My ears have already settled the debate between the DSP-A1 and the Denon 5700. But let's see what the reviews have to say. One reviewer who reviewed the Yamaha DSP-A1 when it came out and has now reviewed the Denon 5700, said the Denon was better than the DSP-A1. Admittedly a small difference, but a difference none the less. I'll take that small difference plus the THX certification, extra power, easier set-up of channel levels, 2 sets of surrounds, memory settings for channel levels in all modes (great for sub difference between music and movies), channel indicators, etc. Oh, almost forgot the review. It is at:www.homecinemachoice.com/tried&tested/

Use keyword Denon and Category Amplifiers

I owned the A1 for about a year. Yes, I loved it. Thought it was the best all in one unit that could be bought. Then the Denon came along. I started comparing. I like the sound of the Denon better. The sounds was warmer and sweeter. The Yamaha seemed brighter and harsher. Of course it became worse as the volume was increased. I have no use for DSP modes. The only ones that I found that sounded OK even with adjustments (room size, delay, reverb, etc.) was the Enhanced and occasionally the Adventure mode. I discovered that Dynamic Range Compression only worked with Dolby not DTS. I know it may be rarely used, but shouldn't it apply to both formats. The reviewer of the A1 at www.homecinemachoice.com thought so ("Shame this lot doesn't work with DTS, the other 5.1 sound format."). Denon applies Dynamic Range Compression and Cinema EQ to both formats. Even the THX is applied to both Dolby and DTS as it should be. I like the GUI, setup, features, remote, and most importantly the sound of the Denon over the Yamaha. Is it worth the difference in price over the Yamaha? Yes. I do not buy online. I buy from local authorized dealers. I bought the Yamaha for $2200.00 in July of 1998. I sold the DSP-A1 for a small loss. I bought the Denon for $2375.00 in May of 1999. If the Denon had not come along, I would have been extremely happy with the A1. If I had never compared, I would have been happy.

After owning the Yamaha DSP-A1 for 3 months now, i have become more and more familar with its functions. Before I settled on the Yamaha, i looked the Denon 5700, i actually purchased it first, to test out for my home theater. The Denon sounded great, the music was very smooth, yet the sound was very narrow, the speakers didn't blend in well which is now my old reciever (HK AVR30) It was like each speaker was easly distingishable. Overall, the sound was great, I mainly bought this piece, for its specs...THX...140watts per channel, DAC chips and all..bragging rights, bascially. I returned it, because i had second thoughts, luckly the dealer had no problem with it and I switched it with the DSPA1. I changed my mind because, i was planning to buy the DSPA1 first, but saw the Denon specs, I should have gone with my first choice. I finally was able to make use of my front effect speakers. After hooking this thing up, i was very impressed. The Yamaha simply sounded amazing, the sound stage was extremely better than my H/K AVR30, and noticbly better than the 5700. Since i use it to listen to music as well, i found the DSP sound fields very useful and fun, although, they are a bit much, more than nessary, some even sound very closely alike. The sound on the Yamaha was much more crisper than the 5700 and AVR30, just the way i like it. For movies...my gosh, that THX certification is BS on the Denon, the Yamaha easly outperformed the Denon. My previous thought was the the Denon was better for HT and the Yamaha better for music, but the Yamaha just sounds better for everything, i can't explain it, the Denon is suppose to be a little more advanced in its technology, but i guess it never makes it to my ear. Although i lose the tuner (i never use it) the Yamaha is still a great choice, the only choice for me. For the Denon, it is more future friendly, which i liked, but for that kinda money, i'd go separtes before i decide to buy the 5700 again. As for appearance, its pretty subjective, I did think the Denon looked kinda cheap, but for the technology, i thought it was better than the Yamaha. The appearance of the Yamaha is very nice, simple. As for remotes, the Denon wins. Yamaha, just makes odd remotes. The Denon was more easier to navigate than the Yamaha. But once your there, its well worth it for the Yamaha. I would recommend the Yamaha DSPA1 to anyone who is conisdering it. Anyone who likes the AVR5700, its a very nice reciever, but you might want to go separates. Either way the Denon or the Yamaha makes a great choice, but i chose the DSPA1, it just made sense.

This is straight out an awesome AVR and I envy anyone who has the pleasure and luxury to own it. Clean sounding, excellent build (heavy and sinister, saw it in black), and power to spare. I have also heard the B&W 202, Denon 5700 (not extensively), and the Pioneer Elite TX27 (same store as the Denon 5700, but not setup correctly, Kievs in KC should be ashamed) which are all very clean, excellent build, and power to spare which should make their respective owners very proud and happy. The main things to address is that the Pioneer is new so there might still be Quality Control issues yet to be reported. It also seems that the B&W and Denon problems have been addressed and repaired at the expense of initial customers purchasing thems trust of HQ reputation for performance and build. I have not heard the Marantz SR18 or the NAD equivolent so can not make an honest comment on them. Those that compare this to the Nak AV10 must not have heard this AVR setup correctly or they would definately take back their opinion (Nak is very good but this is definately the next tier). These are not the "cheesy" DSPs found on your cheaper or mid-fi AVRs such as Pioneer, JVC, Sonys (I include most but not all of the ES ones), or the low end Yamahaes and Denons. This thing has bass, mids, and trebles and all the bells and whistles with an outstanding 2 year warranty that most likely you'll never need (but do ask the the people who initially bought the B&K and Denon 5700s not the recent purchasers about their faith in those other products). I do know that Denon has recently came up with a new Denon AVR 3300 (haven't seen or heard) which has 105 wpc which falls between this Yamaha model and the 2095 in performance but the price will dictate if this is still the budget top tier AVR. I also wonder if the price drop that is recently being observed for the DSP-A1 means that Yamaha is coming out with a more powerful version (the main reason of choice for the argument of the Denon fans) for marketting reasons? No matter, this is still one of the upper echelon of AVRs and if it still does not have enough power for the owner the price difference of this vs the others will allow the owner to still buy another integreated 2-channel amp for bi-wiring their mains. This is simply a win-win purchase and is a very fine piece of equipment which I wish I could own in the near future.

Bought the A1 six months ago but wanted to spend some time with this unit before submitting my review. I owned the 3090 for more than 3 years before the A1 and was completely satisfied with it until the DTS DVDs started appearing. Knowing the 3090, I had complete faith that the A1 would be at least equal if not better than it. Yamaha has done it once again. The A1 is clearly a performer. Has all the features of the 3090, with more power. The surrounds (rear and front) are finally given the opportunity to perform. If you own this unit, get yourself a pair of front effect speakers; you will not regret it. Works wonders on bad soundtracks (you cannot avoid it on certain DVDs) and definitely gives you that extra envelopment and realism on good ones.
Like most, my only complaint is the remote. No so much on the appearance but the limited customability. Like most A1 owners, I do not own any other Yamaha components, rendering the most important buttons like CD and Tape useless, unless I assign them to buttons with meaningless names. The remote finally ended up in a drawer somewhere. Got myself a TC1000. Remote clutter gone forever. Even got the wife's thumbs up on it. (rare occurrence)

For those of you who are interested, I paired the amp with NHT 1.5's, Audio Center 1, Super Zeroes, Super Zero XU's and a pair of MK subs. Works well with music as well as HT.

Enjoy!

just to clarify.The denon 5700 is rated at 140 watts X 5 at 1KHz for all channels. This is equivalent to the Yamaha DSP A1 rating of 110 watts X 5 from 20Hz to 20KHz. The amps are about the same power on both units. The jap version of the DSP A1 rates at 1 KHz and yields the same numbers as the Denon. In addition the Denon 5700 weighs about 6 lbs less than the DSP A1. This is attributed to a scaled down power supply. The DSP A1 remains superior in sound and build quality.
The only thing better is costly separates.

I agree ARC. The Yamaha DSP-A1 is a very nice piece. But I too would prefer the B&K AVR202 or the Denon 5700. Trouble now is deciding which one. I like the sound of the B&K but I also like the features of the Denon with the Denon sound being a close second to the B&K but better than Yamaha DSP-A1. Music is better on the B&K and the Denon. On movies they are all close. I do not like DSP modes for movies or music. They sound terrible on music and I watch movies with the sound as it was intended (speakers calibrated and no DSP modes).

This is a nice piece, but to me I'd prefer B&K 202 or the BIG 5700!I think they are better systems specialy the 5700 and its features 5 channels stereo wao!

I think the DSP-A1 is a great piece of kit for the money. I have owned one for a year and a half and have had much enjoyment out of it. The Denon amp is also a good buy. Which product is best is obviously a very touchy subject, but my belief is that both are very good value for money and which one is chosen should really depend on which speakers the buyer intends to use. The arguments in this thread about power ratings are quite interesting. Both amps offer similar power ratings and are obviously the most powerful integrated home cinema amps available, but the actual power rating means very little. The ability of the power supply to give sufficient amounts of current and to remain stable when the volume is turned up is much more important than RMS power ratings, and in this respect due to the nature of these amps (5 channels running from a single power supply with limited capacitance) neither are up to scratch. 110 Yamaha watts bear no comparison to (for example) 100 Chord watts, 70 Naim watts, or 100 Audio Research watts etc, because amplifiers like these have power supplies with far greater current capabilities that do not fall apart under stress. With budget speakers that are easy to drive this is not so much of a problem but I would warn anyone wishing to partner the Yamaha or Denon with low sensitivity speakers with difficult loads that it is not to be recommended. I tried the Yamaha with a pair of Proac Response 2.5 loudspeakers, which have quite low sensitivity, and the results were pretty disastrous. At a decent volume level the amplifier goes into immediate clipping on low bass notes.
An acceptable solution to this problem is to use the amplifier as a processor and add relatively reasonably priced power amps, for example: Parasounds, NADs, Brystons, Chords etc, would all enabling the user to be able to choose from a much larger range of decent speakers. In this respect both the Yamaha and the Denon are still worth the money for the processing power alone.
One thing that the Denon does has in its favour over the Yamaha though is the THX processing. When partnered with THX speaker packages like the JBL HT1 mkII or the KEF reference THX it is possible to get great results. Hi-fi based speaker packages around this price might offer more detail and sound less raw but the sheer slam and high volume level abilities of THX speaker packages like this make them an excellent and not that expensive buy when partnered with an amp like the Denon. If one is interested in the home cinema aspect only (as THX speakers sound poor with music) this is a great route to go down. Due to the ease of drive of THX speakers it is also not so necessary add power amps. Unfortunately though it is not really possible to use the Yamaha with THX speaker packages with great success. This is not due to the re-equalisation/timbre matching/decorrelation/ aspects of THX processing that the Yamaha is missing but is due to the lack of the THX bass crossover. I tried the Yamaha with the KEF package and it is impossible to get the bass to integrate into the system (by adjusting subwoofer volume/sub crossover frequency etc) in the way that it integrates seamlessly when using an amp with THX processing. So in this respect I feel the Denon has a definite advantage. However the Denon does not have the type of DSP modes that the Yamaha has which in my opinion can, when used in moderation on certain soundtracks offer an interesting alternative to plain processing.

Just to clarify a mistake made in a previous post, the Denon 5700 is rated at 140 watts per channel into 8 ohms at 20 Hz to 20 kHz on all channels, front, center and surrounds. This information can be found at Denon website in the white paper for the Denon 5700. The surrounds are not rated at 1 kHz as mentioned by earlier posts. Yes, the Denon and the Yamaha are close. I agree with the reviewer who said he gives the edge to the Denon because of THX processing. I have found the Yamaha and Denon to be very close. For me, the THX processing, personal memory (ability to have different sub levels for movies and music), channel indicators, channel level setup, remote, tone defeat for music and theater, etc. sold me over the Yamaha. Yes the Yamaha has DSP modes. I found I liked the Enhanced and Adventure modes on Pro Logic, DD and DTS. But those were the only ones I liked even after tweaking others (delay P. Room Size, S. Room Size, etc). I had all speakers balanced at 75 db on both the Yamaha and the Denon. I hear no difference in information coming from rears of both units. The Yamaha did not "lite up" the rears as one reviewer claims. If any difference, I give the edge to the Denon again for more noticeable detail in all channels! Give both a try and see for yourself. There is not leaps and bounds difference between the units. The differences are subtle. But add THX processing, component video switching, ability to run 2 sets of rears (A, B, or A+B and you can assign them seperately or together to the different modes DD/DTS, THX, etc.), and the other features I pointed out in this review to better liked even though subtle difference in sound quality and you have a winner in the Denon 5700.

A truly awsome product!!! I bought it about 6 months ago and I'm still blown away every time I use it. Nothing else can compare, and I've owned some very high end gear. If your looking for a center piece for a new home theater system and don't want to break the bank, give this yamaha a shot. There's really nothing else quite like it.