Price Paid:  $30.00 from buy.com

Summary:
For the incredible price I paid ($30, after a $50 Yamaha rebate), this is a great product. The buy of the century! It has nice features and appears to work as advertised. It looks great. But like anything, it does have some drawbacks. (Also, my ATI All-in-Wonder card *requires* 2 connections to an analog sound card, so I can't replace my Sound Blaster anyway, greatly reducing the value of the Yamaha in my setup.)

Strengths:
Great looks, nice front-panel layout, good power, good sound quality. Comes with a USB cable. Nice tuner features. Lots of inputs. Under Windows XP, you don't need (or want!) to use Yamaha's old drivers -- but Microsoft's work fine and get installed automatically when you connect the unit. Incredible bargain that I got.

Weaknesses:
Its special controller application will NOT work under Windows XP, at least for me, thus depriving me of some (minor) control over features that are unavailable via the front panel. (I've heard that other people have gotten it to work.) The unit, though very nice looking, is surprisingly large and heavy. Yamaha's software has not been updated since 1999 and is apparently not available online. I wish the device supported multiple USB inputs with switching, for use with multiple computers! (It does support switching among one USB & two analog sources, but that's not nearly as good.) The volume knob works for the speaker outputs but NOT for the line output, making it less convenient to use with the high-end powered speakers I already have. Connecting headphones does NOT mute the line out!

Similar Products Used:
N/A

Price Paid:  $125.00 from www.yamahamultimedia

Summary:
The RP-U100 is NOT a five-channel receiver as the description of the product states. It is a 2 channel stereo receiver with 30 watts per channel. It is very good looking and comes with it's own software that is compatible with any version of windows. This software controls the DSP effects, volume, input selection and turning it off or on. It is made to act as an external soundcard for a computer through a USB connection. Setup was easy. I have found it is the best product for me to connect my computer to my stereo. And the great thing is it has it's own amplifier, so i just connect my speakers to the back to get awesome souind from my mp3 collection and great sound for computer games! It has other inputs on the back, too. It also has optical in/out, digital out, and many line level in/outs. This means you can use it as a recording device! The RP-100 is 1 out of 4 of yamaha's external sound cards. It has the most stereo power, but no remote. The best model tehy make has surround sound, but less power to each channel. Right now I have one CD player connected to it, my computer, and a turntable to the digital in. I use PSB Alpha minis which are another incredible value. Check out PSB's line at www.psbspeakers.com. Another main reason I chose this was the fact is has a subwoofer output. To the I connected a Hsu Research VTF-2. The sound is Incredible, and i highly recommend looking at a powered subwoofer. 30 watts might not sound like much, but to bookshelf speakers, It plays louder than I have ever cared to listen or party to music.

Strengths:
Good amount of power for any 2-way bookshelf speaker. Lots of inputs. USB CONNECTION!!! Subwoofer output. Looks :) Good experience purchasing, talking to customer service.

Weaknesses:
A little distortion at high volume levels using analog inputs. Not noticeable over music anyway and even less of a problem using USB or digital inputs.

Similar Products Used:
1. www.stereo-link.com 2. Echo Indigo Which are both excellent, but are only 1 output to an existing stereo. The RP-U100 is a stereo and bridge combined!