BudgetAudiophile

1339 readers

1 users here now

A place for AUDIO enthusiast to share, discuss and listen to others people setups

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

KintsugiUwU@lemmy.world

Thoughts on the Yamaha RX-V4A (lemmy.world)

submitted 4 months ago by Delphia@lemmy.world to c/budgetaudiophile@lemmy.world

1 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Ive been looking into what I can put together for the price I can get a Samsung q990f system for and this reciever seems to do everything I want and it has the benefit of being cheapish.

Essentially I want to watch 4k blurays on a 4k tv with good surround sound. I love the "one box, minimal wires, no legwork" nature of the Samsung. That has value to me. BUT its not quite as good and if something in the bar goes dead, the whole setup is pretty much garbage. So I'm exploring my options.

Second hand receivers that arent 15 years old are still demanding half of what that receiver costs me new, and it seems to have everything that someone setting up a budget 4k 5.1 home theater could want. So, thoughts?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] IMALlama@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

IMO what you're really asking about are your options for routing AV signals. These days you have two choices:

Run all your AV sources through your receiver and have it switch them
Run all your video sources into your TV and have your it switch them

Both options come with their own pros and cons.

In no particular order, here are some option 1 pros:

You only need to run a single wire to your TV. This usually results in new sources showing up next to your receiver
Gives you onscreen overlays (volume, meun/settings, etc) for your receiver
Enables you to have per-source settings (eg give this source more gain than some other source)

Option 2 cons:

If you want to hear any audio that originates from your TV (eg a smart TV running netflix/whatever) you're going to need to pipe it to your stereo, which now gives you another wire
You're limited to the IO of your receiver. When a new signal path becomes available that your receiver doesn't support you're going to be faced with upgrading your receiver and likely your TV

Option 2 pros:

You only need to run a single wire to your receiver. This usually results in new sources showing up next to your TV
When new video tech/standards come along you will hopefully only need to upgrade your TV

Option 2 cons:

You will end up switching sources on both your TV and your receiver if you want to listen to audio only sources (radio, physical media, even audio streaming via a HDMI based chromecast/fire stick/whatever)
Your TV must be on for any "video" based

As option 1 is the "classical" way of doing things, most receivers are geared this way and have a huge amount of IO.

There are multiple ways to realize option 2, including:

Using the RCA audio outputs on your TV if so equipped and you have enough outputs for the number of audio channels desired
Using the digital audio output (optical, coax) on your TV
Using HDMI ARC and connect it directly to your receiver or to an interface box that breaks out analog audio channels

I personally run a receiver from the 1970s using the optical audio out on my TV and an interface box for 2.0 sound. I use my receiver to switch audio only sources and my TV to switch video sources.

Many receivers have supported both optical and coax inputs for a long time, so if your TV supports that as an output option this would enable you to use an older receiver and save some $$.

If you want to go the HDMI ARC route you're going to need a new(er) receiver. The standard was introduced in 2009 for 5.1 audio. eARC was introduced in 2017 and supports many more audio channels.