Great looking, Power, Easy to operate, lots of little extras.

The remote is not user freindly.

I'm impressed, it sounds clean, no static, it stays cool, all very important things for an amp.
It is a little hard to get set up but once you get it tuned to your liking it's worth the extra effort. I don't like the remote control. It is to small and they tried to fit to many buttons on it. Lets just say that is this units only downfall. Overall this unit is worth the money for sure.
It gets my seal of approval.

Similar Products Used:

Denon,Sony,Carver,JVC,JBL,other Yamaha products

Really clean sound. Ease of use. Great detail in music even at low volume. Dolby Digital and even old Pro Logic reproduction is outstanding.

I'd give the manual and remote a 4--see below.

I had just returned a Denon 2801, which had something wrong with the Dolby circuit. But, while I thought the Denon performed well, it couldn't hold a candle to this unit.

First, I've got to say that if my local Good Guys store had bothered to have these receivers hooked up, so I could do a side by side comparrison, I would have bought the 800 in the first place. I realize that it would be impossible to hook up every function, on every receiver, but why not just have a CD hook up. I certainly would have been able to tell the difference with a lot less trouble on both our parts.

The music reproduction, from my CD player, is fantastic. The seperate bass and treble controls have a wide range, which really lets you make significant adjustments. The Denon required you to go into the menu, which was a pain, and there was no comparrison as to range.

I never really believed the DSP would do much of anything. My old Onkio and recent Denon, had similar features, but the differences of one setting to another were never very detectable and they tended to sound contrived. The DSP settings on the 800 are awesome. I listened to an orchestra piece on both Hall and 5 chanel (the latter a feature the lower priced Yamahas didn't have). The change in settings made noticable differences, which didn't feel contrived or artifical. With some more modern music (Mannheim Steamroller) the system took off, even at low volume.

Watching movies is equally great. Dolby Digital was outstanding---can't wait to try DTS. But the biggest surprise was the Pro Logic. I have a good sized collection of VHS, many with Dolby Surround. My old Onkio, while it had an old Surround feature, only worked well on spectacular sound tracks. The Denon wasn't a whole lot better on this feature. But, the 800, even on a movie with few dynamic sound effects, sounds almost as good as DD. This was a wonderful surprise, which makes me value my old VHS collection more than I expected.

Now, on the downside, adjusting speaker volume on the 5 surround speakers is not as easy as with the Denon. They both cycle through the speakers, with white noise/tone, but the Denon was a little easier to stop and adjust the level of each speaker, while using my sound level meter.

The manual was 1000% better than the Denon's, but still could have been better laid out. Wish people would start putting indexes in these things.

The panel display on both the Yamaha and Denon were not very clear. With the Onkio, while you may not have been able to see the writing, you could tell which system you'd put on by the position and color of the light.

My only complaint about the remote was the little wheel used to set the remote to different devices. It's a little flimsey. They could improve it by tightening it up a little and making the detents a little more defined.

HOWEVER, the remote is possibly the most useful one I've ever had. I like the slim-line design and the receiver controls are well-laid out. The volume control could have been placed closer to the top for easier use. But the best feature is that, while it can learn other remotes, who needs it. They have 3 pages of code listings for just about every piece of equipment I own, including my Echostar sattelite receiver. The key patterns, for each type of device, are fairly well laid out and it beats the heck out of setting up a device on "learn" where the keys may or may not be located well (if you can remember what you did). No, it's not totally as versitle as the original remote, but you can do enough basic functions, to at least put your other remotes in a nearby drawer. The even include a quick reference chart for using the remote with different devices.

All in all, it's a great value. I'm kind of glad the Denon had a bad circuit. Otherwise I wouldn't have known what I was missing.

Similar Products Used:

Denon Onkio

Excellent features

None yet

If you are in the market for a A/V receiver, the Yamaha
RX-V800 is an excellant choice. This receiver is equally suited for both music and movies. The RX- V800 has a warm clean sound and is loaded with plenty of features.
I recommend that you also invest in quality interconnects and speaker cable to bring out the best this receiver has to offer. Believe me its worth the extra cash. Do yourself another favor and price shop this receiver extensively because of the wide price differences between retailers I have seen in both stores and online dealers. Becareful of shipping charges too.
Another aspect you guys need to do is Spend some decent money for a good quality speakers. I purchased the Klipsh-Quintet series. What a mistake! Dont buy this. I've sold the speakers to my cousin.
Anyway some good match for this would be
B&W series speakers. It has good looks but the grill sucks! It pops out every time.
Atlast after lots of research, I have purchased the Deftech procinema 100. Wow! its superb. Get one. I paid about $1350 for the full set of speakers and woofers. Man my room rocks!

My configuration
System: Yamaha RX-V800
Def-tech pro-cinema 100 series
I have replaced the centre speaker with C2-Deftech
Toshiba 1600 DVD player
NAD 5340 CD player
Technics HX Pro dual tape deck
32” Sony
Sony VCR
beyerdynamic DT531 headphones ( awesome!)
cable speaker wires/ Audioquest (Dont buy Monster -just a brand name)
Jade interconnects

Similar Products Used:

sony

DSP modes! Phantom 6.1 / DTS/ES! Sound Quality! Remote! Power! PRICE!

None!

First off, the remote is great! It learns, it is is comfortable for the hands (though the volume is a little out of reach), it controls every A/V component with ease!

Secondly, the Phantom DTS/ES and DD 6.1 are amazing! Clear sounds great. No other recievers in this price range have anything to compare to this!

Thirdly, it has enough power to fill any room with sound.

Fourth, The DSP modes are great. Never have I heard any that sound so clear. This is the first time I ever ended up using the DSP modes over the plain old encoding (The DSP modes DO utilize DTS/ES and DD 6.1)!! It is great.

This is an amazing reciever and well worth the money!

best buy

none

Excellent receiver and price. Lots of inputs and outputs. Cutting edge staff. But I have a question: are the main, center and rear otputs the same pre-out other people call? Can I hook up the main output with my sub line input? Please email answer to me at: bowy_c@hotmail.com. Thanks.

Nice clean sound. There's a warm, lively and dynamic sound to it.

the remote

This Yamaha receiver really put my sony receiver to shame. When listening to music or watching movies on the Yamaha, it's so much more detailed and life like in comparison to my Sony. Definitely a Class A amp.

Similar Products Used:

Sony STR DE-845

Cristal clear sound.

Remote control

I definitly like to help out new buyers to keep in mind that this unit is a "GREAT BUY" if you are shopping for a receiver.Tested with Bose AM-15,pioneer PDR-839 CD-R,
Sony-Dss,Denon DVD.

Similar Products Used:

Denon AVR-2400,Sony es-333

Remote, lack of EQ contour or simple bass/treble adjustment for rear speakers

This receiver was the final piece of my home theatre, which has taken over 10 years to piece together due to my limited budget. Needless to say, I was not about to put down my hard-earned money on something that wouldn't keep me happy for years to come. For less than $500, I don't think I could have chosen a better unit than the RX-V800. Even at its list price of $800, this model is a worthy competitor to others in its class, though I would say that the Denon AVR-2801 at $700 deserves consideration.

The RX-V800 is a great-looking unit with a very uncluttered front panel. The power from this well-built beast is clean and I can't detect hiss from my listening position until I crank the volume past -20 (the range is from a low of -99 to a max of 0), which I tested with my CD player on pause. With program material playing at this level, I would have probably blown out my windows, my speakers, and my eardrums.

One of the features I really appreciated was the 5-band center channel EQ, since I built my dual center channel setup out of car speakers that don't match the voicing of my Polks up front (I prefer dual centers because I like having my dialogue and effects centered on the screen, not above or below it). The built-in test tone made the actual voice-matching adjustments quite simple. Another thing I love about this receiver are the sound fields, which for the most part are quite usable, unlike the hokey DSP modes I've tried on other manufacturers' receivers. The only mode I really didn't like was "Church," which I felt had some rather unrealistic reverberation and echo characteristics. I hate to say it, but I think my friend's older Pioneer VSX-D607S, which I used for over a year, did a better job with the church DSP. However, this is insignificant since I'm sure most people prefer not to listen to this mode. The rest of the Yamaha's processing modes are cool to tinker with. For music purposes, I have always been a traditional stereo man, but I am now an ardent fan of the RX-V800's 5-channel stereo and I listen to my CD's for hours on end in this mode. One surprising thing I noticed was that I could pick out details in the music that I hadn't heard before, even with the high-end preamp/amp combo that I currently use to provide 420 watts of high-current juice to my sub. In addition to being able to hear nuances in the music, I could also detect recording flaws in some cases. This may be due to an inherent brightness in the RX-V800, which many have suggested is a common characteristic of Yamaha amps. This is a reasonable explanation since I know that many studio professionals prefer Sony's MDR-V6 headphones for that same reason: the brighter timbre helps to identify subtleties in recordings. Anyway, I like the Yamaha sound for music but it's a matter of personal taste.

For movies, this thing is unbelievable. I never knew what I was missing when I had the Pioneer. As long as I heard effects from the different channels, I was happy. However, in hindsight and with the benefit of comparison with a superior product, I realize that the Pioneer had a tendency to overlocalize effects so that the sound alway seemed to emanate directly from one of the 5 speakers. The Yamaha has a more "seamless" sound, so that the panning across and around the soundstage is much more realistic. The Pioneer could half-heartedly create this enveloping sound only if I sat directly in the "sweet spot," whereas the Yamaha seems more forgiving of listening position and even sitting off-axis with the RX-V800 is more enjoyable than being directly in the middle with the Pioneer.

The abundance of connection options are another plus for this unit. I needed 2 coaxial digital inputs (optical cables are too expensive for me), one for my DVD and one for the digital output on my computer soundcard. The RX-V800 can support up to 5 digital inputs with up to 2 of those being coaxial, and all of them are assignable. The default sources for the coaxials were CD and CBL/SAT, but using the onscreen menus, it was very simple to reassign them to DVD and CD-R. The RX-V800 also supports S-Video and component video switching.

As great as this receiver is, there are a few things that I feel could be improved. One is the lack of memorized volume levels for different sources, although perhaps this feature can only be found in receivers in the $1000+ class. Anyway, this comes in handy when you have sources that have significantly different output levels. For example, my CD player and the Yamaha's built-in tuner play noticeably louder than my DVD player and VCR. This means that when I'm done watching a DVD at my normal movie levels, I MUST remember to lower the volume before switching over to the tuner or else something in my system would get killed, most likely my sub.

As some others have mentioned, the volume contour needs to be steeper at lower levels. Even with the loud sources, I usually have to turn the volume up to at least -60 to achieve a satisfying level, which is equivalent to only about "8 o'clock" on the Pioneer's volume knob. Fortunately, the top half of the digital volume range (-50 to 0) has a much steeper perceived loudness slope than the bottom half, so unless you have very inefficient speakers, you should be able to achieve wall-thumping sound pressure levels without having to crank the volume up to the point where it hisses.

Another common complaint relates to the remote control, which I must agree with. Though it is a pretty clever design given its small size, it's almost overengineered in my opinion. I would much prefer separate buttons for the different components than a selector wheel. It's certainly a unique solution and may even seem cool at first, but after some real-world use, it soon becomes more and more gimmicky. I hate having to look down and peer into the little window to see which component you are controlling. With the El Cheapo Pioneer remote, all I had to do was hit the "CD" button and it would switch the receiver source to CD as well as simultaneously set the remote to control the CD player. This made sense to me. With the RX-V800 remote, this same function is accomplished by pressing the "Input" button (or rotating the wheel to the "Amp/Tuner" position), then hitting "CD," and finally rotating the wheel to "CD" so that you can control the player. The only advantage of this method is that the receiver source and the controlled component can be selected independently, but this is not all that practical in most scenarios and in any case, I could do the same thing with the Pioneer by selecting the source and then cupping my hand over the infrared emitter so that I could select another component to control without switching the receiver to listen to that source.

The last thing that I don't like about the RX-V800 is the inability to make tonal adjustments to the surround speakers. I would have really liked to be able to employ a 5-band EQ on the surrounds in the same way that you can with the center channel. This is one of the features that I really appreciate about THX-certified receivers, which are required to have some form of treble/bass tailoring on all channels. Although I feel that the Yamaha is superior in many ways to other models that are certified, this is one area where it falls short . For those of us that don't have voice-matched speakers all around, as is ideal for modern surround sound, the only way to attempt to match timbre between front and back speakers on the RX-V800 is to use the bass and treble knobs, which only affect the main speakers. Thus, if you want to voice-match your mains with a pair of surrounds that have harsh treble, for example, the only option you have is to crank the treble up on the main speakers as well, which is obviously not ideal since it would be much more preferable to just turn down the treble on the surrounds. The only other solution I can think of is to use the preouts for the surrounds and feed them to a separate outboard amp with tone controls, which would then power the rear speakers independently (By the way, if I am wrong about this, I would love for someone to tell me). I have some nice B&W bookshelf speakers for my surrounds, but I know I am not realizing the full soundstaging capability of my theater system since they are voiced differently from my Polks and cannot create as realistic a 360-degree panning effect around the listener as would be possible with matching speakers. Of course, if you have 5 identical speakers in your system, then none of that matters.

In summation, the RX-V800 is an EXCELLENT receiver. The only reason why I devoted so much specific detail to the aspects which I don't like is to help prospective shoppers make a more informed choice. Plenty of positive stuff has already been outlined in previous reviews and the good stuff certainly far outweighs the bad stuff with this receiver. I would highly recommend the RX-V800 to anyone who wants an awesome combination of price and performance.

Vast number of options, Great sound, learning remote

Vast number of options, remote hard to get used to

I bought the Yamaha to replace the Kenwood, which although adequate had a few weaknesses sound wise (poor imaging, overtly strong bass). The Yamaha surpasses it in every area and is absolutely fantatsic. Richersounds were advertising this amp on their website for £400 but I purchased it from one of their branches instead. At this price this is an absolute steal.

The sound is clear and accurately imaged. I took it to a friends house to compare against his Aura Excellence II and he was favourably impressed. It has a warmer more listenable sound quality (compared in stereo mode not in suroound modes) than his hifi amp (which by his own admission can be a little too bright). The soundstage is accurate and well presented.

The DSP fetures of the amplifier are very good although my own opinion of Hall, Concert, Rock effects etc are that they are something of a gimmick but if that is your thing they are well presented on this amplifier.

Testing with a DD 5.1 source showed similar performance to the stereo source... well imaged slightly warm sound. Vocals are clear and explosions and other LFE are well rendered.

This amplifier also supports DD, DTS, Dolby Surround, Dolby Surround EX, DTS-ES.


All in all this is a very good amplifier especially if you can get it at a reduced price.


The rest of my system is as follows:
Speakers: Eltax Liberty 5+ (also tested with Mordaunt Short MS25i Pearls), Eltax Liberty Centre, Eltax Liberty 1+ surrounds, Yamaha YST-SW 90 Subwoofer.
Audio sources tested - Wharfedale 750s DVD player, Arcam CD player, Yamaha CDX496 CD player.

Similar Products Used:

Kenwood 5030 A/V amp

Quality product, powerful, nice looking

Remote is ackward - but how often do you change all the odd settings.. just sit and listen kids - forget the now now now stuff

Very easy to setup, manual requires a good read to get all the use from the complex DSP information and settings.

Does not run hot, although I have not pushed it that hard yet. DTS 5.1 movies are best in Sci-Fi mode without question. Have not used the OSP tools yet - wish it have a RS-232 port.

Expect to keep this for about 5 years.

Similar Products Used:

Sony, Dennon, Technics