Lots!

None for me!

That's right, you all know the story - guy buys 3300, guy loves 3300, 3300 turns on guy, guy has to break up with 3300. Not once, but twice! You'd think guy would fear 3300's parents and stay away from her cute bigger sister, 3801.
Well, guy figures what the heck, third time's a charm, right? RIGHT! This new chick is HOT!! (but not in an egg-frying way). I love this receiver! Let's face it, not everyone can plunk down five month's worth of house payments for high end seperates, but we all want a system we can come home to and feel good about firing up. This will give you that. I'm not going into all the details - the guys ahead of me have done that and done it well - I'm just gonna say that for the money, I haven't heard anything that touches this product!

P.S Jas - dude, are you for real?

Similar Products Used:

AVR3300 (yikes)

7 channel amplification, digital inputs namable, easy to set up.

remote, could be better

I am living life large with this reciever. Plenty of power plus the ability to run ES encoded movies without having to add a seperate amp for the rear is a plus. I upgraded from a sony strv 444es when it was recalled. The main problem I have with this is the remote. The sony was much easier to use, but I am planning to get the Denon rc8000 remote or the phillips pronto (it helps that I work for an electronics store and get employee purchase, oh yah?) Now all I need is an HDTV.

Panasonic 36 inch tv
Denon avr 3801
Boston Acoustics VR965 mains
" " VR920 center
" " VRS surround, surround back
Sunfire ARC sub (pounds)
Pioneer DV 333 dvd player (excellent for the price)

Similar Products Used:

kenwood, sony strv444es

Clear sound. Future proof

None identified yet

First things first: As the former owner of a 3300 I can only regret Denon waited so long to address all the negative issues surrounding this machine.

As stated my previous and first Denon experience involved model 3300, which after only three months of usage turned off constantly while watching movies on Dolby Digital (using only two channels!!!). After a couple of weeks of giving a chance to the receiver I got tired of dealing with the problem and contacted the Local Dealer which offer me to service the machine. This was unacceptable on a $1M item, so I requested a full credit to my card, which the dealer accepted after my continuous pressure. Needless to say this was a very negative incident for me. I started shopping for a replacement, but I missed the "musical" tone of Denon each time I made a comparison with the competitors on this game (i.e. Marantz 7K/8K, Yamaha 995/2095 and NAD to name a few). I got lucky to find another dealer on my area. I explained to them my concern on buying Denon again, but they guarantee that in a situation like that, they will be provide me with a new receiver. They went further as to assure me that in the eventuality something goes wrong with the equipment, they provide a temporary receiver while I wait for the new one, that's service!

Now on the 3801: I have only dealt with it for almost a week now. So far so good. My early experience has shown me that the 3801 starts where the 3300 finished in terms of musical abilities. Previously I felt that at least Denon receivers sound improved after the first month of continuous usage. If this is the trend, then I can only expect an EXCELLENT sound a couple of weeks from now. This is an astounding achievement for me since my first requisite is for the machine to SOUND FIRST CLASS before any other consideration.

As to the new features they only add to the great value this equipment represents. Currently you can not find a receiver with 7 channels of equal power at this price range ($1,099), not to say 7 Channel Stereo, DTS ES/Neo, Dolby 6.1, etc. etc. etc. People could argue why they include formats that may not be accepted in the future. I reply to those people that the beauty of this model lies right there, as it becomes future proof in terms of possibilities. In addition the DTS Matrix/Dolby 6.1 could be used on movies not originally mastered on those formats.

Last but not least, The Big Question, Does it Overheats???? I left my 3801 running on Sunday for about 6.5 hours without any overheating problem, in the contrary I was amazed to find the equipment only warm all the time. I heard that Denon is using heat sinks rather than a fan in this model but I have not found if in fact this is actually the case (I can see the metal case where the fan was located in the 3300 but could not detect any fan sound). I think that one of the most attractive ingredients that separate this model from the 3300 and other competitors is the fact that it is built in JAPAN. This should enhance the reliability experience greatly.

In summary: Disclaimer - This is my opinion only!! This is the most refined receiver you can buy today in it's class, period. It grows on the 3300 strengths (Crystal Clear sound) and replaces the documented weaknesses (overheating/reliability). With it's list of features and formats you can anticipate that the 3801 will be up to date for a long time.

** I am currently waiting for an order of Meadowlark Kestrels to add to my system. These speakers are surely a hidden treasure (check Meadowlark page and see the reviews!). I auditioned them at a local dealer and in essence they provide a sound unheard of at their price range. This company has not got the exposure it deserves in terms of marketing, although this add to the mystique of the product and their efforts to do it well the first time.

Equipment recap:
Denon AVR 3801
Sony DVD Player 560D
Meadowlark Kestrels
Audioquest Coaxial Digital Cable YIQ-1
Tributaries SP4 Speaker Cable
Radio Shack S-Video Cable (Gold Plated)

Similar Products Used:

Denon 3300, Marantz 7M/8M, Yamaha 995/2095, NAD

Excellent Surround Sound-Dynamic and Clear.Well Built and solid construction. Built with the future in mind. 32 bit processing.

none

Excellent quality and oustanding seperation in the surround 5.1,6.1 and 7.1 modes. Very good on music with vibrant and energetic sound. The surround is as good as I have heard on any receiver at any price. I don't believe that anyone would regret the purchase of the 3801. It has definitely been built with the future in mind.

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha 995

Sound detail and clarity. Simple but still well executed setup. Improved remote over earlier models.

$1200 is about $200 too much. I've heard Denon will only repair units under warranty that are purchased from authorized dealers.

I purchased the AVR-3801 intending it to be an upgrade to my AVR-2600. Somewhat to my disappointment (although I understand it's the norm. these days) there's no RF demodulator for my LD player, so my outboard AC-3 box didn't get removed from the rack.

A quick word on the remote: it's better than the remote on the 2600 and 3300, but I'm not giving up my Pronto for it. The only noteworthy annoyance with it is that the backlight illuminates the buttons but not the labels. Aside from that (stupid) oversight, the remote is actually useful.

Of sound quality: There's an obvious and dramatic difference between the 3801 and the 2600. The newer unit has much better detail and staging; so much so that there is background dialog that I never knew existed in some of my movies. This amp makes much better use of my full-range center (B&W LCR-6 s2) than my old one did. The sound does lack some of the dymanic "boom" of the 2600, but as I grow used to it, I think the boom is artificial as the low bass is there there, but the mid bass is toned down.

Regarding some of the heat issues raised in other reviews: I haven't seen any problems at all, much less heat related problems.

Similar Products Used:

Denon AVR-3300, Denon AVR-2600

Best A/V Receiver for the money...Period

None for my needs

Some of these reviews make me laugh really loud.

The 3801 is the most complete A/V receiver I have ever owned or demo'ed for under $1200. While looking at the 4801 and dreaming about the 5801, the sales rep asked me if I ever looked at the 3801, it was a done deal. Some of the negative sound reviews I have to imagine are due to poor speaker quality or something other than the 3801. Dolby 5.1, Dolby 6.1, DTS, DTS-ES, Matrix kick all forms of a ss. I regularly ahve friends over who comment that "I never heard that on my system before!" Enough said.

Some of the controls are confusing at first, but I only had to set the system up once and never dealt with them again except for the occasional speaker upgrade. Everything is controlled from the remote, the on-board controls are limited, but who cares.

My system:
Denon AVR-3801
Denon CD and DVD
Klipsch KG 3.5 Main L&R
Klipsch KV2 Center
Klipsch KSP-S6 Surround L&R
Klipsch KG .5 Rear Surround L&R
Klipsch LF-10 Reference Sub

Don't buy anything without giving the 3801 or 3802 a chance.

Last note, I think you're crazy not to set up all 7 speakers for a surround system. I have tested my system with di-pole surrounds only, direct radiating only and my prefered set-up of di-pole surrounds with dual direct rear surrounds. It makes a huge difference.

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha, Earlier Denons, Harmon Kardon, Sony

DTS-ES, 7 channel amp @ 105watts

Haven't found any yet

This receiver is great for someone that is looking for alot of features for a reasonable price. I found the instruction manual and the remote a little confusing, but can be figured out if you have patience. The learning feature on the remote makes life much simpler when watching DVD's. Now I just use one remote instead of 3-4. This receiver is packed full of great features. I purchased mine at Acoustic Sound Design. They have excellent customer service and will match Denon's warranty through their store.

Similar Products Used:

RCA, JVC

Value is tough to beat
Sound and build quality are excellent
Simple hook-up and on-screen menus
Expected Denon quality (made in Japan)

Manual contains a lot of broken English
Feel of volume knob feels a bit cheap
All settings can't be properly set without OSD

After doing several weeks worth of research, and listening to a multitude of receivers at local retailers, I decided to go with this one. I had never owned a Denon receiver, and have always stuck with Yamaha, but my last receiver (the aging 992) didn't seem to perform to my satisfaction, and I've been fighting with it for the past few years.

I had heard my friend's Yamaha DSP-A1, as well as some other higher-end Marantz and Denon receivers, and I was always impressed with the neutral and pleasant sound of the Denon units.

So when I read about the 3801, it felt like my prayers for a powerful (yet very affordable) receiver was within my reach.

I have only had this unit for a couple days, but the differences I noticed immediately were very pronounced. I'm currently running a fairly plebeian array of Infinity speakers (1 CC3, 2 RS5s, 2 QPS-1s, no sub (9'x9' bedroom)), and I was pretty unhappy with the performance. For the last couple years, I thought this was due to the speakers, but upon hooking up the 3801, my speakers came alive, and I was extremely happy with the receiver's performance straight out of the box.

After spending about 4 hours delicately adjusting each of the many settings available, I was even more pleased with the sound quality of this amplifier. I couldn't accurately measure sound levels of each speaker (I don't have a dB measuring device), but got the levels fairly close to even across all 5 speakers, and proceeded to throw in some test material.

Since my Yamaha 992 didn't have DTS support, the first thing I tried was Fantasia 2000 in DTS mode (played through a Pioneer DV-414 via Monster TosLink, which will be replaced with a DV-37 3:2 pulldown progressive scan player tomorrow). My ears were in heaven as the first few notes of Beethoven's "Symphony No. 5" played and completely engulfed me in its wonderful accuracy. Not a hint of distortion, and the sound was very uniform and natural. I was so happy with what I was hearing that I just sat there and watched the entire feature. It's amazing how much more impact movies have when the audio can keep up with the visuals emotionally. I hadn't experienced goosebumps at the end of Firebird Suite since seeing it in an IMAX theater. But running through the Denon, I got those feelings again. Absolutely incredible.

Next, I moved on to music CDs. I popped in my MFSL CD of Bob Marley's "Exodus" (using the same DVD player via optical out), and tried it in all the applicable surround modes, as well as standard stereo. Matrix mode was my favorite, since the way it used the surround and center channels was subtle, yet enhanced the listening experience. Stereo mode was unspectacular, but far from disappointing. I think this could easily be enhanced by an outboard equalizer, since the basic bass & tone controls provided on the 3801 are hardly adequate for shaping music.

Since I play a lot of video games, I tried both the analog and digital audio connections, both of which provided the expected results. The analog connections yielded a good sound, but weren't exceptional (perhaps I should have done this before watching Fantasia 2000 in DTS?), and the digital optical audio was fantastic, especially on musically-powerful DVD software such as Beat Mania IIDX on the Sony PlayStation 2.

Aesthetically, I love this unit, although I wish you could adjust all the OSD menu settings on the actual unit, without having to use the actual OSD. If there is a way to do this and I'm just missing it, I would appreciate it if someone could email me. Maybe I just accidentally glanced over it in the manual. Either way, it's not that big a deal, but an annoyance nonetheless. Making these adjustments on the 992 could be achieved without its ugly OSD. To its credit, the 3801 has a nice and simple OSD, and the background color is black, which is nice and simple.

The manual for this unit, while fairly detailed, is written in fairly cryptic English (most likely directly translated from the Japanese text and touched up a bit), and is difficult to understand. This didn't slow me down all that much in the set up process, but if this is your first mid/high-end receiver, it could prove to be a little confusing. Luckily, set up in general on this unit is a snap, so it's nothing to worry yourself about.

The remote is good, it has a nice weight with the 3 AA batteries in it, and the buttons have a nice feel. The backlighting is a nice blue-green, but proves to be pretty much useless since the button labels don't light up. More often than not, you'll find yourself holding the remote up to your eyes at an angle so that the light coming from your TV will allow you to read the labels. It's kind of a nuisance, but I primarily use the remote for soundfield settings and volume, and that's it. Source switching, etc. is usually done between sessions when the lights come back on. Still, for those who live by the remote, this could end up being a problem. If you're still not happy, what's your solution? Upgrade to a Marantz programmable remote.

All in all, I think the 3801 is a tremendous value and performs as good as comparable receivers that cost hundreds, if not thousands more. Properly adjusted (and it will take some time... I'm not even there yet!), this unit should provide you with everything you could want in a receiver in this price range. It doesn't hurt that it is built to grow with you as your A/V system grows. It has an abundance of inputs and upgrade capabilities, and is an incredibly solid piece of engineering. Very highly recommended.

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha, Onkyo, Marantz

Sound & Clarity, 7 channel amplification, assignable digital inputs, DTS-ES

Remote has bit of a learning curve. Could have more digital inputs.

This receiver is absolutley INCREDIBLE. I purchased this receiver the first week, it was released. Was originally looking into the AVR-4800, but this receiver came out with 6.1 and a new with an LCD remote, these factors made all the difference.

I would highly recommend this receiver to anyone. My friends and family are left breathless after they hear movies and music on this receiver. For the price this receiver is an absolute steal.

My system:

Sony Wega KV-32XBR400
Polk RT55i (Fronts)
Polk CS400i (Center)
Klipsch Quintet (Rears)
Polk PSW650 (Sub)
Sony DVP-S570D (DVD)
Sony MXD-D5C (CD/MD Combo)
Monster Cable HTS-500 (Power Conditioner)

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha RX-V995

Price, inputs, DTS-EX, pre-outs.

Remote, stereo sound, tone control flexibility

Just got unit 4 days ago. Setup was relatively easy, but after playing it for about 1 hour I began to have problems.
Monitor output from receiver to Video input of Sony XBR is evidently sending some kind of signal to TV that causes TV to shut down every time I switch from tuner to Video input to watch other sources or adjust surround parameters. I am exchanging unit tomorrow for another-I have to believe this is a fluke.Also, the stereo and direct modes sounded flat and lifeless and the Widescreen mode was awful-mostly center speaker w/ hardly any left or right. I'm wondering if this particular unit has more wrong with it than just the monitor output since everyone else has raved about it. It had some trouble recognizing the DTS signal from the Eagles Hell Freezes Over DTS disc-I had to load several times before it read it and then it still sounded worse than my stereo Yamaha R-9 that I am replacing. However, I did try it again last night and it worked perfectly for about 45 minutes on the Eagles DTS disc and WOW! I had been feeling like an idiot for telling my wife how great DTS was going to sound and until last night I was ready to go back to my former setup. It really delivered the groceries, unfortunately I couldn't keep it working long enough to test it out on much else. I would prefer more EQ control-10K & 100 hz weren't much help to me. In a perfect world you would get 3 bands of sweepable parametric EQ-I'd gladly pay double for that type of control. I agree with what another reviewer said about the remote-some buttons are backlit, but not the labels-you can't tell by looking in the dark what you're pressing. I'm looking forward to trying another unit-I really want to be blown away by this product, so far not a great experience. Will post again after exchange, hopefully with better results.

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha