Need advice on receiver for LC80i's

lvshane

I need to replace an old (18yrs) Yamaha receiver. I'm not much of a techie and I am not up to speed with all the a/v lingo. I simply am looking for something that sounds good while playing cd's, ipod, etc... I have a 5.1 system with Polk lc80i's for front and rear speakers. I recently purchased a Pioneer vsx-819h receiver and the sound was terrible. Needless to say, it is going back. I have about $400 to spend (which I know is not a lot) and am looking for suggestions near this price range. Thanks in advance for helping out this non-techie.

Kex

lvshane wrote: »

I need to replace an old (18yrs) Yamaha receiver. I'm not much of a techie and I am not up to speed with all the a/v lingo. I simply am looking for something that sounds good while playing cd's, ipod, etc... I have a 5.1 system with Polk lc80i's for front and rear speakers. I recently purchased a Pioneer vsx-819h receiver and the sound was terrible. Needless to say, it is going back. I have about $400 to spend (which I know is not a lot) and am looking for suggestions near this price range. Thanks in advance for helping out this non-techie.

Welcome to CP. The LC80i are 4 ohm speakers. Not many receivers are rated for that (most are only 8 ohm capable). For $400, you will not have too many choices. Perhaps the best option would be NAD, which are well known to accept 4 ohm and 2 ohm loads. I also find them terrific in dynamic ability. You can actually find models from a trusted source as they phase out the T7x4 range and replace it with the T7x5 range of receivers. The T7x4 do not have any HDMI capability, but they do have component (limited to 720p). Otherwise, for 1080p you will have to hook up video directly from the source component to the display.

Some options:

- T744, $400 new, on sale: http://www.spearitsound.com/nad/T744.asp
- T754, $500 refrubished: http://www.spearitsound.com/nad/T754.asp
- T755, $700, new with HDMI: http://www.spearitsound.com/nad/T755.asp

Never mind the modest power ratings: these receivers have excellent power output that will effortlessly outshine many others with twice the published specifications. The biggest limitation of the T744 is that it does not have pre-outs for all channels, so adding an amplifier in the future on this model would be limited to the front three channels IIRC. The biggest limitation of the T755 is that, although it handles HDMI, it will not process the new HD audio formats that some are keen to have. The T754 and T755 seem like the best choices IMO, but the T744 should still be a better choice for 4 ohms than just about anything else in that price range.

reeltrouble1

good advice.

RT1

cnh

What is an LC80i....? I don't see any reference to that model anywhere..either in Polk Vintage or on the Polk Ebay archive? And welcome to CP...

Thanks

cnh

lvshane

Thanks for the welcoming and the suggestions. I failed to mention in my original post that I also have 4 Klipsch outdoor speakers that I currently run off of a speaker selector. If I am not mistaken, those are 8 ohm speakers. Does this change your suggestions at all? I don't necessarily need a dual zone receiver but it would be a nice feature if it had this feature.

I'm assuming that a receiver that can accept 4 ohm loads can also handle 8 ohm loads with no problem. Is this right?

I have never heard of NAD until reading some of the posts throughout the PA Forums. It sounds like it may be a good fit for me. At this point, the price is an issue but maybe I can hold out and scratch together some more $$ for the better receiver.

Lastly, what are your thoughts on Cambridge Audio receivers? I'm not sure if these would work for me but I've seen this brand around the forums quite a bit.

Thanks again for all the help!

lvshane

The LC80i's are in-ceiling speakers. You can check them out on the Polk Audio products page.