I wanted to build a home theatre... I bought this receiver used at 1/3 the price. It had excellent reviews.... I should have looked at the schematics before buying 😀
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hold on there - I don't believe Onkyo would have made such a pigs ear. I think we're missing something here. The grounding is important and the engineers that designed it have been making amplifiers for many years and know this. It's quite feasible that the chassis is being used as a ground to good effect. The fact that different grounds are connected through capacitors could be good practice to ensure small differences between them at r.f. I suggest looking more closely.
I had the 805, 906 and still have a 876 somewhere.
I paid less than a thou for each one (Canadian dollars).
Me too I read all the reviews and they were all good.
The true power on them three receivers is over 120 Watts @ 8Ω with 0.1% THD, with all seven channels running continuously.
And into 4Ω loads, with two channels driven and with 0.1% THD they deliver more than 300 watts.
But! You said that the digital circuitry is less than stellar.
I guess all of them reviewers are up to no good when it comes to decipher the interior.
Should I have purchased an Arcam AVR600 instead? ...Or a Denon AVR-5308CI? Both are over five grands, each! ...USD (in Canada much much more).
No matter what there are always compromises in audio electronics.
...Even in a SSP that costs $30,000 (Krell Evolution 707) and mated with eleven monoblocks (Krell Evolution 600) for an additional $360,000 if your setup is a 11.4-channel one.
Then you need four subs; that's another $40,000 (REL Studio III).
So far that's $430,000 and you don't even have a single loudspeaker (yet you want eleven of them).
Anyway, after investing over $9 millions for your home theater state-of-the-art dream (including the room, the acoustics, the centrifuge nuclear power grid, the furniture, the lights, the video gear, bla-bla-bla), it'll still have some issues somewhere. ...A bad resistor, or burnt fuse, or a spider making home inside one of the amps.
Just get the Onkyo 818 receiver and eat some froot loops for the next couple months.
The thing with Emotiva is this; their amps are pretty good for the money (lots of power), but their SSPs are not up to par.
It's Ok, use your receiver as the SSP. ...Like the Onkyo 818 for example.
...Or a Marantz one, or a Yamaha one, Denon, Pioneer Elite, ...que sera sera.
NAD, Arcam, Cambridge, Rotel? ...Nah, Onkyo/Integra; cost much less money.
What's weak in receivers and that is not in separates, separates have their own weaknesses. ...Cost, features, and value.
Let's try to find receivers with the less weaknesses possible, with great sound, smart build, useful features for the common mortals, and excellent financial value.
Let's try to find receivers with the less weaknesses possible, with great sound, smart build, useful features for the common mortals, and excellent financial value.
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So the power amp is something that costs money do to well - big power supplies are expensive (caps, weight, copper, space in the chassis) and power output devices cost money along with heatsinks (and space).
But I'm not seeing any value-priced pre-amps, something with room correction and other bells & whistles. Seems that Oppo has no room correction. Emotiva is the only other option but is it any good as a pre ????
Which leaves the idea of using a receiver as a pre-amp makes sense if the rest of the what is inside it can be said to be good. Just have to add and wire up a pre-out. Then just add an external power amp.
Is there a better way without spending large $ ?
Oppo Blu-ray players have bass management (analog multich out), that's it, no room correction and EQ.
Emotiva SSPs have Emo 1 and 2 room correction and EQ, but not properly implemented.
The best is not to use them and use the manual parametric EQ of the UMC-200 instead.
As an analog preamp, most people like the sound better than most receivers.
And that's good value if you're going to use it as so, because $500 is cheap.
Methinks for most common mortals with regular set of ears and normal bank accounts,
a receiver with a good room EQ system (Audyssey, ARC, Trinnov), mated with some Emotiva amps is a good alternative.
Pick your features in the receiver, and the power in separates; all affordable.
But! Like I said before, some Onkyo receivers have true power in them, with a big transformer, three more smaller ones for the audio and video sections, a solid heatsink, four power transistors per channel, solid copper bus bars, weigh over 55 pounds, and cost near $500. The main caps are 18,000 or 22,000uF times two.
The amp section is high current design with 60-65 amps peak.
Plus they have Audyssey MultEQ XT, THX Ultra2 Plus and ISF certification. ...Of course I'm talking second-hand ones.
If you want just ask, and I'll post some pictures of their internals.
* Our Frenchman member here opened his Onkyo TX-NR905 and made some measurements, from the digital section. He did not like them measurements, fair enough.
But he bought it for his home theater, for the gobs of power, for Audyssey MultEQ XT, for THX Ultra certification, for its HQV Reon-VX50 video processor, and for 66% discount (amazing value).
As an aside; when a receiver is THX Ultra certified it means that it can produce 105dB in rooms of up to 3,000 cubic feet, can drive speakers down to 3.2Ω loads, and had been submitted to hundreds of tests including the preamp section.
The Onkyo 818 has one very important advantage; Audyssey MultEQ XT32.
And more advanced dual-core video processing.
Its weight is less @ 40 pounds, it's transformer is smaller, it has two power transistors per channel, its two main caps are rated & 15,000uF each (I believe).
It is a newer receiver so it has all the streaming features with USB and Ethernet ports.
And! It only cost $699 brand new! ...It is also THX Select2 Plus certified.
Add an Emotiva power amp (two or five channels) to it (for more power), and you are in the neighborhood of roughly $1,199 (everything brand new with full warranty).
This is for home theater. If you want quality stereo music only get a JOB225 power amp with a JOB preamp, for roughly $4,000 and you can play with the big boys with stereo systems costing up to $50,000.
Up to a certain point, with wisdom, knowledge, you get what you pay for.
But there is always better, and better deals yet.
How much do you value your life's happiness? 🙂
Emotiva SSPs have Emo 1 and 2 room correction and EQ, but not properly implemented.
The best is not to use them and use the manual parametric EQ of the UMC-200 instead.
As an analog preamp, most people like the sound better than most receivers.
And that's good value if you're going to use it as so, because $500 is cheap.
Methinks for most common mortals with regular set of ears and normal bank accounts,
a receiver with a good room EQ system (Audyssey, ARC, Trinnov), mated with some Emotiva amps is a good alternative.
Pick your features in the receiver, and the power in separates; all affordable.
But! Like I said before, some Onkyo receivers have true power in them, with a big transformer, three more smaller ones for the audio and video sections, a solid heatsink, four power transistors per channel, solid copper bus bars, weigh over 55 pounds, and cost near $500. The main caps are 18,000 or 22,000uF times two.
The amp section is high current design with 60-65 amps peak.
Plus they have Audyssey MultEQ XT, THX Ultra2 Plus and ISF certification. ...Of course I'm talking second-hand ones.
If you want just ask, and I'll post some pictures of their internals.
* Our Frenchman member here opened his Onkyo TX-NR905 and made some measurements, from the digital section. He did not like them measurements, fair enough.
But he bought it for his home theater, for the gobs of power, for Audyssey MultEQ XT, for THX Ultra certification, for its HQV Reon-VX50 video processor, and for 66% discount (amazing value).
As an aside; when a receiver is THX Ultra certified it means that it can produce 105dB in rooms of up to 3,000 cubic feet, can drive speakers down to 3.2Ω loads, and had been submitted to hundreds of tests including the preamp section.
The Onkyo 818 has one very important advantage; Audyssey MultEQ XT32.
And more advanced dual-core video processing.
Its weight is less @ 40 pounds, it's transformer is smaller, it has two power transistors per channel, its two main caps are rated & 15,000uF each (I believe).
It is a newer receiver so it has all the streaming features with USB and Ethernet ports.
And! It only cost $699 brand new! ...It is also THX Select2 Plus certified.
Add an Emotiva power amp (two or five channels) to it (for more power), and you are in the neighborhood of roughly $1,199 (everything brand new with full warranty).
This is for home theater. If you want quality stereo music only get a JOB225 power amp with a JOB preamp, for roughly $4,000 and you can play with the big boys with stereo systems costing up to $50,000.
Up to a certain point, with wisdom, knowledge, you get what you pay for.
But there is always better, and better deals yet.
How much do you value your life's happiness? 🙂
Last edited:
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So what we want to see now are some of the competent, but low cost, receivers being produced with pre-outs. I believe Yamaha is now doing this ?
For my Pioneer, I need to add a socket or two at the back and wire it up to the signal after it leaves the MUX/volume chip and I should be good-to-go too - just not sure how long a cable that chip can drive but I don't need a long cable.
Yammer RX-A840 is the lowest of the new line that has pre outs 849.95
Last years RX-A830 on Amazon for 599.95.
Last years RX-A830 on Amazon for 599.95.
Least expensive Yamaha with pre out.
Last year: RX-V775
This year: RX-V777
I bought the RX-V775 that seem to work well.
Last year: RX-V775
This year: RX-V777
I bought the RX-V775 that seem to work well.
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I don't see myself buying a new receiver just to get the pre-outs. Contrast $600+ for a new receiver against the cost of a drill bit, 5 RCA connectors and some wire. For short cables this should be fine; of course long cables needs a proper line driver/buffer but even then it ain't a big deal to whip something up.
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Well, I decided to go in an hack my HT receiver to improve the amplifier performance.
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/solid-state/230403-tgm6-amplifier-7-channels.html#post4199133 (start at post 13)
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/solid-state/230403-tgm6-amplifier-7-channels.html#post4199133 (start at post 13)
Here's an interesting blog post with HTR DAC measurements that had me thinking of this thread.
Harmonic distortion on the TX-NR1009, while unlikely to be audible, seems quite pathetic for a modern DAC. A 2nd harmonic at -70 dB is not exactly what I'd call state of the art performance...
Harmonic distortion on the TX-NR1009, while unlikely to be audible, seems quite pathetic for a modern DAC. A 2nd harmonic at -70 dB is not exactly what I'd call state of the art performance...
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