2. home-theater
  3. 181212-178689

Reliable Mid-Priced 7.2 Channel Receiver

We're near move-in to a new home, sold the ancient Onkyo 5.1 receiver and am looking at 7.2 channel new options.  I was looking at the Denon S960H, generally seems good power and currently down to $599, plus $50 coupon.

The bad news...reading reviews.  I look at the 1 & 2-stars (of 5) reviews on Amazon and Best Buy and it gets scary...lots of issues.  So I looked at Yamaha (next) and Sony and Pioneer in that price range.   Almost all have numerous, serious complaints, some also poor customer support.

This will be used in the main room with 75" tv (streaming), Blu-Ray and old CD player.  I would love to use it as the source selector (is that ARC?) but if an issue I would usually use just the TV sound, and if source selection became an issue, just send the sound to the receiver via optical and turn on the receiver sound / source manually as I did with the old Onkyo.

So, I am most interested in how to select a reliable 7.2 receiver in my price range.  Perhaps best to order with a place with good return policy, like Best Buy, versus some random Amazon provider?

All input is most appreciated.

Paul

peahrens
alucard19
363 posts
 

Spend the extra money and buy the Anthem MRX 540 or MRX740 AVR you will be happy you spent the extra money.

sgreg1
612 posts
 

Have a Pioneer that plays every day for over 15 years. Sounds great snd never any issues at all. It is class D amp and I do not use for two channel. My two channel is its own system!

peahrens OP
1 posts
 

Thanks for the comments, everyone. Regarding questions raised, I plan not to exceed $700. I have a better setup in the den / movie room. The living room setup would use the 7.2 Denon S960H, with 5 speakers there, plus 2nd zone of 2 on the patio. The living room speakers are B&W towers and center, plus some Polk 8" ceiling speakers behind the sofa. I would like to use the receiver as the source selector, to use the 5.1 aspect watching TV, hoping the switching will work properly with a new Samsung TV. I only would use the TV speakers for normal TV watching (e.g., news) if the switching using the Denon remote did not work properly. If that problem occurs, I would have to separately start the TV, plus the Denon, messing with 2 remotes (e.g., for movie, sports, concert, etc.). Or find my Harmony remote and see if that accomplishes what is needed.  I would love to have the Denon remote be all I need to watch TV or play a Blu-Ray. I think I will order the Denon S960H, at only $549 with the coupon.

mahler123
3,359 posts
 

I know that you specified your budget, but the build quality and reliability might be better in the 1K range.  My advice would be to look for a bargain in the used markets.  AVRs generally don’t have high resale value.  If you get something cheap and it goes bad after a couple of years it won’t sting as much

kota1
2,706 posts
 

Congrats. the Denon has a lot of nice features and they are reliable. You may want to consider an after market power cord with any budget you have left, maybe Pangea or Signal cable for around $100.

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