DD 5.1, Yamaha

No DTS, low power ratings

I bought this amp on clearance. It was an impulse buy. I was actually going to look at the Sony str-de545 and 845. I saw this one sitting in the middle of the floor and thought about it real hard. I went and got my vcr player and came back to think about the amp some more. I didn't want to get it because it was only rated at 60 watts per channel and it didn't have a dts decoder. I thought about it a minute or 2 more, and thought it would be worth it for half the price of one that did. I made sure it wasn't an open item or refurb and then decided to get one.

I got it home and hooked up and was surprised. It sounded good. Not much bass response though. Read through the manual and found the Bass out to SW, Both, or MAIN function. Tried playing with that some, no change. Through my own testing I found that only works when the mains are set to small speakers. I thought maybe it could be the speakers. They are pretty old anyways. I got a new pair of speakers, was planning on it anyways. I got the Wharfedale Modus 8's. They sound incredible with this amp. The bass response now is about 5 times what it was, seriously .. no BS there. It made that much difference. I now have to turn the bass knob down some. I turned it up with both speakers. There is only a hint of distortion once it gets almost halfway up. Nothing to bad, but it is noticeable. Yamaha recommends not going past the half way point so I didn't go that far. It was still more than enough to fill up my apartment with sound (with the new or old speakers).

The video part works as it should I think. Overall I think it is a good amp. I was almost expecting the video to not be in synch with the audio if I used the a/v ports on the reciever. This was not the case, which I am thankful for since my dvd player goes through the reciever into the vcr on to the tv.

I am pleased with the amp. I would still like to upgrade. I thought it would be a good starter reciever though given the price and features.

Great sound with plenty of power. Getting everything hooked up was very easy. The tone controls on the front of the unit are nice: They are more intuitive than electronic/digital tone controls.

The remote isn't very good. Yes it's preprogrammed to control many components, but what's the deal with making it soo small with somewhat hard to read labels? The button lay-out isn't too great either.

I bought this receiver for my parents to go with some Klipsch Quintet speakers so that they'd have a nice small surround sound system. What partially led me to this receiver was that I had a Sony receiver (my first receiver) that broke down on me 4 times from Best Buy. Their policy states that if a product has to be brought in 4 times for repair, then they'd replace the product. Yamaha is probably the best brand BB carries so I picked up the 5230 and a CD and I was out the door. I would've liked to have kept the receiver for my bedroom, but I thought my parents would enjoy it more, especially since I already have plenty of audio gear. After my little brother and I got everything hooked up we threw in Jurassic Park (VHS). The sound was great! I was quite impressed. The sound is very detailed and spacious. A little bright but I suspect the brightness to go away after the receiver and speakers are broken in. My HT system which consists of a Denon AVR 3300 and NHT Super 2s, Super Center, and the HDP-2 surrounds is better, but my system also cost about 8x more. However, I think if I had my parents new system, I would be pretty satisfied. Those little Quintet speakers can really belt out some big distortion-free sound, with the help of a sub for the lows. Now when I go to see my parents I can stand to actually watch/listen to movies at their place without wanting to run home to my system. VHS sounded very good, but I think my brothers and I will have to chip-in and get them a DVD player for X-mas. That shound sound great.

I don't find there to be any weaknesses in this price range other than the remote. The similarly priced Kenwoods might have more inputs etc, but they don't have full-bandwidth sound to all 5 channels (20hz-20khz). No S video, but I think video signals should go straight to the TV for the best results anyway.

If you're shopping in the $300 range for a receiver, keep an eye out for this one. If I didn't have to limit my options to BB, I would've also looked at Denon, Marantz, and Onkyo. Getting the Yamaha was kind of a no-brainer given what BB offers.

Overall, I'm satisfied with the receiver and I expect it to bring the family together every now and then for some good movie watching fun.

Value rating is high because I think for $300 this is a very good receiver.

Overall I give it a 3. I know it seems low, but this is on an absolute scale, competing with the top-of-the-line from every manufacturer.

Similar Products Used:

Denon, Onkyo, Sony, Nakamichi etc.

Sound quality

None yet

I purchased the YHT-17 box which includes 5 small satellite speakers and a powered sub. This is my first real audio system and I am quite impressed with the quality of it. The system currently is hooked up to my computer with optical for my 5.1 channel DVD enjoyment. As for my gaming I connect the front and rear analog output from my four-point soundcard to the external decoder input. The box of stuff cost $375 and $45 shipping online for a total of $420. I'm sure that the speakers could use an upgrade, but I should save for a car and college first!

Similar Products Used:

None

Quality, Price, Power (70 watts, seriously under-rated)

Remote, Not enough digital inputs (I want one more)

My old Sony STR-615 is 186 Watts, and the new Yamaha is only 70 Watts (someone measured wrong or something). Guess what, the yamaha is 5x more powerful to my ears with the same speakers in the same room. I have 2 4ohm Marantz speakers, 2 generic 12" speakers from an old organ, 2 small Koss speakers, and 2 old generic brown speakers, hooked up with the configuration below.

The yamaha sounds like a device with more life as well. The sony had dolby mode, but the rear channels were choppy, and it sounded decent as a mix, but not very well if you were closer to one speaker. I love the quality of this reciever, especially for the price. Check out my configuration and email me any ideas for affordable ways to improve my home theater configuration.


Room Configuration:
____________________________________________________
(3) (3) |
(1)(2) (TV) (Yamaha) (2)(1) |
|
|
|
|
___|
| |
(ME) | |
(4)___________________________________________(4)|__|

(1)=Marantz (3 way 300w 4ohm, on floor stands)
(2)=Generic 12" (4ohm Facing the floor to shake the foundation)
(3)=Koss (4ohm each - Center Channel)
(4)=Generic Rears (8ohm)

(1) and (2) are connected in series on main speakers A, one of each on left, and one of each on right (4ohm+4ohm = 8ohm)

(3) Koss speakers are connected in series as center channels up towards the cieling (4ohm+4ohm = 8ohm)

(4) are connected independently to left and right terminals because they are already 8ohm's each

And i still have terminals for Main B on the reciever, the marantz speakers don't have good acoustics, so maybe some speakers to hook up in addition can help with that?

- Email suggestions to: rjsoderlund@hotmail.com

Thx

Similar Products Used:

Sony STR-615

Good power - low distortion - beautiful surround.

None observed yet. Remote takes time to learn.

After my Onkyo reciever went up in smoke I finally had to move on to an A/V system.Using the reviews in Audioreview I believe I made a very good decision.Forget what some other reviewers have said about bass response,believe me there is PLENTY of bass. I am sure that it has a lot to do with the
speakers ( I have an old pair of Advents that people are just amazed by).I compared the sound side by side with a similar priced Sony unit and the two didn't even come close in sound quality (there are many adjustments on both units and maybe they wern't configured the same. Whatever the case I bought the Yamaha. It is a clean unit, I couldn't be more satisfied.You couldn't have afforded this sound quality ten years ago.

Similar Products Used:

Onkyo,Sony

Un flattering orange display. analog treble and bass adjust. cheasy antenna hook up.

I've had this natural sound A/V reciever for a few weeks now and I'm very impressed. I sold my Sony 445 for $85 and got this for my birthday. Sound is very punctual and real clear. Good sound imaging in stereo mode. The thing that really suprised me about this unit is it's DSP sound environment. Usually, I'd assume these to be bantha fodder but they're quite far from it. I use rock music and Disco settings quite often along with standard stereo. I listen to a lot of music through this. It has a lot of customizable settings for dsp's and additional options that really help out at times. Also heavy duty speaker connects for the mains but less than stellar connects for the center and surround connects. The Disco mode seems to take regular stereo sound and then envelope it around you from the front. Set the rear speaker delay to one and it sounds quite good once correctly configured. Anoter really really really cool feature is Background Video Mode. You can watch one of the three video outs or t.v. and choose to listen to any audio in while you watch something else. Here's an example. I'll play Dreamcast while listening to music from my dvd player. You can't listen to optical audio with this feature because it's only analog on the audio only in's. Yamaha has patents on their dsp's and the tri-field dsp's. I don't know about those. Most of the time I use Standard Digital audio or maybe Yamaha's expanded Digital or Pro Logic for decoding digital audio from dvd's. I run a Sega Dreamcast, a Phillips DVD player, a cheap 4 head vcr and my television sound through the reciever. The yamaha has been up for each of those components and done very well. THD is really low on this unit too. %0.06 or something. barely any hiss from speakers like my old sony had. I use 16 awg speaker wire to my center channel and mains and 22 awg speaker wire to rear speakers. Design Acoustics PS-24 center. Pioneer 3-way bookshelf loud speakers for mains and little Sony 2 way bookshelf speakers for the surrounds. Monster Cable digital audio transfer. Digital bass and treble adjust would have been nice but not a big deal. The remote is quite narrow and slighltly difficult to learn and to operate. But you can program it to all of your compnonents too. That's been real nice for me. This reciever is real good for music and movies in that oreder. For the price now 250, that's not a lotta skrilla for all that you get with this. I'ts out of production now, that's why. It is a very big unit too. Not bad just true.

Similar Products Used:

Sony STRD-445(piece of fucking shit!!) Sony is lost when it comes to audio.

- Price
- Various music and HT mode

- None at this price

For a casual listener like myself, its a great product. Its fun to try different settings like Sci-Fi and Adventure mode for home movie and Jazz and Concert Hall mode for music listening. It adds more flavor to the sound. If you don't have kick @$$ speakers, why spend money on a kick @$$ receiver? It won't be compatable. I have a set of decent consumer grade speakers and this receiver does the job well.

Similar Products Used:

None

Easy to set up, nice sound, plenty of power, simple but effective remote

none so far

For the money, you cannot find a better and more reliable reciever than the ones built by Yamaha. I had my original reciever for 12 years, and it still works like the day I bought it. As far as this reciever, and cannot say anything bad at all about it. Easy to use, simple and sounds great. I have also had other HT recievers in the past that would have absolutely no bass sound if you didn't have a sub woofer attached to it, but with the HTR 5230 there is enough bass if you have efficient enough speakers attached.

A super reciever for the buck!!

Similar Products Used:

Denon, Yamaha, Klipsch Speakers, PSB Speakers

Great sound and power for $115!. A steal. Seems more powerful than my old 5 X 100 watt Sony. Easy to install. Switches for two sets of main speakers. Dolby Digital, Prologic, etc.

None so far. Doesn't have DTS.

How can they sell it this cheap?

Similar Products Used:

Sony...345

Very good sound for the price. easy to setup , A solid 60 watts per channel, Very reliable never had a problem

No DTS

This Receiever belonged to my roomate. Worked well until we could upgrade to seperates. Unit very easy to setup and use. Worked well with my Phase Technology 10.5 speakers since they had a built in 100 watt amp for the 10 inch woofer in them , the receiever only powered the mid and highs.. Recently upgraded to Harman Kardon AVR-210 witch is a nicer unit but costs $600.00 so that is kind of a apples to oranges comparison. Hooked up the pre amp outs to a Acurus 100x3 amp. to run the front three channels of the home theater setup I have.. But back to the Yamaha unit for $250.00 you can't beat it.! I would recommend it to anyone starting up a home theater set-up that don't care about not having DTS.

Similar Products Used:

Pioneer, Sony, Harmon Kardon AVR-210