The Active Sub, easy to use, and DTS

would like a little more power

This is my first system that i bought myself and for what i paid for it, I couldn't be happier sure i'd like more power but i picked this one over the kenwood system because the kenwood one just looked cheap and i didn't like the passive subwoofer and actually my uncle bought the kenwood system that i had turned down and his is 600 watts mine is 450 and mine sounds a lot better his speaker just sound like crap. so i would highly recommend for people getting into home theater systems

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Kenwood HTB-204

Price! Good quality sound for the price. DTS and Dolby Surround processing. Comes with everything you need.

Supplied interconnects are just crap.. the speaker wire and sub cable are very noisy and I'm no audiophile. Lack of digital inputs and lack of selectivity with the ones you get. The sub lacks really good punch. The supplied fronts will limit the quality of your experience.

I love this package, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have it's faults. I'll reserve most of those because I'm using some fairly crappy KLH speakers for my mains (not the Sony supplied speakers, which made great computer speakers btw when attached to my Cambridge Soundworks sub). I purchased this setup to move up from my surround in"capable" Awia receiver that had it's boards fried. Moving down from 120 watts to 80 was a little bit of an adjustment as the sound just doesn't have the same punch in stereo mode that the Awia had. Not comparing to the Awia, the Sony has a very good sound and it's better considering what you get in this package for the price. The center and rear speakers are good for home theater. I tried using the fronts supplied, but the 50 watt sub isn't enough to create the bass needed to listen to music at the levels I like listening at. I still use the Sony sub, but I also have a KLH 100 watt sub and KLH 5192's. All in all the system sounds good. A set of Bose or Boston Acoustics speakers would really make me happy. You can't beat the auto-decode feature, but I'm very dissapointed in the amount of digital inputs and the selectivness of those inputs. My DVD only runs optical and I'm forced to run it on Video 2, instead of the DVD button. That's not the end of the world, but it it's annoying. Sony should just have labeled these inputs with numbers. An S-video passthrough would be nice for us gamers, but I'm asking too much for this price range now. Spend the money and go up to the 100 watt version if you still see these in stores. You'll thank yourself in the end.

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Older Awia stuff.

Sound is great ease of use once it is set up

Speaker setup is a bit confusing.

Got the system for an early Christmas gift. After looking at a ton of reviews and talking to some people, I picked the DDW-740 over the Kenwood and Awia Systems. I bought the Kenwood one for my parents and the speakers look and feel cheap, the two Awia systems I looked at in two different stores had some funky auto shutoof thing they did after about 5 minutes and I was not impressed by them. I really like the sound I get. The set up is a bit confusing since in setting up the speaker volume, you set distances/balance under one menu and the individual volume under another. This is one thing that the Kenwood does better. Set up is a bit easier since you can do it all in one menu. The Kenwood is still a mystery to my folks. They only can get it on and off, and with some luck they can select the correct component. The Sony's sound is very good. 450 watts is more than plenty. With the volume cranked, my 12 by 14 room shook during scenes in SpiderMan. (I was also deaf for 10 minutes afterward.) The DDW840 has a universal remote and you can assign the speaker size of the front L-R speakers (I used the boxed pair so it didn't matter), so for the extra $100 it is a good option. For me, the DDW740 is a dream... I would do it again in a heart beat.

Easy installation. All componnets prepackaged (save a couple of connecting cables that required two trips to Radio Shack - check everything before you start), individual speaker configurations

None noted so far but only had system a week or so.

I've been looking at "home theatre in a box" systems for some time but not being well versed in the technology kept putting off a purchase. When the new issue of Consumer Reports rated this system as tops (over some that cost more than 3 times as much) I took the plunge. Installation was straightforward - even when I wall mounted rear speakers and had long cable runs. Everything worked first time. I upgraded from supplied cables (exceedingly thin) to Monster Cables.

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None

price...caught it for 247.00 at CC. the active sub.

like i said for 250.00 what do you really expect?

just recently bought this to compliment a 20 jvc flat screen in a smaller sized bedroom. comparatively, this system is just as good as the next within this price range ie. kenwood, panasonic, magnavox, venturer. one bright point is the 50 watt active sub that comes with the system. most of the others are passive that connect via speaker cable. i have the sub at 50% volume and it's plenty for the room. the speakers are nothing special, but what would you expect for 250.00? the reciever comes with dts, 5.1 and a variety of "sony" inspired listening modes all of which are pretty useless as far as i'm concerned. it has coax and digital audio hook up's and component video as well. i would recommend buying some 14/16 gauge speaker wire, a coax cable and a sub cable. the system includes all of these, but they are horrible and with a smaller system like this, you want to take advantage of every possible angle you can to improve the signal...and yes, i did notice a considerable difference after switching out the cables. i liked the fact that you can customize your setup. for example the distance between the front, center and rear speakers to the listening posistion, boosting the db for all 5 speakers as well as the sub is cool as well. the reciever at 80 watts pushes the speakers to the brink at max volumes, but if you are like most people who buy this system, who are relatively new to home theater and this is the first system in there home, you will get bit buy the bug and eventually upgrade even if it's just upgrading the speakers and keeping the reciever.

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none. demode many, but have a marantz system with overture 3's for my main theater system.