Stereo and Home Theater sound quality Remote Features Price

No 6th or 7th channel Not THX certified

This receiver is grand in all sense of the word. I have had this receiver for a year now and all I can say is WOW. I tested many other receivers in this class from Yamaha, Denon, Harman Kardon, and Onkyo and I can say without a doubt that this receiver is the best of all. Sound quality is very pleasing to the ear. In stereo and home theater mode, you can't go wrong. This unit is rock solid. Weights in very heavy for optimum performance and stability. Plenty of power too. I can power my Paradigm's with ease. This is by far the best looking receiver in it's class. I really like the lcd remote as well. I have never had a problem with this receiver. No problems with the remote or overheating. Runs cool as a fiddle.

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Tested all major receivers in this price range

Power Clarity Features Looks-very pleasing to the eye Remote Best value in this price range-unless you want to spend $3000 on something better

Not much for this price

One word to describe- AWESOME...Never had a problem with this receiver. I think this receiver is top notch. I really don't know why everyone else seems to be having problems with the remote batteries. I have had mine for 8 months...used everyday and I still have the original batteries. This receiver rocks...very clear and loud at high volumes. I have it hooked up to many other high end components and speakers, and this amp will outclass all in it's price range. Features are great as well. Wish it had a RS-232C port for upgrades and also true 6.1 or 7.1 decoding instead of the virtual matrix 6.1, but I guess that what you get for getting last years technology.

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Denon Onkyo Harman Kardon

Overall just a nice package, Enjoy but don't put any Pizza boxes on the top. Oh ya, DTS and DD sounds great, very clear and precise.

Not made to hold Pizza boxes

After having this unit for a couple of months, I now have it set up properly and truly ENJOY how good this receiver is! Not a single problem, the Amp is VERY strong - and I am running power hungry speakers. The only way that the amp would over heat would be without proper ventilation. I think people must be putting something on top of this receiver. " I always staked up a DVD, VCR, Tape deck on top of my Sherwood". WAKE THE H*** UP FREAKS, this reciever needs to breath – Just like you and I, Take the pizza boxes off and place them on the floor!!

Great Sound, great design, build quality, power, clarity, versatility, DTS, Virtual 6.1, warranty

Not THX certified, no upgrede to news format 6.1 or 7.1

I don't understand why so many people are having problems with this receiver. No problems with my unit, just ES quality. This is a far more better amp than any Yamaha or Harman/kardon amplifier. I have found the Amp to push more than enough power to all points. The unit: Has been fantastic. This Sony 555 has made me very happy. I spent over a month comparing it to other receivers in its class and I’m happy that I decided on the 555. I read many of the reviews on this site to help me in my selection. I almost bought the Denon 3801, but after hearing them both side-by-side, same speakers, same music and the same DVD, I chose the 555 for the sound quality it displayed. Other reasons for that decision were the price of the Denon ($1500.00), the Denon remote was “plain Jane”, and the two year Denon warranty versus the Sony ES five year.

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Yamaha DSP-AX2, Denon AVR-3801

great power, sound, and reliability

no 6.1 decoding, no internal cooling fan,

Let me start off by saying that unless you are a die hard audiophile, this receiver is more than adequate. I didn''t get into home audio until a few years ago. I did research and listened to many receivers myself, and I was very impressed with the 555. I heard the same kind of things from a few of my buddies that I read on these reviews, but that was before they heard actaully heard it. Everyone has there own opinions on name brands and there isn''t a product out there that isn''t going to get a bad review. After those same buddies listened to this product, there opinions of Sony totally changed. This receiver has plenty of power, great 5.1 and DTS decoding, and from my experience, great reliability. I have Bose 701 fronts and 301 rear''s. I know they aren''t top of the line, but being able to get these products from the military exchange store at such a discounted price, I couldn''t find a product that compared. Sony has always seemed to be a reliable product for me. I have never had problems with their products, although when I do have questions, there customer support isn''t anywhere close to being the best out there. On the other hand, I do have a few minor complaints about this receiver. The first one being there is no 6.1 decoding. This may be missed by a few, but of the 120 DVD''s that I have, there are only 3 that come in 6.1 format, so this isn''t really a big deal to me. My second complaint is that Sony didn''t put a fan on this unit to cool it. I work on multi-million dollar pieces of medical equipment day in and day out, and I know that heat is one of the major contributing factors to faults in electonic systems. I installed a couple fans in my rack that I got out of old PC towers to help cool it when I want to crank up the volume. It never gets hot at normal listening levels and I have never had it clip either, even before I installed the fans. My last complaint is that it has no tape monitor circuit or EQ inputs. Once again, this isn''t that big of a deal to most listeners. All in all, this is a great receiver for what I paid for it. Don''t trust the bad reviews you read about anything until you hear it yourself. Everyone has there own tastes of sound and unless you are superhuman and can hear little minute imperfections in sound, you will be more than happy with this receiver.

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Sony 5 disc Sony 5 disc DVD changer Sony Laptop computer

Reliable, Sound Quality

Remote

I went back to read some of review on Sony Str-V555ES I could not believe What I read. Thing like over heating and things burning out. I can tell you I have owned my Sony for a little under 2 years, and it has been reliable unit. I have McIntoch amp that I use for my music and it gets warmer than the Sony. I have watched movies for hours add nothing has burn out. I have never had any trouble with the people at Sony. I don''t kwow may be the people that had trouble, bought their unit from a deal that was not authorized. One has to stop and think a $1300.00 unit for $600.00 Hum! I DO NOT WORK FOR SONY

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Rotal,Onkyo,Harman Kardon

I have to say that I have been monitoring this forum for a long time as I am a PROUD owner of a STR-V555ES.

The quality of some of the reviewers with regards to this product is APPALLING. I have never heard such a load of horse manure in my life as some of what is said about this product. Granted there were initial problems with this product with regards to heat and I will admit that, but the rest of complaints I have read are largely unfounded. People write a positive review and are immediately labeled as SONY employees. Well guess what I was a Sony employee for over 8 years and left the company over two years ago ( I still bought a STR-V555ES despite the fact I owe nothing to Sony, because it is a GREAT piece). The criticisms leveled against this product are completely false and my contacts in Sony Service confirm the fact that VERY few if any of these units have problems. I have close personal friends who sell these things and they have NOT seen one of them come back. To read these reviews, you'd think that everyone of these things was breaking down. As far as hiss, these things have far less hiss than most units and a little bit of hiss is a fact of life with any DSP chipset. The hiss on the DSP for this unit is negligable if even noticeable. As far as humming, mine did hum. At first I thought the unit was faulty (having read some of these "reviews") but then discovered that my ultra expensive Monster Power Bar was the culprit as it was inadequately shielded for the cable coming from my satellite. After removing this problem, the receiver was dead quiet.

I raise issues with people who claim to be audiophiles and then say they use a Yamaha 595a (a nice lower-mid receiver). What kind of an audiophile uses a Yamaha 595a or even a Sony STR-v555ES for that matter. These are NOT audiophile pieces. I urge anyone reading this forum to really evaluate the motives behind some of these posts and demo the unit for themselves. The reality is that there is very little out there that touches these quality of these units for the price you pay for them. I have sat here quietly in disbeleif reading these outright misrepresentations too long and I finally have decided to speak out. I urge users to protect the integrity and usefulness of a sight like this by only posting accurate reviews and not slamming product for what can only be to dissuade other people from looking at it. SONY is a huge company with a solid reputation that obviousy cannot afford to put out a product half as bad as some of these "audiophile reviewers" would suggest.

I urge those who come here doing legitimate product research to really evaluate what people are saying before jumping to conclusions. There are some very good reveiws on this site that do offer CONSTRUCTIVE criticism of this product such as complaints regarding the remote or the lack of a comprehensive manual or possibly the reality of the OCCASIONAL factory defect (NOTHING is perfect). However use common sense when evaluating accuracy and motivation of all reviewers (including mine) and of course demo the product yourself.

I am sure that the majority of owners of this product who will read this and agree and maybe others who will come back at me and say I am full of it and am brainwashed by SONY or that I am still on their payroll or something like that. I give this unit 5 stars for value, and 4 stars overall (I still think the manual and the remote needs work). But overall, the unit performs flawlessly.

Lots of Power, Clarity

Hissing, Very Slow Remote

Well, I thought I would submit a second review on the V555ES. The first one I got had a video switching problem which prevented me from getting any video signal unless I enabled and then disabled the OSD.

The unit also hissed with nothing connected to the unit except my Klipsch speakers, that hiss ended up getting on my nerves.

The remote was very slow and unresponsive, I got constant communication alarms. Changed the battery lots of time, made no diff.

Volume control would go up and down by itself.

A&B Sound kindly swapped the unit out and got me a brand new unit.

Video switching problem fixed.
Remote still very slow and unresponsive
Volume control up/down fixed.
Hiss, lots of it, so much so I have now sent back the V555ES and got a Marantz SR-19EX.

Right out of the box the SR-19EX has been perfect, NO HISS at all, remote works very well.

Sonically, I believe it is much better than the Sony V555ES, much smoother power delivery but with lots of punch when you need it for movies etc. CD play back is first rate. The Tuner is superb.

Set up was very easy with OSD, given that the remote fuctions properly, not like the Sony. An example of how bad the Sony remote was, who would ever design a remote with no Channel up/down on the main part of the remote, like the volume. Instead you have to activate the LCD to change channels, that is totally crazy.

Enough ranting. I am a huge fan of Sony products as all my other gear is Sony but I must say, I would stay away from the V555ES unit until a new model comes out that might fix some of these reoccuring problems that other reviewers have mentioned.

People who own this product, please do not take this the wrong way, Sony has not made an ES product this time, maybe the replacement for this unit will be better.

The V555ES should have been like the Marantz SR-19EX, perfect out of the box. I gave Sony two chances to get it right. The Marantz was the end result.

I hope this honest review is of use.

None

Poor component quality, useless remote control, difficult to fine tune.

This is the second in the row Sony ES product I buy that does not survive more than 2 months. The first one luckily broke 5 days after the purchase and I was able to return it and get a refund. I was so dissapointed that I did not want to buy another Sony ES product for a number of years. Finally I was convinced to buy this brand new Sony ES 555 receiver. I am not even going to talk about the remote control - it is useless and I had to use my Mitsubishi universal remote but the quality! Just when it was a little over a month old, my wife was watching a DVD movie when she heard a loud pop and smoke - the digital side of the receiver when out. Unfortunately I could not return it as it was over 30 days old so I had to take it to Sony center for repair. During the 5 minutes that I was there filling up the paperwork, I saw another two guys with 555s picking them p and bringing them in for repair. Anyway, 2 weeks 7 man-hours later (moving furniture, disconnecting and reconnecting) I got it back fixed. Sony center had replaced 3 blown resistors. I still have it but hope to sell it soon and get an Onkyo or something similar that has better component quality.

Great Sound, Hookups on backpanel, Control over individual speakers with remote, DSP modes

Remote, no rear center speaker hookup

I,m not big into stereos exactly, i have a lot of computer and video gear etc, do a lot of sound work in multimedia production.

This receiver is excellent for hooking up everything in my place...

example. remote control to Vid cam laserlinking to laser pickup into Video input 3 on the reciever to the vcr/TV/Computer....the computer/camera/and vcr are all cross connected blah blah

This thing has completley consolidated all of the wires that would be unplugged and replugged constantly.

About sound... i,ve slid into a sorta stunned state a few times sitting on the couch listening to it, even with low cost speakers i,m blown away.

($550 Canadian for a set of 5 sony...they have the new 32 bit tweeters supposedly( useless without new ES 32bit dvd decoder though))

150 Watt center 8 ohm
180 watt tower fronts 8ohm
120 watt rears 8ohm
Yamaha Sub

i,m running the thing at 8 ohms and it gets hot but not that hot... NOTE: i would not put anything on top of this unit restricting airflow!

Also i cant hear ANY hiss whatsoever at any volume from 1 to 5.I've never got the volume past 5 (way too loud in my little apartement)

MY favorite listening mode is "Virtual Multi Dimension"
If your rears are actually on the side(like in my teeny livingroom) you can set that up in the options.

I,m kinda pissed about the 6.1 thing (no rear center speaker) for a DVD i really might miss it... but music... nah

Anyhow... no regrets on this purchase