AV reciever for SACD/CD/DVD-A

[Overdose]

Hi all,
I have been pondering on various future upgrades to my system, which at the moment consists of OPPO 981 player, Panasonic SA-HE9 reciever and B&W 602 speakers. I know the OPPO is supposed to be a good player, but the sound is somewhat hamstrung by the reciever. The reciever was only bought as a cheap all purpose amp for music and films. My question really is this, is it possible to get music playback quality comparable to dedicated music SACD/DVD-A players and amps, using a high quality AV reciever? I have been considering the Yamaha CD-S1000 and A-S1000 for SACD and CD music playback, but this would mean having two players and two amps, one set for music and one for home theatre. My aim is to reduce the amount of boxes and cables on my rack. I would also like to point out at this time, that the cost of hi-res formats has so far put me off buying them, with the exception of Dark Side of The Moon 30th anniversary SACD arriving tomorrow.

My initial thought was to get something like the Onkyo TX-SR875 or similar, as it has an HDMI audio input for the OPPO.

 

[pete321]

Hi, I used to own an Onkyo TX-NR905 but always found it a bit too lean sounding with music, I certainly preferred the music abilities of the Pioneer non-HDMI AV amp it replaced. However, I never tried it with SACD, the 875 and 905 importantly both support the SACD DSD signal over HDMI which not all AV amps do. I'm currently using a Yamaha DSP-Z7 which accepts DSD over HDMI and sounds great. I think you've got to stick to the idea that a good AV amp will be the equivalent to a stereo amp at one third it's price. So if you apply that logic to the 875 when it was new it would equate to stereo amp performance of about £300.

 

[Overdose]

Thanks for the reply. I understand what you are saying about the dedicated hifi vs AV amp price thing. I think the problem is the multi-channel music from the SACD meaning you need a surround sound set up to experience the music as it was intended and therefore would need an AV reciever for this?

I take it that you prefer your Yamaha to the Onkyo?

 

[pete321]

Overdose: I take it that you prefer your Yamaha to the Onkyo?

Yes, but it's in a different price bracket, the RRP of the Z7 is £2000 and the Onkyo 905 had an RRP of £1400. I thought the Onkyo was just OK and I paid £800 for it. The Z7 replaced my £3000 Arcam AVR600 which I got a refund for after getting fed-up with it's unresolved bugs. The Z7 has proved to be excellent value for money IMO, especially as you can get if for £1500 now. I'd say it's stereo music performance is close to the Roksan Kandy III, with surround SACD/DVD-A via HDMI from my Oppo it's superb.

 

[Overdose]

Thanks for all that.

The Roksan Kandy CDP and amp was on my dedicated hifi short list, so for a similar price, it would seem that I can achieve the sound quality I was looking for and have a first rate home theatre experience to boot.