump the day of the wtc attack, man was I po'd! I was scurrying around behind all of my electronics so that I could get sound and picture to see what the heck was happening. Of course the warranty had run out a couple of months ago to boot. I am ditching all of my Sony gear.

Thanks for all of the input. Oh, i picked up the 4802 for $1700.00 delivered off of ebay.

Thanks to all again,

Michael

Aaron

Originally posted by localnet
I can control all of my gear, including my 4DTV sat box, now that really impressed me.

Geez, I must have really been snoozing! They have 4-D TV's? I must have missed the 3-D TV's. And wouldn't a 4-D TV be distorted since you're representing it in 3-D space? Furthermore, some people say time is the fourth dimension. Now I'm really confused.....

Aaron

localnet

You haven't heard of or seen 4dtv? It's really cool! The movies come right into your living room. It's just like the holo-deck from Star Trek! You are right in the middle of the action! You should really check it out. I would reccomend a good projection system to use with the 4dtv unit.

Michael

PETERNG

I think Sony made outstanding video products, I still have at least two old Sony TVs, they ‘re almost 20 years old and in perfect working condition (picture, color and sound). I also had some Sony DVD players, and their performances are flawless. I don’t think they make good audio products but I know they try to do better on the ES line…I would rather buy audio products from Yamaha, Onlyo, Denon or Pioneer Elite instead of Sony.

wangotango68

you know i have had 3 sony recievers over the years and have had no problems with them at all,not on and the sony da777es they stoped making cause it is basically there top of the line es 5channel power amp and the matching preamp in one and it was taking sales away from them.

scott :cool:

PETERNG

I have no doubt that Sony ES product is more reliable and better-built quality (very heavy, almost no plastic parts) than many other products and it will last a longtime. I am still debating about the performance of the product (background noise level). I have the Sony 555ES receiver that I use for the bedroom, and as far as judging by ears; I think my Pioneer Elite receiver sound a whole lot better. The Sony receiver has so many bells and whistles for the DSP and it’s difficult to adjust the sound to please your taste. I don’t use the DSP options at all. I love the decoding blue light and the dot matrix display on the Sony 555ES and the Sony 777ES, unlike other receivers, the manufacturer try to cut corner buy replacing the better dot matrix display by the cheaper digital display...:)

joelll

Hmmmm...

Well, first off, I have no money for upgrades, so my borrowed Sony HT receiver, which i don't like, is staying right where it is for a while.

I intend to replace the so-so-Sony HT receiver with a Marantz when I can, but that'll be a long time from now.

But, as far as two-channel stereo goes, it's possible to get some amazing sound for cheap money.

Quality pre-1980 equipment often has features, power levels or design that are quite expensive in current models. Sure, there's no remote control, but I'm not the sort to mind getting up (and most good CD players have volume control and remotes). Instead you get beefy construction, discrete components inside, real RMS amp output ratings, and simple to use controls.

My own favorite makers are Sansui, NAD and Marantz.

Vintage Marantz prices are a bit high, but they made great equipment before 1980 or so, and have started making great stuff again (there were some dark years, 1980-ish to 1994-ish). Browse http://www.classic-audio.com for info and specific ations. I want to build a system with a Model 3800 preamp, 510M amp (256wpc), 2130 tuner, 6300 TT.

Vintage Sansui gear is more in my price range. In my living room, I have a Sansui Eight (80wpc) receiver that my sister gave to me, powering my Polk Monitor 12's, and sounding really quite good. In my study, I have a Sansui 4000 (40wpc) receiver that I paid $30 for, sounding great through a pair of Large Advent speakers and small Genesis I's, which complement each other when driven simultaneously. The classic 125wpc 9090db receivers usually auction for $275 or so.

I paid $40 for my Nad 3020 integrated amp, now in my bedroom system, which was a huge bestseller back in the 80s.

My total audio gear investment is less than the used cost of a pair of SDA-SRS 1.2tl speakers that I'd like to hook up to the Marantz wish-list above.


Wow, this is longer than I thought, and contains almost no mention of HT. Oh well...


joelll