Excellent remote, ease of use, Urushi finish

None

I love this receiver. I am more interested in home theater than music and that is why I purchased it. The THX certification guarantees that it will serve my purpose. The remote is excellent. It has dedicated buttons to turn on the TV and switch to the proper input,which makes it a breeze to get into HT mode. I do have some MB Quart 4 ohm speakers that do require a lot of amplifier gain, but the receiver will handle my speakers. Overall this is an excellent receiver.

Similar Products Used:

Sony STR-915, Denon AVR-85
Sony STR-915, Denon AVR-85

Great looks, incredible power, great remote, ease of use, simplicity of design

Speaker terminals are very close together

I got this unit after I purchased the Kenwood VR3090. The Kenwood was fine except for the fact that the remote was the most godawful thing ever created. Nothing could be done on the receiver itself! So with that said, the Pioneer's remote is a dream! Everything you could ever possibly want to do with it is simple and easy to do. On top of that it is a "learning" remote which just means that it will learn the commands of other remotes to lessen the clutter in your room. Now onto the receiver itself.
I got this receiver for $635 because Pioneer is coming out with their new 36 model to replace this one. It has 5.1 EX handling. NOT a big deal. I watched T2 Special Edition with this receiver in DTS 5.1 ES and it blew me away. I still get goosebumps thinking about the response from the surrounds and the sub impact. This receiver is everything I wanted and more. I haven't found a single downfall except that the front panel on it squeaks when I open it. So no worries with this one! Buy one if you can still get one!!!

SYSTEM:
Pioneer Elite 26TX
Onkyo DVD-C6000
JVC 32" High Res. Television
Pardigm S-1000 Sub
Acoustic Research AR9 Fronts
Acoustic Research AR-2C Center
Wharfedale MMF1 Surrounds
Philips/Magnavox Super-VCR

Similar Products Used:

Kenwood VR3090

Final Set of Information:
My receiver came back today (4 days) Not bad! Its working great. And for those with this issue:
Here is what the tech fixed: Resoldered IC9371+IC9372 on the DSP PCB

Hope this information helps all with this issue. Enjoy and good luck! Much thanks to TOPS Electronics in Haverhill, MA, they did a great job repairing this and I thank them!

Has it all

None

I have been using this unit for six weeks and am very pleased.

It is as good as advertized and the people that are slaming this unit in the previous reviews are not being honest and may be working for another manufacturer.

Five stars.

Great THX-Ultra receiver for the money. Tons of S-video inputs and assignable digital inputs. Takes a while to set up but sounds great once you do. The learning remote is designed well enough that I am finally down from five remotes to just one.

The sound appears very crisp and clean - the sound is definitely an upgrade from my old Carver receiver. I like the multiplicity of svideo inputs and I wont be surprised if within 18 months I max them out with a sat dish, a tivo, a cable box, who knows what else, and they are addressable. Yes, the design is attractive but is that too important? Level of construction is bulletproof. Unit runs cool to the touch and I have driven it for about 4 hours at a time to date.
I like some of the dsp modes, such as HALL2 for the Eric Clapton Concert DVD (try this - its a great recording), and I also have used the THX ultra and it is powerful.
Following some of the comments below I await the rental delivery of Super Speedway and hope it lives up to the hype!

Unfortunately I didnt realize that many of the controls require on-screen manipulation and some are missing completely in a simple format, for instance, channel balance. In order to do balance you need to set each speaker separately via the remote as in speaker setup, and it shows only on your screen. Seems like a foolish way to save 50 cents of build cost. In addition, one setup issue I had points to a design flaw. When playing digital inputs, such as DVD via coax/fibre, you need to manually set the signal input to digital. The vsx-29 big brother does this automatically and it took me a disappointingly long time to realize that this is why I couldnt get any sound to appear with my DVD player (some of us have limited time to read 60 page manuals).
I think the interface, unfortunately, is overly busy. I also have not yet figured out if there is an FM signal strength meter (I'm going to guess there isnt one.

Have really been enjoying listening to cd's and watching both movies and concerts thru the receiver. It truly is thrilling to have a close to theatre level performance in my den. While I am sure that there are better units out there at different price points this is a very solid performer.
Was able to buy for $800 from a reputable NY dealer. Dont consider myself an audiophile because I cant get consumed with determining the minutae of equipment, but suffice it to say that I have been enjoying the higher end of midrange equipment and the sound that comes from these for a long time.

Similar Products Used:

Carver

This unit is great. Dolby Digital and DTS decoders. Also THX Ultra certification. What else do you need? 4 digital inputs and S-video switching -all for under $850.00

none found

The new Pioneer Elite line is strong... They packed these units with all the features you need and very competitive prices. Do ot buy it in the stores - you can get this unit for 3-4 hunderd dollars less on the internet. I purchased my unit at www.homespeakers.com for $850.00 - The internet is growing fast and you can find almost anything at the right price. this unit was over $1000.00 at the good guys.. Has enough optical inputs to run my sat and dvd player. Fills my room with clean highs and a deep bass. I am running Polk speakers. This will be the last unit I buy for a long time - until Pioneer comes out with a new and improved unit. Its going to be hard to beat this one.....

Similar Products Used:

I listened to denon - onkyo and Sony

I have to admit that I was a bit skeptical about buying this receiver, But then I listened to it!! A very powerful unit, and it drives my 4ohm speakers great! Even though the specs only go down to 6ohm this unit is THX Ultra certified and one of the key requirements for a receiver to be rated THX Ultra is that it has to drive a 3.2ohm load with a sinewave signal on ALL channels and must sustain a 250W output level across ALL channels! Now thats power baby yeah!
A very straight forward menu interface is just the cherry topping, the ease of use is welcome change as well. I have only had the pleasure of owning this unit for a few weeks so I'm sure there's a little more breaking in I have to do but so far this thing kicks butt !

The only two things I wish I could change is the length of time the backlighting on the remote would stay on and I would have liked to have the option of a gold finish on the faceplate, although the Urishi finish is very attractive in it's own right. Oh well, you can't have everything but hey, I only spent $749 anyway!

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disfunctional

AVOID THE VSX-26tx - IT WILL FAIL!!

After many phone calls, I was able to secure a new unit. Pioneer's first offer was to fix my unit - they have been fixing it for over a year, and it still fails. Then they offered to replace it with a "B" stock VSX-27tx. I asked if they were operating a corperation or pawn shop. I paid $$$ for a NEW unit, not a refurbished one. They then offered a VSX-36tx, off the production line. It has been working wonderfully, and will post a review for it in a couple of months.

I am disappointed in Pioneer's customer service. They were less than polite, and clearly had a goal of "maybe he will stop calling".

Wish there were a page to rate customer service
PIONEER - no stars (out of five)

Similar Products Used:

VSX-36tx

Everything

None

I have had this unit two years this month and have had no problems with it. The unit is not available new any longer -excpet as a close-out. I would not hesitate to but Pioneer Elite again.

The unit is versatile and very easy to set up. Couldn't be happier.

Similar Products Used:

Pioneer Elite VSX-24TX