Best AV processors for under $10K


Looking for AV processor that takes care of best of both worlds (audiophile 2 channel and multichannel for movies). I have used Bryston SP2.0 and loved it's two channel sound but it is outdated for video. Classe SSP800 is one option but would like to hear what other options are out there. Also, internal DAC must be top notch for 2 channel.
urfi
Dbphd wrote:
As I understand it, DSD does not convey information for bass management; you need to convert to LPCM if you want bass management.
No format conveys information about bass management. Some have an LFE channel but that's not bass management.
Kal, what is bass management? Are you saying the sub is only activated by LFE? What's the role of crossover? I thought when you set a crossover frequency in the Oppo menu, frequencies below the crossover would be sent to the SW output with LPCM conversion but not if the signal is maintained as DSD. With digital output, presumably setting a crossover in the processor menu sends frequencies below the crossover to the sub output of the processor. I've seen few 2.1 or 5.1 SACDs with an explicit LF channel. So please inform us. What is bass management?

db
metn
You have a number of excellent choices:

Cary Cinema 12 around $5k comes with 32bit dacs and sounds fantastic very musical

Bryston SP 3 around $9.5k is the newer better version of what you have.

Anthem Statment D2V still great sounding, outstanding room correction and video processing, $8.5k
Dbphd - I am no expert, but here goes anyway. Corrections welcome.

Bass management is just what you think it is. It simply separates the frequencies into separate channels, as you describe. If you set your mains to crossover at 80hz, the frequencies below 80 go to the sub and those above 80 go to the mains.

The issue Kal is addressing is where that frequency information is contained in a digital signal. Each digital signal for a given channel is just a single amplitude number (usually a 16 bit number), with 44,100 of these numbers per second for CDs or 48,000 (and some 96,000) for Blu Ray sound tracks. Each individual number does not have a frequency associated with it. The frequency information comes when analyzing a series of these digital numbers. You can mathematically determine the frequency of a set of LCPM numbers by doing a mathematical transformation of the numbers. The digital filter in the receiver/player does these calculations and reconstructs the digital signal in such a way as to remove the low freqencies from the digital signal for the mains and add it to the subwoofer digital signal. All of this is done on the digital data, before it is converted to analog.

There are chips available that do these conversions for LPCM signals. The manufacturer just selects which one to use or has a special one made for them. The different "filters" that are available in some DACS, for example, as just different designs of these digital filters, somewhat like the different analog crossover designs found in speakers.

Similarly,time delays can be added in the digital data to account for the distance of the listener from the speakers and room correction can added.

Similar chips are not generally available for DSD signals, which consist of 1 bit of data, but at 2.8 MHz (2,822,000 samples per second), or 64 times as fast as CD (44.1 KHz) signals. (128 DSD is also becoming available) To do bass management, time delay and room correction on DSD signals they are typically converted to LPCM signals, usually at 88,200 samples per second, and then standard LPCM digital filter chips can be used.

As far as I know, there is no inherit reason, other than maybe computational speed, why a digital filter could not be developed for DSD signals. When SACD was initially designed by Sony they did not develop such a chip and assumed people would just send the full signal to each speaker. Of course, in the mastering, some of the low frequencies were already moved to the subwoofer channel. So, it was up to the mastering engineer to do any bass management.

Many DSD users are purist, who think that changing the signal to LPCM degrades the sound. Jdub39, on the other hand, thinks the 8801 bass management and room correction is a great improvement over the straight DSD sound.

That is a long winded overview. Fortunately, there are lot of very good engineers who can make all this magic happen. The mathematics of it is pretty complicated.

Hope I got most of that correct.
03-09-13: Dbphd
Kal, what is bass management? Are you saying the sub is only activated by LFE? What's the role of crossover? I thought when you set a crossover frequency in the Oppo menu, frequencies below the crossover would be sent to the SW output with LPCM conversion but not if the signal is maintained as DSD. With digital output, presumably setting a crossover in the processor menu sends frequencies below the crossover to the sub output of the processor.
You are confusing the issue. If you set up bass management in the Oppo, you have added it to the PCM signals and the processor cannot distinguish what is LFE and what is rerouted bass.

I've seen few 2.1 or 5.1 SACDs with an explicit LF channel. So please inform us. What is bass management?
The .1 in 5.1/2.1/etc. is LFE. It has nothing to do with bass management. LFE is a distinct channel. Bass management is a process which you describe above and is independent of LFE (although both come out of the subwoofer). Both 5.0 and 5.1 recordings can be bass managed although only the latter has an LFE channel.