Solid build Quality, learning remote, smooth audio performance, # of inputs, 5 channel mode, runs cool even when pushed hard

lack of backlighting on remote, high settings required on volume control to get moderate sound levels

The quality of this unit is apparent right out of the box, it has a very solid build. Setup is relatively easy and the manual is straightforward and helpful (not sure why others on this site have such a problem with it?). Programming the remote takes a bit of time but is not difficult; it is worth the effort to thoughfully consider what macros to program for your equipment. The width of the transmission beam on the remote seems narrow, you have to be accurate with with your aim. Sometimes the programmed macros are not followed through, I believe this is related to the beam width as well. The lack of exotic DSP modes is appreciated, what a useless feature on some other receivers ( Sony has 27!!!). The 5 channel mode is very good even for music. The sound produced by this unit is very smooth and musical; no harsh high or boomy lows; makes my older non audiophile speakers come alive. The range on the volume control seems oddly designed though, it goes from -81db to +15 db and you don't really detect any sound until about -40db. To get powerful performance levels requires a setting of +5 to +10 db, near the top of the range. It may be due to inefficient speakers, I have nothing to compare it with. Overall though, an excellent well built receiver, strongly recommended.

Similar Products Used:

Sony ES69

Performance in stereo and surround, midrange depth, warm sound, build and looks and surpassingly, price. Makes my sound system look like a $10,000 counterpart.

Makes all other components in my system look like $5 plastic toys.

First of all, I can't understand why some people give a good review and than give a 2 star rating...

I never heard of Marantz before, but I knew how I want to hear my music.(I play guitar and attended a couple of life perfomances in my life) I bought Yammy first and although it's a great performer in both HT and music, it felt too digital. Then I auditioned Denon 2800 and that gave me the idea of what kind of sound I like, but I still felt that bass was a bit weak with Denon, and midrange sometimes would be forgotten in the dynamics of the sound. Then I went to hi fi shops and started listening. Sony ES and DB line are absolutely gorgeous receivers, but that's about it. Like a blond babe they have striking looks, lots of "bells and whistles" :), but no depth. Pioneer was great for HT but when I wanted to listen to it in stereo, sales person did not have it hooked up. Then there was SR-7000 Marantz, it had both striking sound and looks. It seems like it would reproduce every bit of detail source has to offer, and it created a remarkable sound stage. Sound was warm and natural, it had all of the important features, including digital out, and more digital inputs that you might hope to ever use. Since I’m a sucker for looks (and blondes), I mast say that I loved metal plate of the receiver, especially big volume and audio source knobs. Unfortunately price tag was just beyond anything I would be willing to take on at the time. For a week I meditated trying to talk me into buying Marantz SR-5000, but doing A/B test for a millionth time and looking at the massive SR-7000 next to it’s smaller brother, I got the king of all receivers with the promotional $50 discount. Months and months later I realized what a great receiver at a great price the Marantz SR-7000 really is. Every time I turn it on, I have a WOW! feeling. It performs flawlessly in HT, and due to it’s warm soothing sound and true 100 W per channel, the movie watching experience isn’t distracted by constant worrying about volume level so that remote control could gracefully rest on the table. Sure it’s not perfect, and remote is not back-lighted and manual is not written for a 3 year old, but in the end you would have a feeling like instead of a blond babe you met a gorgeous brunette who is pleasure to listen to. (BTW she has to be a brunette, this one is actually made in Japan)

My System:
Marantz SR7000
Toshiba SD-2109 (Damn, I need a good CD player, was buying Marantz CC4000 OSE, but than there is that SACD format that seems to be the next best thing since vinyl)
Polk RT800I (great speakers, second to none)
Polk RT400I (great center, period)
Polk f/x500I (everything else is not surround)
Polk SW450I (yep, there are better subs...And grass is greener on the other side)
Sony MD320 (cheep MD deck, does everything I need)

Wow, I’m just 21 and life is good!

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Yamaha 5240, Denon 2800 and Denon 3300 auditioned.

Remote, Craftsmanship, Inputs (tons of them), Sound Quality

Volume only goes to +15dB, remote not backlit, bass/treble adjusts only to +/- 6,

Talk about a great receiver. It's sold out all over Arizona. I got a great price on it, $720 + tax. Everything about this thing is great. Excellent sound reproduction at all volume levels, however you really need to turn up the volume on DVD's to about +10dB to get the full effect. Bass and treble only adjusts so far, guess I have to get a big subwoofer. I replaced an aging HK receiver and plan on getting some B&W speakers to compliment the system.

To those that have had this system for awhile. How come my DVD player/CD player will only play audio when I switch the A/D button (on the receiver) over to Analog? Isn't it supposed to be in digital? Email me at bigmoney30@juno.com Thanks.

To those that don't want to wait for a new shipment to come in, you'll kick yourself later. Really HARD!

Similar Products Used:

Harman Kardon, Denon

Remote, DD & DTS, Inputs/Outputs, Clean Power, OSD

None Found

Did a lot of research on the Marantz, Denon and Yamaha websites as well as checking out the reviews here. Found that the SR7000 was head and shoulders above both the Denon 2800 and the Yamaha 995. Has the same features as the more expensive Denon 3300. Got a great deal on it from A&B Sound in Saskatoon, resulting in the similarly featured Denon 3300 being almost twice the money.

Unbeleivable learning remote controls everything else I own. I enjoy the 5 channel stereo, inputs galore and enough power to make your ears bleed.

I matched it to two Paradigm PS100 powered Subs, Paradigm Monitor 3 up front, Paradigm Titans in the rear and an Infinity Video One center.

I would reccommend this unit to anyone who is in the market for a high power receiver.

Similar Products Used:

Denon, Yamaha, JVC

Cost, 2ch stereo, 5.1 dd/dts, build quality, good pre-amp down the road, power : price ratio, 5-ch stereo, tuner

No component video switching, remote was overhyped, sub cross-over, manual, volume dial

Caveat: I own this machine so I am quite possibly biased :)

I have been reviewing these machines for quite some time now. It has been a long struggle to try and find a good 2ch/5ch solution integrated into one unit. I also knew that down the road I would want to turn the unit into a pre with at least a 2-ch or 2 1-ch monoblocks for the fronts. Good 2-channel has obviously been the hard part to find.

The Marantz was what I finally ended up buying. I found it for just over 1000$CDN+tax including extended warranty at a local dealer. It has very clean power, and I hook up an entry level DVD player to it through the digital coax to get excellent sound quality thanks to the seemingly high-qualiy DACs of the Marantz unit.

The lack of component video switching was no problem as I would rather hook them directly into the TV rather than introduce yet another set of interactions. If you find this awkward, then simply explore the macro functions of the remote to automate switching on the TV and amp.

The remote is cool and will definitely impress your friends, but it has some nuisances. First off, I would have preferred a few more buttons and less reliance on the jog wheel - it won't help you in the middle of a movie when everything's dark (LCD not backlit). Also, the Marantz has some non-discreet functions, i.e. you have to toggle through states on the amp rather than select them directly. 5-ch stereo is one such function I can't figure out how to program with a single button press. I find the beam-width of the remote to be also a bit narrow so you can't be lazy in aiming the remote and expect it to work each time.

The unit doesn't run very hot, although I am only powering PSB 300i bookshelfs. Combined with these speakers, the sound is very tight and imaging is excellent (to my untrained ears, anyways). The tuner is great and has picked up signal with much more clarity than my old Yamaha RX-V592.

The sub cross-over is at 100Hz. This isn't an issue for me at present as I am running my bookshelfs at full (ugh) and will not be upgrading to a sub for a little while. However, for many of you with high-end fronts, this will probably be too high. You will likely want to biwire your fronts into the sub and use your sub's variable crossover rather than rely on the fixed 100Hz filter employed by the amp.

5.1 is obviously good on this system, as it is on most. I also look forward to purchasing some monoblocks for the front left/right. Even though there are supposed to be subtly better monoblocks than the marantz ma500/700's, these seamlessly integrate with the sr7000 for one-button power up which is nice.

As to the other products, I found the only Denon in this price range that competed to be the 3300. However, I found it to be more expensive. The 2ch and 5.1ch were very close to my ears although I slightly preferred the sr7000's 2ch. I also thought the Denon's Dolby ProLogic was quite poor - perhaps there was something wrong with the setup. The 3300 did have component switching, and as with the sr7000 had multiroom/multisource. The 3300 also had 7.1 inputs/outputs to support new formats although I am not too worried about the 7.1 contenders so far. Their remote is terrible so you will want to budget extra money for a 3rd party remote if you go with Denon.

The Nak av-8 didn't compete in my opinion (sound quality, features), and the av-10 was simply too expensive so that review is short.

Yamaha seems to do a fine job on home theater (probably my favorite for DPL and DD/DTS) but didn't seem to come remotely close on my CDs in 2-ch. I spent very little time with Yamaha for this reason. I also find their remotes quite poor so you will want to factor in extra money to buy a separate remote.

The Pioneer sounded great. I was quite impressed with it but simply chickened out. I could find very few credible reviews of the unit, I've had bad luck with Pioneer's entry line, and they seem to have much higher markups here than other mid-range brands. For some music I found it sounded marginally better than the Marantz (i.e. rock, big-band), but for others it was not as impressive (acoustical guitar, piano, casual jazz, uncomplex vocal work). The Marantz does seem to get a bit clogged up with complex music compared to the Pioneer. Let your ears be your judge.

All in all, the sr-7000 has a ton of features. For some reason, it doesn't seem that popular here in Canada. The local retailer almost seemed glad that I was buying one as they seem to be moving the Yamahas and Pioneers in great volumes while the Marantz hangs around. Marantz retailers are less common so you may have a tricky time finding on-line or local retailers. They seem to go from 700$US - 850$US plus tax and shipping based on what I was able to find on the net. Watch out for invalid warranties on the Internet. I believe Marantz is a bit of a stickler on this issue. One Internet retailer has them for 750$US:
* http://www.wildwestelectronics.net

I think the jump from the SR-5000 to the SR-7000 is significant, but I could not justify the large price difference between the 7000 & 8000. Audio-wise they seemed identical to me, build quality is better in the 8000 (i.e. copper shielding), you get 5 extra watts, etc.

Sorry for the long post. After lots of research I found I had lots to say :) I hope this helps you in making the right purchase.

Steve

p.s. Note that I am scoring this unit in its class, as the review guidelines suggest. To me it can't be beat for 700$US out of the models I evaluated.

Similar Products Used:

Evaluated many: Yamahas (RX-V592, 595a, 795a, 995), Denons (AVR-1800, 2800, 3300), HKs, Nak AV-8/10, Pioneer Elite VSX-24/27TX, NAD T750/60

Channel separation, no. of inputs, low distortion, remote

Bass response and localization of sound

I bought the SR7000 last week to upgrade to Dolby Digital up from my prologic HK AVR MK20II (60 wpc), primarily based on the overwhelming praise as seen in audioreview.com in general. Got it for $680 at Harvey's in NYC (it seemed sold out at many stores in the city, just shows how important this web site is for audio manufacturers).
The good points first: Great channel separation, very good clarity and low distortion, particularly at low frequencies. I'm not sure why everyone's cribbing about the manual: its concise but all information's in there. Just as good as manuals of other manufacturers' receivers. And I found the remote to be great too. Overall, it seemed to be of very good quality.

In spite of the above, I returned my receiver today. Why? - the most important reason would be soundstage: with the HK, I could close my eyes and feel Springsteen singing in my room. Using the Marantz, I could close my eyes and tell you exactly where and how far my two speakers are located because I could identify the source of the sound to two points on the two boxes (I use Polk RT20p towers with 100w built in subwoofers at fixed 80 Hz crossovers). This is not what I want. Also, the SR7000 sounded flat and dull as compared to the HK I own. Another problem was that there seemed to be a fair amount of attenuation of low frequencies (making the bass tight, a good side effect) as compared to the HK. The voices of Mark Knofler, Leonard Cohen, Chris Rea, Jennifer Warnes, etc seemed too thin (my listening choice is mainly jazz / classical, by the way). Having had some experience designing power amplifiers, these seem to be the after effect of trying too hard to remove distortion by filtering noise (which explains the good clarity in this speaker)and ending up filtering out some of the original material as well. I know that good clarity and low distortion sound good but the bottom line was that I could here a big difference between the natural sound of the HK v/s the thin sound of the Marantz. This surprised my for two reasons: One, I believed that contrary to what's been written in Stereophile, etc, one could not really find out the difference between two amplifiers offering good, flat amplification over the 20Hz - 20 KHz range. Two, hell, this is probably the best selling receiver this year for any price range! So I spent a lot of hours listening to it in many different configurations hoping to be wronged. I ran it Source Direct (with no subwoofer sound) and also with Source Direct off and the surround mode set to Stereo. I listened to a wide variety of music on it and compared it to the sound from the HK AVR 20 MKII. Same result. Sure I heard sounds on the Marantz that I did not hear on the HK on the same music before, but the reverse applied too.

Anyways: moving on to things less important to me: movie playback is very good (don't know whether its the Marantz or the Dolby Digital or the toslink cables, but I'll credit the Marantz). I loved the build quality and it seems that very few people have encountered problems or defective pieces.

So, where does that leave me? Obviously, I'm not going to get another HK. I've read that their new receivers (AVR 500, etc) have major reliability issues and also sound inferior to their old lines. I guess, I'll just wait six months till DD 6.1 (or whatever the new flavor is) becomes popular and then try out whatever the audioreview.com darling is then. Of course, as I was lugging the 32 lb receiver on the streets of Manhattan today, 2 strangers said that they just bought it themselves and how great it was! Oh well, either I'm obviously missing something or I'm just lucky to have a good audio receiver at home to compare it with.

Similar Products Used:

HK Avr MK20II, Denon AVR 2800, NAD T760

Great DTS/DD sound, keen looking remote, informative front display panel.

Stereo quality stinks, remote has no backlight.

Solid performer. However, unlike what others have said, I feel that the stereo quality stinks compared to my old Harman-Kardon AVR40. Seriously -- the bass is muddy and dull. It seems to slop anything below 300hz all over the place. Very over-saturated. Trying to use the BAS/TRB EQ settings is an exercise in furilitiy... it only makes things worse. Seriously, this is not worth the money for playing CDs.

However, if you're going to using it for DD/DTS... this is a perfect receiver! Awesome in every respect for this purpose! Seamless integration with your DVD/HD setup (no component switching though... heehee) and excellent DD/DTS decoding. A sure winner for HT users!

Unfortunately, since I also like good music quality, I will be returning my SR7000 shortly. :(

Lots of power, Great DTS and Dolby Digital, Very musical

NONE!!!!

At $799.00MSRP, you will be hard pressed to find a better receiver. This receiver has it all: power, warm sound, solid build. I have this thing matched with my Energy speakers and it works great with it. I previously owned a Yamaha but the bright sound got to me over time. I wanted to purchase the Denon 3300 but too many people had problems with the receiver. It's funny how so many websites are selling the Denon at such a discounted price. (Check the prices at www.pricescan.com) Take a listen for yourself, judge this receiver with other receivers around its price range and I'm sure you will come to the same conclusion....

Similar Products Used:

Yamaha 793 and Denon 3300

Clarity! Clarity! Clarity! Digital sound is very defined.

None so far

I just picked my first Marantz (SR7000 obviously)and boy do I love it! I upgraded from a Harman Kardon AVR20 II Dolby Pro and my ears have never felt better. I have to admit, upon owning one of the AVR 20's, I never thought I would leave Harman Kardon's side, but after reading the reviews from this website on the AVR500 and all of the sound problems it had, and after listening to it myself, I decided to venture into new territory. I wanted something expandable, (ya know, 7.1 channel, etc.) and I definently wanted something with DD and DTS. I really don't even need to mention that I wanted more power (100x5 @ .06 THD at 20Khz!...which the 7000 has.). So after combing through my endless subscription to Home Theater magazine (highly recommended), I noticed an excellent review on the SR7000 with rating's only in the 90's (very high, almost never). Some as high as 96/97!(very rare). So, I had to hear it for myself and went down the street to my Marantz dealer and luckily one was hooked up in a demo room. Connected to it were 4 of the PSB Image 3LR's and a 3C center and a sub. Now, I know the debate on PSB's is pretty big, (low cost speakers, but great sound. How can that be?), but let me tell you that the 7000 made them sing. In fact, I am looking at purchasing a set of them myself now. Where does it end? Any-whoo...if you are looking for a great receiver to rock your HT, this is it! I couldn't believe the clarity! Saving Private Ryan, The Matrix, Air Force One, Bond, and on and on and on. You really want to put this system to a test? Pick up the IMAX film "Super Speedway" and let that be your deciding factor. Good for speaker and receiver testing. If I had to complain about 1 thing, it would be that it seems that I have to turn the volume up 3/4 of the way to really get it rockin'. But there are hundreds of different features on this thing so I might have missed a button, or it might be that I have really crappy Sony speakers right now. I have been told, though, that it is really the better distribution the receiver has and that it won't distort your speakers even all the way turned up, and boy is it loud! Well, I have talked too long about this receiver...go buy it. It is calling you.

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Harman Kardon AVR500

Great Sound. What else needs to be said?

Complex setup (Like every other DD receiver).

I received this thing last night ($644 + $12 S&H), it took me about an hour to get something coming out of my speakers (which is a personal best for a DD receiver). This is by far the best receiver I have ever owned. I have owned low end sony and jvc receivers in the past and thought I would try a higher end receiver. Either this thing is 5 stars or my other receivers are 1 star.

The receiver does take banana plug connections. There are some plastic inserts in the terminals that can be popped out with a small flat head screw driver. It took me about 5 minutes to take 10 of them out.

I didn't have the receiver output to my TV. I have my DVD player going directly to my only S-Video jack on my TV. I am realising that my DVD video will have to go through the receiver since it is very difficult navigating all the receiver setup menus while seeing only one line of text on the receiver display. I did manage to setup my digital input for the DVD (I watched the matix and it sounded incredible) and through trial and error, I was able to setup my CD player. By default the CD is set to a digital connection and I had to change it to analog to get sound.

Pros: 1) Great Sound. Doesn't distort at high volumes. 2)Remote is very neat looking and once I figure out how to use it, I think it will be the best remote I've ever had. It also glows in the dark. 3) I like the 5 channel stereo, except the rear speakers are too loud by default. They were drowning out the front speakers. I set the rear gain to -2 DB and it helped. 4) The tuner is much better than any other receiver tuner I have owned. I was surprised that I was able to listen to FM radio that sounded almost as good as a CD.

Cons: 1) The manual doesn't explain things in detail. You have to fill in the blanks. The manual isn't any worse than most manuals that come with DD receivers, but I have the impression that whoever proofread the manual didn't actually try to follow its instructions step-by-step. 2) Setup (This wouldn't have been a problem except for item 1 mentioned above). I'm a computer programmer with a masters degree in engineering. I know how to do complex things. I had trouble setting this thing up. There is no way that joe average citizen could set this thing up without a support phone call. To be fair, I didn't use my TV for the menus and I did manage to get the thing working the way I wanted and this receiver isn't any more difficult to setup than other DD receivers. Why don't these companies put more effort into their documentation?

I also didn't have any trouble with the subwoofer. I like a lot of bass and I set the Gain to +2 DB and it sounded the way I wanted.

Overall, I'm very happy with the purchase.

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JVC RX-884VBK