My Pioneer SC-LX85 is no where near as versetile as my old £700 Denon !!!

[umbucker]

First of all I just wanted to point out that in general I am very happy with the increase in overall sound quality and power increase upgrading to my Pioneer SC-LX85. However in terms of its menu's, settings and over all ability to set up my speakers and system I was a bit disapointed with the Pioneer.

Stereo Mode
On the Denon there was the ability to access the settings for listening to music in Sterreo. THis meant you could set a different crossover, set the speakers to large to cancel the sub woofer ect.. I liked this as I would perfer to listen to music with no sub woofer, set the speakers to large. I would then revert back to a source such as Sky where DTS NEO would automaticaly be applied with the sub woofer engaged with a crossover at 60HZ

Crossover Settings
The Denon had the ability to be able to applly a crossover to each set of speakers. I have my large floorstanders set at 40HZ and my smaller centre and rears set to 80Hz. The Pioneer only has a single crossover which must be applied to all speakers.

To end, the menue system seemed to make more sense than the Pioneer, where everything was accessable. With the Pioneer it seems many of the functions and settings are allocated to buttons on the rmote, some buttons have more than 1 function on each button with a 'function 2' button to access them. I think it would have been far easier to be able to access all these fuunctions through an easy to use on screen menu.

 

[Amadeus1756]

Have you looked at using the app (if you have an iPhone or preferably an iPad)?

I think you're right in that remotes are often overcrowded due to the amount of functionality provided - I had a Sony VCR which was basically unusable for anything other than the basic functions because or all the other stuff that it could do.

Do you think your requirement for different crossovers for different speakers is unusual? It would imply that Pioneer would say so, and the fact that the WHF review doesn't cite it as a concern (not saying your need isn't real, more wondering how many other people would be affected). I am looking at the SC-LX85 and like you, will listen to music through it, tho cinema is my main use.

 

[Frank Harvey]

Pros and cons both ways.

Multiple crossover points enable the user to get the most out of each of their differing capability speakers.

A single crossover point means that all speakers are working within the same frequency range, making the soundfield far more consistent.

 

[kinda]

I definitely found it useful to have the separate crossovers on my Denon amp, and the auto-setup sets them at different levels, (the speakers are all the same make / type).

I previously had a Maranbtz, with a single crossover, and the sound definitely seemed more immersive and integrated front to rear with the Denon, which set the surround crossover lower than the fronts. I suppose with smaller sats as I have some of the bass from the sub is at a high enough frequency to be directional.

But in general I would have though the differing position of the speakers, and room acoustics, would make it useful to have separate crossover for each speaker. I naively thought it was standard now on newer receivers after getting the Denon.

I helped someone setting up a VSX 2020 not long ago and that seemed a lot less intuitive than the Yamaha, Marantz, and Denon menus I'd used before.