First post - low budget receiver (1 Viewer)

[parin_patel]

Adam, to answer your other questions:

The Onkyo and Denon receivers will definately sound great with both movies and music. And as Reggie mentioned, they match up really well with JBL speakers. That was one of the things I noticed when comparing them to the Sony receiver, which was great with movies (I really like their Cinema Studio DSP modes) but was average with music.

Using the DVD player to play CD's really depends on the DAC's on the DVD Player, and I don't really have much experience with the Panasonic DVD-RA60 to comment much on it. You should let your ears decide that one. I've heard that the Panasonic RP-91 is good with both DVD's and CD's and if the model you're looking at is anything similar to that you should be ok.

Personally I am using my computer in another room to play DVD's, CD's and MP3's. They're hooked up to the Onkyo 595 by a pair of Digital Coaxial SPDIF cables from my sound card (Soundblaster Live 5.1) and dvd decoder card (Realmagic Hollywood Plus, comes with a remote). The setup works very well for me and gives a lot of flexibility.

 

[Adam Bluhm]

Thanks for the reply. Now I have to research DAC's. It's just something new for me to learn. I'll do research on the player. I'm still confused as to why I'll see the DVD RA-60 on sites for retail but not on the Panasonic site (not to mention the many other products along the same lines). Heck, I have an August 2001 wholesale book and it doesn't list the RA-60 (among others). Ah well. Life can be a mystery.. for me anyway.
«edit»
Okay, I just checked audiovideo101.com and found that DAC is basically the D/A converter. I have no idea about individual quality of brands converters themselves, but do know it has a 96khz converter.

 

[parin_patel]

Just read your last post Adam after typing my last reply...

You should be able to find the Onkyo 595 (75 Watts/channel) from J&R or BestPriceAudioVideo, both authorized dealers, for around $400 shipped. And I think Earl Simpson mentioned in some other post that you can get a good deal for the Denon for a pretty good price from 6th Ave (another authorized dealer). Also, the watts per channel rating on receivers can be deceptive sometimes. For example Kenwood and Sony rate even their basic receivers at 100 Watts (usually thats tested at 1 kHz, with only one channel being driven). Onkyo and Denon are better with their power ratings (they test from 20 Hz-20kHz) and are also high current (more amperage) receivers.

Anyway, good luck with setting your system up.