Price,performance,ease of use,sound etc...

absolutely none, although i wish it had 5.1 circle surround
like the newer models

This is a followup to a review i recently posted. I really feel sorry for those of you who have had problems with this reciever.If i had trouble i guess i would be angry as well, and possibly a bad review would follow.I think this is why the reviews on this site are not as high as they should be.To all of you SO CALLED audiophiles...why are you even rating this reciever, I know of people who spent more on cables than i did for this reciever! They are audiophiles..
YOU ARE NOT !!! I would be embarassed to call myself an audiophile and spend $400.00 on a reciever!
As such i am quite proud and happy with this thing. Being a former caraudio enthusiast, i know good sound when i hear it, and this sounds great! I run a set of amazing Paradigm
Atoms along with a PDR 10 sub and it rocks!...yes even in 2 channel stereo! For movies...Dolby Digital/DTS ...UNBELIEVEABLE!! I love it! Be fair to this reciver and compare it to others at this price, not hundreds
more, and it will kill anything similarily priced. PS. Home
Theatre Magazines FEB 2oo1 issue page#20 (Listing of their evaluation-room REFERENCE equipment) guess who's there...
thats right the KENWOOD VR 309 !!! NUFF SAID!!!

Similar Products Used:

listend to alot

Low Price

Digital Audio Unreliable

I really like this receiver WHEN it works properly. The sound is excellent (for home theatre) and it is dirt cheap. Unfortunately it has a tendency to cut digital audio once in a while (DD + DTS). The only way to make it work again is to power off / power on the receiver several times. Very annoying when you are trying to watch a movie. Furthermore, in the last month it simply refused to play any DTS sound (DD still works though). Reading the other reviews I can see that I am not the only one with that problem... I guess you get what you pay for !

Price, looks, 2 yr warranty

Stereo playback is BAD!

I was really impressed with the home theater sound overall - and my amp is compromised. expl below. I've had my tv hooked up to stereo for a long time. But waited till recently to buy this. I bought the Home Theater Direct Level 3 speakers, Sony DVP 560, Toshiba W808, reasonable quality wires - and the Kenwood. Altogether a budget price of about $1,800 excl tv.

So, the Kenwood. Although I am impressed with the overall sound for price but my receiver has never decoded DD or DTS; only pro logic. I even bought a second dvd player (not incl in above price) to make sure the output from the dvd was ok. I also read below about the one digital input stopped working on someone - so I bought a fiber connector to try that as well. Nope- still no DD or DTS.

The receiver has been in the shop for repairs for over a month - the local nincompoop cannot find the problem and has shipped it to Kenwood. Guess - I won't be watching the SUPERBOWL on that TV eh.

I read the rave reviews from etown and thought I could comprimise with this amp and be happy. It is for my basement and I'm the primary user. Hobby. Overall, I am very disappointed and wish I would have spent twice the money for a Denon.

I had it connected to JBL 100T's for stereo playback; usual amp is HK PM665. I cannot believe how bad it sounded.

You make the call.

Similar Products Used:

first home theater receiver / however I have a couple thousand $ invested in stereo gear

I have just got my VR309 that I purchased from shop4.com. I was planningon getting the VR209 which was priced at $299 just about everywhere. VR209
is really a awsome combination of value and features. The 309 is almost idetical but with the added DTS decoding. The shop4.com's price is the same at
$299. I just couldn't pass up the deal.

After I hooked it up, I am very satisfied with sound and it worked very well
with my BIC speakers system. I am sure there are many better receivers out there but at $299, you just have to smile :-)

Five Stars!!

I have had the vr309 for a while now and I have no complaints. You can't beat the features for that price. The remote is packed and it is so easy to set up. This is my first Dolby Digital purchase and its amazing.
I would recommend to anyone.

OK, I was real excited. This Receiver Has DD and DTS and lots of extras, like banana plug inputs. I bought it at Circuit City for $399.00, brought it home, set it all up, and sat down ready to watch a DVD on my new system, hit the power button and NOTHING HAPPENS! The power supply was dead. Don't they check these things at the factory. SOOO...I returned it, and got my money back. I went to Good Guys, and they sold me the VR-309 for $350.00. Went home, set it up, etc, and went to watch a movie on DVD, which worked fine, then BOOM, NOTHING 10 minutes later!! The unit kept shutting down. I called Kenwood, and they said this is the protection mode if there is too much output. All of my speakers are Boston Acoustic 8 ohm, which the Kenwood rep said shouldn't have overloaded the system. (I wasn't playing it loud at all when it overloaded, by the way). The Kenwood rep then said that the DVD digital output was too high, and I needed to lower the output of the DVD player. I never heard of this, and couldn't see a way to do it in the manual, so I called RCA, the DVD maker, and they said the rep at Kenwood was nuts, there's no way to reduce the digital output on a DVD. OK, so I've spent almost 6 hours going back and forth and setting up and troubleshooting two of these receivers. Am I crazy enough to try it again with the Kenwood VR-309? Well I'm not that stupid! The bottom line is that these receivers are poorly made, there is no quality control, and they are wimpy, and overload easily. I have high sensitivity speakers, and only play at reasonable volumes, and the unit just can't handle it. It's rate at 100W per channel, but I doubt that it would survive a test of that rating. I will never buy a Kenwood product again!

I just upgraded to Dolby Digital from Pro Logic. I did a fair amount to research online to determine the best option for a low cost entry. I bought my VR-309 through a buyers club for $299. The receiver was very easy to setup and install and the sound is great. The remote takes a little getting used to, particularly in programming control of other A/V equipment but overall it works well. I would highly recommend this system to anyone who wants to upgrade to Dolby Digital. The price can't be beat and it is packed full of features.

Picked this receiver up in a package with the jbl scs-125 speaker system. I have to say I am very impressed. It is my first kenwood product, and my first Digital receiver. The sound it puts out is very clean, hardly any distortion, mainly due to the KAM 1 circuitry in it. Good functions for the price, the DTS is very nice. Greta Pro Logic from the TV and radio. Cant wait to get my DVD player, that will be a treat. Good build quality on this unit, suprising for the low price. 4.5 stars

For the money this is a good reciever. Compared to my old kenwood stereo reciever, the sound quality is not as good. I will also say that 100 watts x 5 is pushing it. Of course I knew that for the money I was not getting a top of the line reciever. One improvement over my stereo reciever is that it runs cool even when pushing 5 channels. For $300 I couldn't ask for anything more.

I purchased a VR-309 for $300 from netmarket.com, Great receiever for the price, I haven't purchased a dvd player yet, but as far as the other options of this receiver things are good. 100Wx5 is a good amount of power and my infinity rs-5, and bu-120 sound good and can be played really loud. This reciever lacks some of the sound modes found in lower end kenwood stereos, the only mode which uses all 6 speakers is dolby pro logic. I would have liked to see a LIVE or HALL sound processing, but the Stereo and Virtual Stereo sound pretty good for playing music.