Woefull HDMI support

[admin_exported]

First of all, Hi everyone, I'm afraid I come with a bit of a rant.

I'm looking at AV amp/receivers, right now just specs, and I'm pretty dismayed by the lack of support for "the future" ie HDMI in/outputs

Shortlisted, or to give an idea of what I'm looking at, are the Arcam AVR600, Denon AVR4308, and rotel RSX1560.

I'm using a pair of celestion A3's and A1's for center/surround, rated at 4 ohms I want something powerfull, fully equipped yet also decent with music.

All of these amps have 4-5 HDMI inputs, then a vast expanse of analougue stereo, composite and s-v sockets. Isn't this the wrong way round? Lets look at a typical system you might build around a product like this

Reasonable HDMI req's

Bluray transport/player

Sky/cable box

Freeview/ freesat PVR

2nd DVD, perhaps for a format unsupported by the main DVD eg HD-DVD, or maybe 2nd zone source.

Console

Computer

Thats 6. Is there a product on the market that could accommodate this, never mind what may arrive soon eg IPTV? In fact given the multi-zone nature of the boxes above multiple DVD & tuners is surely not an inconceivable setup?

Why so few HDMI's and so many analogue sockets? How many people buying a £2-3k AV amp are gonna need 7 composite video inputs? sure many will have an old VCR and a turntable, perhaps cassette deck and a laserdisk, so that 2xstereo and 2x video iputs, allow a couple more for stuff not yet upgraded to HDMI?

Is anyone else as equally annoyed as me that these products seem engineered to be just about sufficient for today? Or do you know of one that'll suit me?

I want a AV amp that'll be a centrepiece for ~10 years, not be connected via an array of multi wotsits and looped connections.

 

[TheHomeCinemaCentre]

The most I can think of is 6 inputs on the likes of the Sony STRDA5400 and Pioneer LX90. if you need more then there are devices that will allow you to route 24 inputs or more. The products of today are built to help as many people as possible. Six inputs is enough for the vast majority of people, I can only think of one system in the last 100 that we have completed that we running low on available space.

Nick

 

[simonlewis]

I have the onkyo 606 which has four HDMI inputs & two spare on my tv (1 used) which gives me six & thats plenty for me i'll probably never need more than six.

Anymore & thats just plain greedy.

 

[John Duncan]

unconditional:I want a AV amp that'll be a centrepiece for ~10 years

And if you'd said that ten years ago, how many HDMI inputs would it have had?

 

[Clare Newsome]

unconditional:
Shortlisted, or to give an idea of what I'm looking at, are the Arcam AVR600, Denon AVR4308, and rotel RSX1560.

If you're looking for a future-proof AV amp, shortlisting products that are at least a year old (Denon, Rotel) isn't the best place to start.

Also, up-to-the-minute digital specs plus great musicality don't typically go hand-in-hand - the Arcam (plus the latest Marantzs) potentially the exception. We look forward to testing how the very promising-looking Arcam fits the bill...

 

[d4v3pum4]

There's no such thing as a future proof AV receiver. If I had the budget, I would be looking at a decent processor and power amp setup. Unfortunately there's not much around but at least if you went with such a setup, you'd only be upgrading the processor and not the whole she-bang.

 

[Anonymous]

Clare Newsome:If you're looking for a future-proof AV amp, shortlisting products that are at least a year old (Denon, Rotel) isn't the best place to start.

Heh, new to me, and latest or not not they're whats being offered for the price. I've been intending to upgrade my electronics for years, and thought that now the HD format is settled the lower volume producers would have embraced HD as one of the focal points of upmarket AV kit. But not so much it seems so as to make HDMI the primary transfer format... while 4 or 5 may be generally sufficient today is HDMI not the connector the future will be based around?

And granted, there's no such thing as future proof, but given the low uptake of HD in comparison to SD DVD I doubt we're going to see any fantastic new formats anytime soon, and now that evan cheap SD DVD players & freeview boxes are being shipped with HDMI why is it still being treated as a novelty on upmarket AV amps?