|
Scott C Unregistered guest | I have been shopping for an HT receiver and doing a lot of homework online. I am considering Denon and Yamaha, but I recently came across a closeout on the Harmon Kardon AVR 7200. I am also considering the Yamaha RX-V1400 and the Denon AVR-3803. The AVR-3805 sounded interesting, but not worth the price difference over one of the others, and then having to pay extra for the setup mic. Also, I have been reading about problems with the new remote and that doesn't sound encouraging. Any suggestions regarding the other units mentioned above? The HK sounds like a good deal if I start remodeling my component rack now so that the 21 inch deep case will have room when it gets here. What about the Denon AVR-3803? I am using Infinity RS5b mains (1980's vintage with EMIT tweeters), an Infinity CC3 center channel, and Infinity RS2000's in the rear. Note: The 5b's are 6 ohm if that makes any difference. HK tech support says that I can use them with the AVR 7200 even though it specifies 8 ohm speakers. I use the system about 50/50 between music and DVDs. Any suggestions will be appreciated. Thanks. |
|
Silver Member Username: Elitefan1Post Number: 477 Registered: Dec-03 | If the 7200 has enough inputs for you[only6] then buy it. It will blow away the Denon or Yamaha. Much more powerful and much warmer than the others. This was a $2000 unit when new. One of the truely awesome receivers of recent years. |
|
Silver Member Username: LandrovalPost Number: 345 Registered: Feb-04 | The H/K AVR7200 is in a class of it's own, it's amp section is so good that it could be found in receivers many times more expensive, dual toroidial transformers etc. It has also some nice features and it's quite logical to use. I would get one if I could, no euro models available so I have to find other options. The Denon 3803 is kinda weak with it's 5*50w continuous power and a bit brigth sounding. I didn't like the Yamaha either, it needs to be paired with warm and full sounding speakers to work well. Nice set of features though. |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | That is the way I have been leaning. Lots of bells and whistles on some of the other models, but the HK seems like more brute horsepower. I will download the user guide and get into more detail on connections.If it looks like this unit would integrate well into my system, I will probably order it and get out the Skil saw. Thanks, Scott |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | That is the way I have been leaning. Lots of bells and whistles on some of the other models, but the HK seems like more brute horsepower. I will download the user guide and get into more detail on connections.If it looks like this unit would integrate well into my system, I will probably order it and get out the Skil saw. Thanks, Scott |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | Sorry for the double post. It was very slow uploading and I did not think it had posted. |
|
Silver Member Username: HawkHighlands Ranch, CO USA Post Number: 610 Registered: Dec-03 | Scott: Any discussion of which receiver (amp) to buy is fruitless without a thorough evaluation of the speakers. I would love to give you my thoughts, but I don't know your Infinity speakers. What I can tell you is that simply comparing the receivers, I believe the H/K is far better than the Denon. I had the Denon 3803 and it did not have nearly the power that they claim--I found the sound somewhat lacking in soundstage depth. I have since replaced it with an NAD receiver. Nevertheless, it may be the better receiver for your speakers. I would strongly suggest that you take a pair of your speakers to a local dealer where you can plug them in to either the Denon or H/K and listen for yourself. Most good specialty audio stores will let you do this when they are not busy. since both receivers are discontinued, you can still listen to their successor models and the sound will be the same. The amp section on the Denon 3805 is no different than the 3803, so that one will be easy. I am not sure, but I believe the replacement model for the H/K 7200 is the 630. So, I would strongly suggest you take a pair of your speakers and some good CDs you know very well to a good local dealer and listen for yourself. That will tell you far more than what any of us can tell you. Good luck! |
|
New member Username: OmegagenPost Number: 4 Registered: Jun-04 | Well after countless hours of forum research I decided to go with the H/K 7200. It will drive my NHT speaker system which consists of: Fronts: VT-1A(towers), Center: 1.1C, side effects: SuperZero's and Rears: SB-1's. I received the unit Monday from Onecall at what I felt like was a steal $832! It hasn't been hooked up yet as I am having my FROG retrofitted to a home theatre room by professionals. They should have it all complete tomorrow. They will calibrate the audio and my TV. I cant' wait!!! Do you all think the NHT's will "mate" well with the H/K? |
|
New member Username: OmegagenPost Number: 5 Registered: Jun-04 | Well after countless hours of forum research I decided to go with the H/K 7200. It will drive my NHT speaker system which consists of: Fronts: VT-1A(towers), Center: 1.1C, side effects: SuperZero's and Rears: SB-1's. I received the unit Monday from Onecall at what I felt like was a steal $832! It hasn't been hooked up yet as I am having my FROG retrofitted to a home theatre room by professionals. They should have it all complete tomorrow. They will calibrate the audio and my TV. I cant' wait!!! Do you all think the NHT's will "mate" well with the H/K? |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | I was about to order the H-K AVR7200 from OneCall when I got the following e-mail from HK tech support: < Good afternoon and thank you for your inquiry. The AVR7200 receiver is designed to work best with speakers rated at 8 ohms. All Harman Kardon Audio/Video receivers can handle MOST 4 and 6 ohm speakers on the market today. However, there are some manufacturers' speakers that have a minimum impedance WELL BELOW the 4 and 6 ohm nominal impedance, when being fed a signal. In this situation, the receiver will protect itself by shutting down, and going into standby mode. This will not damage the speakers or the electronics, but it is an indication that the speaker in question is not compatible with our receiver. *Note: The continued use of the receiver with speakers that cause it to shut down can result in eventual failure of the receiver, which is not covered by the warranty.* The reason why we state this is in case someone has a problem, in which their receiver shuts down, the website explains that the receivers can and will shut down. The HK receiver will work with these speakers connected, as long as the volume is not raised to a high level, for extended periods of time. If so, there is a good chance that, over time, the receiver may start to fail, due to being "overworked" by these speakers.> Translation: If they work, fine. If not, you are on your own. A local dealer carries Yamaha and Denon. They have a Yamaha RX-V2400 and a Denon AVR-3803 set up as in-store demos. They are usually willing to let equipment out for in-home demo. I think I will check with them tomorrow to see if I can try each of them with my Infinity speakers. I assume that the results of such a test should give me a good idea what the Yamaha RX-V1400 and the Denon AVR-3805 should sound like with the same speakers. Thanks for the replies to date. Scott |
|
Silver Member Username: HawkHighlands Ranch, CO USA Post Number: 611 Registered: Dec-03 | Scott: I think you are reading too much into the message from H/K. Frankly, it has ben my experience that the H/K is far more able to handle low impedence speakers than either Denon or yamaha, especially the 7200. Denon is a pretty funny bunch in this regard, where if you go to the owners manual for the 04 and 05 models, they will specify the receivers power down to 4 ohms. What they don't tell you is that is for one channel only! Instead, look on the back of the receiver near the speaker binding posts, and it will tell you what load the amp is specified to handle. Typically, it is 6-8 ohms, but if you hook up more than two speakers, it will say (typically) 8 ohms only. But, the real key here is what can the power supply and the output transistors tolerate, temperature wise (lower impedence speakers will tax these components more and will result in generation of more heat). The H/K 7200 is a very nice unit that is, in the industry's parlance "over-built." That is, the quality of the components is higher than it needs to be for the specifications. That is certainly not the case with either Denon or Yamaha's mid-level units. If low impedence speakers are a concern here, you should be looking at an NAD. It is the only sub-$1000 receiver I know of that is specified to handle 4 ohm speakers (specified down to 2 ohms!). Mine has been a real champ, getting abused by my twelve year old, yet, it drives a full 5.1 Dynaudio Audience system, all of which are spec'ed at 4 ohms and the minimum impedence is as low as 3.4 ohms. Yet, it exhibits no complaints and the sound is absolutely superb--far superior to my Denon 3803. About a year ago, we had someone on this forum who had purchased Polk LSis, which are rated at 4 ohms. He wrote Polk to ask what would work with his LSis and Polk responded with five brands as I recall, and only two brands offered receivers: B & K and NAD. The rest, like Adcom only offered separates. Speaker manufacturers who offer 4 ohm rated speakers fully expect you to bypass receivers for separates as few receivers (other than NAD and B & K) do a satisfactory job with a 4 ohm load. I know the top of the line Yamaha has no trouble, but it runs three large, so you may as well get seperates at that price. |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | From Harmon Kardon's message: "The HK receiver will work with these speakers connected, as long as the volume is not raised to a high level, for extended periods of time." This may well be the "out" as far as running 6 ohm speakers. My concept of a high listening level is probably far below the level referred to in the "CYA" reply that I received from H/K. The "extended periods of time" would be determined by how long my wife is out of the house. I would love to audition several receivers at home with my speakers in my audio environment, but this would be limited to a couple of receivers available locally. The RS5b's are too large to haul to a dealer and set up. At any rate, the only H/K dealers listed anywhere near here are Circuit City and they do not carry this level of merchandise. It would still come down to mail order on the AVR7200 (in which case it is yours whether you are happy with it or not), or an in-home trial with the Denon or Yamaha. Sure was an easier decision when my last receiver died and I picked up a display model Sony (no comments please!) from Sears (see previous note) for $160 as a temporary measure until I got around to researching this purchase. |
|
Silver Member Username: LandrovalPost Number: 347 Registered: Feb-04 | Hawk, the replacing model for 7200 is the 7300. Scott, compare the power to 4ohms with Denon, Yam and H/K you will definitely see whats happening. The 7200 was measured a nice 5x142W to 8ohms or 1x332W to 4ohms and other 7x00 models have easily been 5x~200W to 4ohms. Good nice power and stable even to lower impedances. On the other hand the 3803 dont do so well, 5x25W to 4ohms is not what you want. The Yamaha is something in between with 5x~100W to 4ohms but it's sound migth not be what you want. http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/article.asp?print_page=y§ion_id=5&article_i d=450&page_number=3&preview= http://www.homecinemachoice.com/reviews/hccreviews/Amplifiers/Denon/DenonAVR-380 3.php |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | I just ordered the AVR7200 from OneCall. Online price showed $837. I clicked on their "PASS" link and entered my address and e-mail because it said that joining this program would give me an additional 1% off of my purchase and double the defective return window to 30 days. When I added the receiver to the shopping cart, it showed me logged in as a PASS member and reduced the price to $799 plus shipping. That is only $80 more than the local dealer had quoted me on a Yamaha RX-V1400. You can also get interest free financing until September, 2005. Hard deal to beat. It should be here Wednesday. I will get it set up over the weekend and check back here next week. Thanks again for all the help. Scott |
|
Silver Member Username: Elitefan1Post Number: 485 Registered: Dec-03 | Scott, Congratulations on the purchase of a really awesome receiver. $799 for the 7200 is a real steal and I look forward to your update. Good job! |
|
New member Username: OmegagenPost Number: 6 Registered: Jun-04 | All my NHT's are 8 omh, so I look foward to experiencing great sound from my H/K & NHT combination. Scott, I too, got the 7200 for $799! Kinda foolish to pass on a deal like that IMHO! Joe |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | That last few dollars off was not a deciding factor since I was not aware of it until checkout, but it does qualify as icing on the cake. Joe, let me know how yours works out while I am waiting on mine. |
|
Scott C Unregistered guest | Ever sen a grown (FedEx) man cry? I left a note on the front door to leave the receiver on the front porch. I was working at home and in and out of the back door and didn't want to miss him. The doorbell rang and there he stood with nothing in his hands but the scanner they use to track the packages. He had his truck backed up to my garage door and wanted to know if I would open the garage door so that he could set it off of the back of the truck. I shared his pain as I carried it inside the house, downstairs to the den, got it unpacked and set up onto the shelf in the stereo rack. This thing was double boxed and the shipping cartons weighed 12# empty! First impressions: (1) WOW! What a difference. Obviously, for the money spent, I was expecting a big improvement, but so far, it has exceeded my expectations. (2) I have tweeters in my rear speakers! As I said before, the Yamaha R-8 that I had before this receiver was nice and I was happy with it until it's demise, but I never heard anywhere near the detail that comes through now in all channels. Never before have I had any receiver or radio that I could run without tone controls and be happy with the sound. I am running this one flat. (3) The bass management is phenominal. Adjustable crossover points for each set of speakers and different settings stored for each input. (4) I had planned to use the second room feature to run a small set of speakers close to the listening position for late night listening after the rest of the family goes to bed, but the night listening feature included on the 7200 works great for this. (5) The only downside so far: The 7200 is said to be able to decode MP3 files and play them directly. In the manual, it states that it may not be able to handle MP3 files encoded at 128 kb/s and above. This would render the MP3 capability totally useless since 128k is an absolute minimum and, if I was going to set up a hard drive based storage for music for this system to play back, it would have all 320k files. No real problem. I need to buy a new DVD player real soon, so I will be sure to select one that will decode the MP3's properly. Just thought I would mention it since this is one of the very few shortcomings I have encountered so far. By the way, the 7200 does fit (barely!) in my stereo rack, although I will have to modify the removeable access panel in the rear to clear the cables and provide ventilation. I adjusted the shelves and have 4.5" above and 3" on each side. There should be about 3" behind after the modification. Right now, I have the panel removed. This was really a close fit. I will post again if anything new or unexpected surfaces, but so far, I am perfectly happy and satisfied that I made the right decision in purchasing this receiver.Many thanks to all who replied to my original post. Your input was very helpful. Scott |