Audio (multichannel and stereo) quality, picture quality using HDMI output

Manual, cables, but most manufaturers make this mistake

I bought this player to replce a Marantz DV6400. Also a very good player but less digital features like HDMI. The player is exellent in picture and sound quality but not user friendly. And also it's not the most well build Marantz I've ever seen. My DV 7010 from 2001 is a tank in comparision with the 7600! Anyway, in sound and picture quality it's worth his price fully. SACD and DVD-a sounds remarkably good, but the thought of first getting trough several menus before i can even play a DVD-audio kills the pleasure of listening! After playing one DVD-A to check the player, I've never played one again, just for this reason. Even SACD needs extra use of the remote to put the player in multichannel mode! The overall quality is not a big plus for the player.

Similar Products Used:

Marantz DV7010, DV6400, Sony DVP 900S, Pioneer DV 565

Almost-universal disc player with above average sound and very good picture quality.

Not as good as you might have been led to believe. It's still very much "mid-fi", if not entry level (sniffle)... the kind of sound quality I'd outgrown 5 years ago (sniffle sniffle)

Yes, I can confirm that this player is hot. And I meant that literally - play a CD or DVD and the disc comes out more than slightly warm at the end. In fact, the player itself became hot to the touch (more so than my Densen amp!) when I had it placed in an enclosed hi-fi shelf that I had to take it out. Weird. This makes me concerned about its lifespan. Disclaimer: I've never been a fan of the Marantz sound, having experience with various models of theirs down the years, starting with the highly-acclaimed CD-50SE in the late 80's. Each player only lasted a few months in my setup at the most. The problem is that - to my ears at least - Marantz makes "hi-fi", not music. And this player has not done anything to make me change my opinion. It's a player of "buts": Yes, the CD sound is good. For a universal disc player. Yes, the picture quality is good. If your TV/projector has HDMI. And the feature set I can't really quibble with, except that it lacks the capability to play the DivX format (which I think may become crucial with the increasing popularity of downloadable HDTV in the future). Don't get me wrong. In the context of its price range, and compared to the Sony DVD player it replaced, it's definitely stonking (the Sony, however, proved more forgiving when playing less than ideal discs). But it doesn't walk on water, which is what you might expect from reading some magazine reviews. Why, one magazine I have read gave it such glowing praise, to the extent of claiming the sound to be on par with the best CD players out there! Unfortunately for the DV-7600, the main player in my system is the Primare D30.2, and against even such an "antiquated" yet delightful source the Marantz finds itself rightfully embarassed (the Primare is 3x the price). To be honest, I don't think this particular Marantz will last very long in my system, either. I bought it off a friend who's had it for a couple of months mainly on the strength of the many glowing reviews it has received, and this most likely set up the DV-7600 to be a disappointment. I suppose I'm just spoilt by the high standards set by the system I have spent many years arriving at, that I am unwilling to compromise when it comes to my new-found hobby of building a complete HT system. On the other hand, when it comes to parting with this player, I doubt its memory will linger long (unlike, say, that of the Quad CD-67 I disposed off once upon a time). Don't set your expectations too high and you won't find this player lacking. Otheriwse, you'd probably be left wondering what the fuss is all about. (It recently won the HI-Fi Choice best budget DVD player award, afterall). It's good. But not *that* good. ----- My system info: Primare D30.2 CD player, Densen DM-10 integrated amplifier, Harbeth HL-P3 speakers with dedicated Xtenders passive subwoofers, Nakamichi tape deck, Kimber cabling throughout.

Similar Products Used:

A couple of Sony DVD players, a Sharp jobbie, another one from Samsung. Still looking for the one to match the kind of quality I'm used to with my stereo hi-fi system.

Movies with the hdmi are just drop dead gorgeous, music in all forms(sound stage, depth, bass).

Heat, hdmi port seems very delicate.Disc load times are way to long, to play sacd, dvd-a you must enter menu and change bitstream to off. Remote needs to be backlit.

I finally replaced my Pioneer elite universal player. And I'm very glad I did. This player sounds very nice,movies, sacd, and dvd-a all sound beautiful. I am wondering about heat, this player seems to get hot. Enough so that when you take a disc out, its warm to the touch. And also the hdmi port(sucks). I have a tv with a dvi con,and use an adapter to plug into the player. And the cable seems to heavy on the hdmi port. I can no longer use this con, and I will buy a new hdmi cable with a dvi at the other end for the tv. If it still doesn't work I'll send it in for a new port. But movies and music are still very nice. The other reviewer mentioned something about entering menu to play sacd's and dvd-a. All I do is wait for the disc to load and enter menu, move cursor over to audio and change the bitstream setting to off. Some people might think this is alot to do but I don't. He has a reciever that he has to change, but my rotel pre-amp is all set. Just change the player and thats all.

Similar Products Used:

sony,pioneer elite

If you like the idea of having to go into setup menus to change settings every time you change disc formats, this unit's for you. A good, programmable remote control might be used to do some of this, but as far as I can tell, there is no direct way to adjust audio settings. You must go through the setup menus. Overall sound quality is pretty good. The HDAM processing used by Marantz in this unit is worth the wait. Video up conversion to 1080i is impressive! If it is on a 5 1/4" disc, this thing can probably play it. Even picture discs from Wal-Mart can be viewed.

Weaknesses: If you do not like the idea of having to go into setup menus to change settings every time you change disc formats, this unit's not for you. Remote control feels cheap. Button layout is not intuitive. Should be backlit at this price point. Supplied cables are not even Wal-Mart quality. I think most people are going to buy this player because it is HDMI compatible and performs up conversion up to 1080i. It requires a digital connection to do this and should have included one.

First Impression: Upon opening the box of this $1100.00 unit I was quite disappointed in the cheapo interconnects supplied. This is an HDMI capable player that comes with a 1 meter, 99¢ composite video wire. I refuse to describe this as a cable. My $300.00 Samsung HD satellite receiver came with a DVI cable plus the standard RCA type A/V cables. The remote is not backlit. ALL HOME THEATER REMOTE CONTROLS SHOULD BE BACKLIT! (Hopefully some manufacturers will read this and get the message). If you own a backlit programmable remote control this may not be an issue. Many of the issues with quality are dispelled once you lift the unit out of its box. At just over 10 pounds, it feels substantial compared to other less expensive units I’ve owned. The appearance is understated, as is most other equipment from this manufacturer. Rear panel layout is well done and intuitive. Everything is color coded to make connections a little easier. The only problem I encountered was in connecting the 5.1 channel analog cables. I found that the RCA receptacles were spaced a little close together for my Kimber Cable Hero interconnects. These cables have a barrel that tightens the grip of the connector when rotated. It was a little difficult to get my fingers around them to rotate them. The remote control seemed broken at first, until I studied the manual for an hour or so. A flip of the little switch on the back of the unit remedied the problem. The manual is really vague about this, but this switch tells the player to either read commands from its own remote, or to read commands from a connected component. Default setting is to read commands from a connected component. Owners manual: As is typical with most Marantz products, the manual is written by Chinese linguists who obviously flunked English. Many parts of the manual are simply not understandable. Trying to decipher what cables should be connected and how to use the setup menus is not possible unless you have lots of experience with digital and multi-channel setups. After 4 hours of experimentation I was finally able to play a DVD-audio disc that didn't get 'down mixed' to 2 channels. The website literature say's that this player performs bass management. So, I thumbed through the manual looking for adjustments for crossover frequencies. I don't consider speaker distance and whether they are large or small as 'bass management'. Bass management would allow me to set the crossover frequency and slope. The only reference to bass that I could find in the manual was to set LFE on or off. Music: CD playback is waaaay better than my Pioneer DVD-444. Tighter bass. Extended highs. Neutral mids. Quite good for this price. The sound has a three dimensional quality that my previous player lacks. This is especially true with acoustic sources. I would not have believed that a digital source component could make this much difference in imaging and the overall perception of depth. DVD-audio sounds good but is such a pain in the neck to set up for that it may not be worth the effort for some folks. (You have to use 6 analog cables and change several settings in the audio menu of both the player and your receiver). This wouldn't be so bad except that you can only adjust the audio settings when the player is stopped. Not paused, Stopped! Speaking of stopped, did I mention that no matter what type of disc you put into it, it takes a minimum of 15 seconds to load? Longer if the disc contains JPEG images. I’m probably not the best person to ask about multi-channel surround music, as my first love is stereo. SACD is awesome. But as with DVD-audio, it's a pain in the you-know-what to go through all the setup menus to get things right before you can listen. Worth the effort in this case because the sound is truly impressive. Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side Of The Moon’ in SACD 2-channel is remarkably open and airy compared with the MFSL gold CD. DTS and Dolby digital decoding is excellent. I don't believe I've ever heard my theater sound better with these two formats than it does with this unit. Lyle Lovett’s DTS surround mix of “Judges, Joshua, Ruth” includes some really extended deep bass notes (She’s Already Made Up Her Mind) that sound more musical and less boomy than I had previously experienced. The overall sound is less grainy than I remember it sounding with the DVD-444. Dialog articulation during movie playback is much better versus the DVD-343 or DVD-444. Video: DVD-video thru component cables seems a little soft. The picture appears slightly veiled as if one is peering through a light fog. Via HDMI/DVI cable and up-converted to 1080i the image improves considerably. Colors were more saturated and the veil of fog is lifted. My monitor's native rate is 1080i so not having tto perform extraneous D/A conversions probably contributes to the improvement. I did not test 540/720p. Video tweaks available in the setup menus are extensive when digital cables are used. I used Digital Video Essentials to check the calibration of the player and was impressed with the player’s ability to resolve high frequency data. Chroma delay is spot-on. Black levels and gray scale adjustments were not necessary. Hue and Gamma are adjustable – something I’ve not seen in other players

Similar Products Used:

Sony 5 CD changer (Can't remember model) Pioneer DVD-343 (terrible) Pioneer DVD-444 (I'll never own another Pioneer anything)