Review and Measurements of Anthem MRX 520 AVR

[peng]

The DAC in it sucks. I should have clarified...the built in amps are excellent. I use an external DAC.

Definitely rated as less power than the others but the sound is better than most receivers of the era.

Not just the DAC, the more critical preamp/vol IC sucks even more:

You can download the service manual and then the datasheet for that Renesas/Mitsubishi IC M61516FP and check out the specs yourself:

https://www.vintageshifi.com/repertoire-pdf/pdf/telecharge.php?pdf=Nad-T-753-Service-Manual.pdf
http://pdf.datasheetcatalog.com/datasheet/MitsubishiElectricCorporation/mXtqqqv.pdf


The T753 is not that powerful either, the S&V charts below shows even the lower mid range Denon beat it in not only two channel driven into 4 ohms, but even in 5 channel driven into 8 ohms though marginally in that case.

Not only that, the cross talks and noise were poor too, consistent with Amir's measurements on the much more up to date T758 V3. Sorry, I don't mean to contradict your subjective impression of you T753, but I can't help but wonder how it can "sound better most receivers of the era" when the specs and measurements are so much poorer.

Anyway, here are the links if you are interested:

Read more at https://www.soundandvision.com/content/nad-t-753-av-receiver-ht-labs-measures#U3zWBlJAAhgRUXv5.99

NAD T753

Into 4 ohms, the amplifier reaches 0.1% distortion at 122.6 watts and 1% distortion at 146.3 watts.
Crosstalk at 1 kHz driving 2.83 volts into an 8-ohm load was –61.60 dB left to right and –61.48 dB right to left. The signal-to-noise ratio with 2.83 volts driving an 8-ohm load from 10 Hz to 24 kHz with "A" weighting was –88.67 dBrA.


Read more at https://www.soundandvision.com/cont...eceiver-review-test-bench#KoWKiehGy2iJ4MwT.99
http://pdf.datasheetcatalog.com/datasheet/MitsubishiElectricCorporation/mXtqqqv.pdf

Into 4 ohms, the amplifier reaches 0.1% distortion at 145.4 watts and 1% distortion at 176.6 watts.

Crosstalk at 1 kHz driving 2.83 volts into an 8-ohm load was –82.08 dB left to right and –80.79 dB right to left. The signal-to-noise ratio with an 8-ohm load from 10 Hz to 24 kHz with “A” weighting was –109.98 dBrA.

 

[RichB]

I’m glad I only pay $300 or so for slightly dated and highly discounted AVRs. If the companies are going to charge $1300 and play the minimally acceptable engineering game I’ll just buy in at the lower price range where perhaps I am getting what I am paying for, and just be glad I’m too technically oblivious to know the difference. It seems like charging that much for such mediocre performance under the hood borders on dishonesty. For that kind of money it should just clean knock it out of the park. IMHO, etc.

I agree. The only problem is it is hard to find 7.1 analog outputs for <$1000.
Even then, the outputs may be crippled by the amps coupling distortion.

- Rich

 

[RichB]

Just buy the Anthem monoblocks. 2000 watts into 4 ohms and fine into 2 ohms. Only $3499 each. They'll play your Maggies for you. Or you could cheap out and get the Anthem 5 channel amp with 400 watts into 4 ohms and 2 ohm capable. Same $3499 per amp. That reduces your per channel cost to less than $500 per channel.

The M2 class-D amps would not fair well measured here:

https://www.stereophile.com/content/anthem-statement-m1-monoblock-power-amplifier-measurements

Without the AP filter, the Anthem's wideband, unweighted signal/noise ratio, ref. 2.83V into 8 ohms with the input shorted, was miserable: 10.4dB, due to the ultrasonic noise. With the AP low-pass filter this improved to 63.9dB, and restricting the measurement bandwidth to 22Hz–22kHz made a further improvement, to 75.5dB. A-weighting the measurement gave a ratio of 82.1dB. Anthem specifies the M1 as having an A-weighted S/N of 113dB ref. 1000W into 8 ohms. This level is 30dB higher than 2.83V, giving a measured A-weighted S/N of 112.1dB, which basically confirms the specification. Fig.4 shows a low-frequency spectral analysis of the M1's output, taken with the AP filter in-circuit while the amplifier reproduced a 1kHz tone at 100W into 8 ohms. The noise floor is very low, with no AC supply–related components visible.

Gymnastics were required to determine that this product meets the published specs.

- Rich

 

[maty]

The DAC is just so so, not as good as Denon/Marantz/Yamaha's. That's why I am confident it would impress Amir more because he focus a lot on SINAD, not just THD.

I am also not very interested in SINAD measurements. I prefer to focus on SNR-A, THD + N and harmonic profile.

[Polish] https://audio.com.pl/testy/kino-domowe/amplitunery-av/3004-yamaha-rx-v685

In general, I do not like to see H3 predominant (and the very awful H5) even if it is below 90 dB. For me it is indicative that something has not been done well, that only good numbers have been sought as too much NFB in class A or AB amps,... and not in the sound quality of the music played.

PS: But do not pay much attention to me, here are a few who continually say that I know nothing at all.

 

[SEKLEM]

The days of highly competitive AVRs seems to be at an end. Just as HDMI was becoming commonplace on modern receivers and processors the competition was fierce and I suspect that sales were good. Economies of scale seemed to favor the receiver market for a time. Now alternative solutions pervade consumer audio. Soundbars have no doubt dealt a significant blow to the pursuit of reasonably priced quality audio equipment.

 

[pozz]

1. The majority of customers know what they want but have a hard time determining what they need
2. Customers are fixated by price

Good points.

 

[617]

If we could do software Dolby and DTS decoding in say VLC, we wouldn't need this overpriced under-performing gear. Decode into a digital stream and shoot it to an 8 channel pro interface and onto amps. Great performance for relatively peanuts. An example of why MQA is a bad idea for stereo.

So, this is my question - is there software that can do this decoding? I keep thinking these devices are doing computery stuff and audio stuff at the same time, A htpc might be an ideal solution to this whole mess. What surround formats do you really need to decode, for say 4k streamed online content (not blu-ray) I mostly watch netflix/hbo stuff.

 

[Dj7675]

Am I correct to find the total device (DAC/AMP) SINAD you would could use this calculator: http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-thd.htm
If that is correct, and using -96 and -65 values I get a value of -65. Or am I incorrectly applying this calculator to these numbers?
It seems like the limiting factor in the AVR testing is going to be the AMPS. Does it seem to be unrealistic for an amp in an AVR to hit a SINAD of 96. When I look at the AMP chart, and see the Nord NC500 based amp at a SINAD of 96, it seems not very likely to see anything approaching that in an AVR. If that is the case, what would be a reasonable SINAD number to expect in an AVR?

 

[GrimSurfer]

Am I correct to find the total device (DAC/AMP) SINAD you would could use this calculator: http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-thd.htm
If that is correct, and using -96 and -65 values I get a value of -65. Or am I incorrectly applying this calculator to these numbers?
It seems like the limiting factor in the AVR testing is going to be the AMPS. Does it seem to be unrealistic for an amp in an AVR to hit a SINAD of 96. When I look at the AMP chart, and see the Nord NC500 based amp at a SINAD of 96, it seems not very likely to see anything approaching that in an AVR. If that is the case, what would be a reasonable SINAD number to expect in an AVR?

You're using it correctly. That's why putting one piece of crap in an audio chain can have such a massively deleterious effect on the system THD.

 

[Icboschert]

So, this is my question - is there software that can do this decoding? I keep thinking these devices are doing computery stuff and audio stuff at the same time, A htpc might be an ideal solution to this whole mess. What surround formats do you really need to decode, for say 4k streamed online content (not blu-ray) I mostly watch netflix/hbo stuff.

I think that you can get 4K and Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 from the Netflix app on Windows 8/10. The browser won't fully deliver it I don't think.

 

[Dj7675]

You're using it correctly. That's why putting one piece of crap in an audio chain can have such a massively deleterious effect on the system THD.

Thanks for confirming. With hi resolution audio for music and things like DTS Master Audio available, it is amazing how difficult it is to even get a system to fully resolve 16 bit CD quality from nearly 40 years ago, let alone anything higher.

 

[GrimSurfer]

This is what makes the Anthem and NAD measurements so disappointing.

 

[amirm]

If we could do software Dolby and DTS decoding in say VLC, we wouldn't need this overpriced under-performing gear. Decode into a digital stream and shoot it to an 8 channel pro interface and onto amps. Great performance for relatively peanuts. An example of why MQA is a bad idea for stereo.

You can get a number of media players like JRiver that do the decoding. Unfortunately you still can't replace an AVR.

The typical scenario for an AVR is a cable or satellite box and a Blu-ray player as two physical inputs. Hardware is needed to switch between those two sources. Software alone won't work. Even having "cable card" support and built-in disc player won't work because the former won't support the user interface for on-demand content.

 

[amirm]

No, I'm talking about zero ground potential in the audio signal. Correct for balanced gear, there is a common signal between two conductors that are inversely phased to audio ground. However, in the case of the Anthem and most devices you test which are unbalanced they don't even have a mains ground since they are mostly class 2 type devices. This means you could have stray voltage between the test device and your analyzer.

It seems majority of the focus is in SINAD in the reviews and measurements. If all the devices tested started at a zero protential, I would expect you might get slightly better measurements. The common earth ground will reduce backround noise shunting any electromagnetic and radio frequency interference away from shields and chassis. Since, in unbalanced audio interconnects, there is a direct signal mode between one signal conductor and the audio ground. The audio ground is part of an audio signal that is commonly connected the equipment chassis, which itself is normally referenced to earth ground. It also would be best practice in your lab. https://www.ap.com/technical-library/recommended-test-system-grounding/ Also see chassis ground vs signal ground https://www.rane.com/note151.html

I addressed most of this in my response. On references, I highly recommend reading Bill Whitlock's papers that is referenced in Rane's article above.

The notion that earth ground reduces background noise/shunting/etc. is simply a myth. Electricity requires a loop. There is no loop at the end of a earth connection. Why would the electrons want to go there? Try lighting up a light bulb with a battery while connecting one leg. Nothing will happen because there is no loop.

Earth safety ground is for just that: safety. If your enclosure becomes hot, it provides a way to trip the breaker. It has no other role in fidelity and should not be considered such. Period.

Now, unbalanced audio signals are a faulty system. They use equipment chassis as a reference. This chassis, even if you deployed "star grounding" can still have differential at both ends. This is caused for example by capacitance between input and output of a transformer, to the case, Y caps in switching power supplies, etc. So you can do all you want with connecting chassis together and still have mains leakage.

As I explained, in my testing if I see mains leakage, I do experiment with different groundings. In general, 90% of the time it makes things worse, not better than leaving my analyzer floating. The analyzer operates as a partial-balanced connection in that manner, providing some level of immunity to ground currents.

Regardless of all of this, we can tell easily from the dashboard if we have ground/mains leakage:

In this case, there are no mains components above the noise floor of the measurements. So it is not a concern at all, nor would it impact SINAD in any manner.

In other cases, when there is mains leakage, it easily shows up:

So for me it is easy to see if there is a problem or not. And whether the solutions do anything. Nothing is missed in this regard in my measurements.

So in summary, best answer here is to use balanced connections. If you use RCA, then anything you play with can make things worse or better. You just don't know without instrumentation. Even then, the instrument may act one way, and your audio system another. Just a bad system all around.

 

[MaxTemp]

I was hoping miracles would save this AVR, but its just as disappointing as the NAD 758 V3.
Is there any hope for Arcam AVR390? If using an external amplifier (Rotel RMB 1585) and possibly only using 2 of the internal amps for the ceiling speakers for ATMOS duties, would the Arcam be better?
Thanks for enlightening us Amir.

 

[graz_lag]

@amirm
RE: Yamaha DSP Z7. Would you mind dropping an eye to the measurements from Audioholics? Based on these, how would you compare the DSP Z7 to the two craps (NAD & Anthem) you recently reviewed?
Thank you so much!
https://www.audioholics.com/av-receiver-reviews/rx-z7-7.1/rx-z7-measurements

 

[Dj7675]

While a little off topic, I think it is a relevant enough to ask here. While neither have been measured here yet what would be possible to make an educated guess on the SINAD of these 2 products: Emotiva XMC1 and a multichannel amp based on the NC252 hypex module. XMC1 does not do Atmos and limited to Dirac Version 1, but otherwise am I correct that this combo would likely exceed a combined 96 SINAD? Granted, this would be quite a bit more expensive that either the MRX520 or NAD T758 V3 but I think the performance would also be a big jump it would seem as well. I have located an XMC1 for $950 and am thinking about getting it for either our living room 2.1 setup, or our theater setup and skipping atmos.

 

[amirm]

@amirm
RE: Yamaha DSP Z7. Would you mind dropping an eye to the measurements from Audioholics? Based on these, how would you compare the DSP Z7 to the two craps (NAD & Anthem) you recently reviewed?
Thank you so much!
https://www.audioholics.com/av-receiver-reviews/rx-z7-7.1/rx-z7-measurements

I looked through them. It is very hard to correlate them with our measurements. Output levels are different, FFT is shown but not THD+N, etc.

 

[amirm]

I have located an XMC1 for $950 and am thinking about getting it for either our living room 2.1 setup, or our theater setup and skipping atmos.

You want to send it to me for measurement? The specs on their website shows better performance than anything I have measured here.

 

[graz_lag]

I looked through them. It is very hard to correlate them with our measurements. Output levels are different, FFT is shown but not THD+N, etc.

I know - that was the reason for which I have been asking for your help ...