Good home theater receiver. More optical in's than you might ever need! 5 yr. warranty.

2 channel stereo sound. Amp runs hot!

This was my first home theater receiver purchase and for home theater use it's not too bad. (Not, much to compare to.) But for music, I must say, it's fairly weak. I am looking to add a amplifier (100-125 watts x 5, $1000 range) to improve on HT sound & stereo. Anybody else using this receiver as a preamp? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Similar Products Used:

NAD 7220 PE & Denon DRA345R

JR, the sub outputs on the back of the 30ES are not left and right. The unit allows you to hook up two subs. (This was in the manual you did not read.). Thought this would help. By the way, I owned the 30 for a month and thought it was great too. I exchanged mine for the 50ES when they came out. I love them both.

I have owned my 30es for five months now, and in general, really like it. It seems to have plenty of power, no heat problems, and a good "voice". My problems with it so far:1) The remote screen inexplecably goes blank once in a while. No amount of button pushing will bring it back! Do to the design, you MUST have this working to access the various menus. The solution is to pull out a battery for a few seconds to reset it.
2) I have turned the reciever on a couple of times and had NO output. You have to turn it off, wait five min. and try again. If it keeps up, I will have to send it in for service.
3) The manual sucks. This is supposed to be their "high end" line. I would like to know for instance where the sub crosses over at for various settings.

It does have some nice features, and decent sound. I would do it again. Electronicaly it is very similar too the 925, except that it has a beefier power supply, and despite the published specs, probably more useable power. It weighs about six pounds more than the 925, and their is a reason for that! A five except for 1-3 above.

Very clean Sharp and overall Quallity

The best thing so far, Better than the yamaha i had before it. In Fact i returned at 11 recivers to good guys before deciding on this one.
did you know that if you return too many things at good guys you get a letter in the mail saying for you not to shop there any more, im shocked but im happy i choose this reciever.

I purchased this unit to replace my aging Denon 3000 Prologic receiver, and to step up to Dolby Digital. After having it for a while I came to appreciate how easy it was to use, especially with the 2-way remote. The only component it would not control was my Harman Kardon cassette deck, which has a remote.Watching and listening to DVD's is fantastic, but when I go back to my CD's I find that this receiver does not do as good as job as my old Denon. I connected my CD player via an optical cable, but the sound did not get any better. I do not know if it is a problem with the electronics of this receiver, but the Denon still sounds better. I would like to try a new Denon Dolby Digital receiver to see the difference.

I have had this unit for a week and I am very pleased, The remote works well and controls all of my components. I punch in DVD and it turns on the receiver, TV and DVD and when I'm done, I press standby and it turns them all off. Guess it was worth it to go all Sony with S-link. The sound fields are good (well about half of them anyway). I was a bit surprised that the receiver did not have component video inputs (only S-video) so my whole system is on S-video, whereas before I had the SonyDVP7700 hooked up th my Sony XBR via component video - I actually couldn't tell the difference anyway. The sound is great for both music and movies, but I've never owned a stand alone CD player, so I can't tell the difference between high end products and low end sometimes. I think the manual could use some beefing up as to common hookups for systems, but maybe since home theater is new to me, it's just me. Overall at $550.00 to my door (American Theater Systems (732) 565-0440), it's a great receiver.

I was looking for a moderately prices receiver with DTS - I came across www.sounddistributors.com and they had a great selection. After talking to Eric at sound distributors he sold me the 30es. I love it. Clean - plenty of inputs for future expansion, and a great universal remote. i would recommend this receiver and sound distributors to anyone looking for high end home theater products.

I purchased this receiver back in October 1998. I decided to wait a while to give my review so I would have used it with my system for a while.
Overall, I am very pleased with this receiver. As some people stated above, the manual could use a bit of work.

I have only had 2 complaints so far:

Sony's web page states that the receiver has an RF input for laserdisc players for Dolyb Digital sound. This is untrue. It requires an RF demodulator to use the RF output on your laserdisc player. This adds about $100 to the total cost for a Sony MOD-RF1 RF demodulator if you wish to use DD with your laserdiscs.

Also, the remote controls everything I have except my cable box. I have a Scientific Atlanta 8600X box, but there is no selection for it. I find this a bit bothersome given that it is missing, given it is one of the more common cable boxes in use today.

Overall, though, I'm very pleased.

imput and outputs number,sound quality clean look(like my DVD 7700),features.

little more power in some cases(not mine).

i have B&W CDM1SE(main),CDMCSE(center),CDMiSE(sur) and ASW-1000 speakers, DVS 7700(sony) , i am very happy with the power and sound quality, music and movie, the features, quality sound and power as enougth to me but i think if i haved a most power speakers and bigger roon i raelly will need a most power receiver(STR-777 maybe).
But i am really happy to 30ES,exellent receiver, exellent features and exelent audio quality good combination with all my equipament.