Denon AVR-X4700H 2020 AVR Review

[davidc]

This really, really, really sucks! I was just about to upgrade from my 4311ci. It really, really, really sucks because the Denon (and Marantz) are now the only manufacturers with AVR's that have all the features I want, and most importantly Audyssey.

How come so few manufactures use Audyssey now? Or, why can't somebody come out with a fair competition to Audyssey in an AVR that has all the features I want. Onkyo used to use Audyssey...I know there is better than Audyssey, but not built into a receiver with all the features I want/need.

 

[davidc]

Why not? There's always been 2 channel purists and surround aficionados from day one. Surround was always a poor cousin and just a gimmicky thing from the very first Dolby surround matrix processors/amplifiers sold for people to add-on a set of rear speakers and "decode" the surround track embedded in stereo movie soundtracks. It's still a whizz-bang, impress your friends with explosions, tacky experience, from the faux cinema light strips on the carpet, to the hideous cinema chairs and the Hollywood hills wallpaper and popcorn machines. Some of the installations I've seen are just putrid.

With the surround formats changing faster than I change my underpants, why anyone would invest vast sums in giant AVRs or

My 2ch music systems are for music. They never get obsoleted- ever. My TV/Movie sound is a completely different setup. It does the job and that's all I care about. We don't need our bowels ruptured by subwoofers reproducing battlescenes in the loungeroom- that's for kids. The systems never meet and likely never will. I like it that way. The day I play a movie soundtrack over my 2 channel music system is the day I sell it all and buy a Bose soundbar (do they make one?).

Hmm...when you really think about the truth here, I'm not so sure you really want to say this out loud...Lol

 

[davidc]

Sure, that was my point: "it's a management choice because I cannot think we haven't got good engineers anymore". We have plenty of them, it's just that good engineering is not a management priority anymore. Even because, differently than in the past, nobody takes the time to measure things anymore. When I started with this "hobby" there were audio magazines all over reviewing stuff with pages and pages of measures. Only here we had no less than five different audio magazines with internal labs measuring the shit out of every piece of hardware. Where are they now? I think Stereophile is the last well known printed audio magazine in the world with actual measures, that's why Amir work here is important I agree 100%.

This is so so so so true. I've been an audiophile since I was about 9 yrs old, 'cause my dad was one. I grew up with multiple American mags, and a bunch of British ones if I could find them, doing bench testing on every damn product out there. I was partially out of the hobby for a long time, and when I came back and found that hardly any testing is done anymore, and manufactures don't even adhere to the previously used "law", which was almost considered a death penalty if you didn't, the FTC Amplifier power rating standard, I was shocked! What the heck had happened? At first, I thought, well perhaps electronics and manufacturing have gotten so good in the last 25yrs that all audio products have gotten so good that we don't even need to measure them anymore. Boy, did this review show me how wrong this is? This is all so disappointing.

 

[davidc]

The smaller boutique brands (e. B&K) have gone out of business or left the market (e.g Adcom), mostly because you need an expensive team of people to implement the “stickers” so many consumers care about. Each sticker costs money to design the functionality and royalty to the patent holder. Just look at the issues Emotiva is having with implementing Dirac.

I’m believe there is a market for a “sport” series of AVRs [think of the Honda Civic Type R or the Toyota Camry TRD), where you pay for performance but get less features. And I don’t think it would be overly expensive to implement.

Take a Yamaha RX-A3080 for example. It costs $2,199. Jack the price to $2,999 and remove: MusicCast, DTS-X, 3 HDMI inputs, multi-zones, Bluetooth, Airplay, Voice control). Then make some improvements to the DAC, better amplification and, just like Epson does with their pro-series projectors, QC important parts for variance in production and hand pick the best performing units for this product.

Edit: I almost forgot the most important part. The new name is “RX-A3080 Premium”

OMG! Did you just compare the Civic Type R to a Camry? (It doesn't matter what kind of Camry). Sacrilege.

 

[A800]

You can't compare the Civic Type R to anything really...

 

[lashto]

I don't disagree, my key point about their choice of DAC, and other chips too actually is that they all behave less than good, not that they are good relative to others, hope I made that clear as it sounds clumsy to me lol..

You might remember I posted a few times about the volume control chip (credit to Dr. Rich who wrote extensively about the importance of that chip), on that one Denon is miles ahead because the NJU72343 is only a few years old and has half the distortions of those used in the NAD, Onkyo and Yamaha's. Did you know that the one used in the A-S801 was already discontinued even at launch time? So I think using Yamaha as an example is actually quite fair, again relatively speaking. And again, I am agreeing with your point, my counter point is simply Denon is not the only one. So they all should do better, and hopefully won't start racing to the bottom.

Sounds like we agree almost 100%. Party at 11

Don't know much about Yamaha, could be that it's a more fair alternative. But I am still not aware of a single AVR that measures good and/or worth the money. Nope, not even the x3600.

As about Dr.Rich, I probably missed your posts but knew about his AVR investigation and also linked it in my posts. It's so good and useful, I would repeat it in every AVR thread/post

 

[BsdKurt]

Scratch that! There is a new development!

Awesome!

 

[raistlin65]

Scratch that! There is a new development!

Can't wait to hear the news. Gotta X4700H that I pre-ordered still in the box. Have been debating on whether to give Yamaha a try, as I mainly want Audyssey for the subs and could use a mini DSP HD instead.

 

[tparm]

Scratch that! There is a new development!

What is the development @amirm ? Picking up my new X3600 in about and hour and half unless you have some late breaking news.

 

[lashto]

Again, it is your opinion that the measurements show this product to be trash. I didn't call it such.

May I call it trash? Pretty please

I promise to do it in a most thoughtful and truthful manner, worthy of the best marketing leaflets ever. And I will treasure it as my own, 100% sincere Customer Opinion!

P.S.
extra bonus: I will print a "trash" label using Denon's beautiful fonts and stick it to my very own Sound United receiver. Right near the HDAudio sticker that Sound United marketing so thoughtfully gives us 'for free'.

 

[davidc]

You can't compare the Civic Type R to anything really...

Except my beloved S2000 of course!

 

[raistlin65]

May I call it trash? Pretty please

I wouldn't call the X4700 trash. Based on Amir's measurements of AVRs to date, I would call it "industry standard," and the X3600 was likely an accident. lol

 

[IslandMD]

This really, really, really sucks! I was just about to upgrade from my 4311ci. It really, really, really sucks because the Denon (and Marantz) are now the only manufacturers with AVR's that have all the features I want, and most importantly Audyssey.

How come so few manufactures use Audyssey now? Or, why can't somebody come out with a fair competition to Audyssey in an AVR that has all the features I want. Onkyo used to use Audyssey...I know there is better than Audyssey, but not built into a receiver with all the features I want/need.

The receiver you're looking for already exists: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...anthem-mrx1120-home-theater-avr-review.11911/

The Anthem MRX1120 measured very well, has excellent room correction and is rumoured to have HDMI 2.1 coming this year.

 

[EB1000]

Response from Denon's support:

"A recent review was brought to the attention of Denon wherein the reviewer contrasted the performance of two Denon products—the Denon AVR-X3600H and the recently announced AVR-X4700H—against one another. The reviewer offered a variety of bench test results, the subsequent conclusion was not favorable towards the new AVR-X4700H. Denon engineering is currently recreating testing completed by the reviewer in discussion. While there are many unknowns as it pertains to testing criteria, we expect to have our own results available to the public the week of June 29. Before any Denon product is introduced to the market, it undergoes tens of thousands of tests ensuring the absolute best quality product. Denon unequivocally stands by its standards of excellence and strictly adheres to industry best practices. Denon will be in contact with the reviewer to ensure we’re all operating against a set of standardized conditions to guarantee consistency and clarity moving forward. "

 

[GXAlan]

That's a nice contrast to lab gruppen. Best case scenario, Denon figures out a fix or offers a rebate on the x4700H. Worst case scenario, they chalk it up to trade off between extra CPU power/8K and what's audible. But in any case, they acknowledge the review and are going to *try* to see how they can make their products better.

Lab gruppen deleted a post from their message boards when someone wrote about the E series seeming to be underpowered.

Kudos to Denon. They have the most reliable HDMI CEC. The X3600H offers super performance, well about its price range. Audyssey XT32 is "pretty good". If they can extend that x3600H performance across the product line, they potentially will dominate the home theater AVR market even more than they already do. If they can throw CPU power at Audyssey to increase sampling rate, and throw an engineer to buy out Ratbuddysey and leverage open-source House curves to create an updated version of the MultEQ app, they will be able to capture the 2ch hi-fi world too.

 

[tparm]

Response from Denon's support:

"A recent review was brought to the attention of Denon wherein the reviewer contrasted the performance of two Denon products—the Denon AVR-X3600H and the recently announced AVR-X4700H—against one another. The reviewer offered a variety of bench test results, the subsequent conclusion was not favorable towards the new AVR-X4700H. Denon engineering is currently recreating testing completed by the reviewer in discussion. While there are many unknowns as it pertains to testing criteria, we expect to have our own results available to the public the week of June 29. Before any Denon product is introduced to the market, it undergoes tens of thousands of tests ensuring the absolute best quality product. Denon unequivocally stands by its standards of excellence and strictly adheres to industry best practices. Denon will be in contact with the reviewer to ensure we’re all operating against a set of standardized conditions to guarantee consistency and clarity moving forward. "

Pretty cool Tens of thousands... that's a lot. Pretty quick turn-around if they meet the deadline of the 29th.

 

[kokishin]

Scratch that! There is a new development!

I was going to reply to your post https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...00h-2020-avr-review.14188/page-35#post-439845 until I saw this post.

I'm not surprised Denon Japan is on top of this. Although it's been a while, I called on PC design groups in Japan (Sony, Toshiba, NEC, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Panasonic) as well as other companies outside the PC space. Japanese engineers take this stuff seriously. After these tech issues are resolved, wouldn't surprise me if you get an invite to a lovely Japanese dinner should you ever travel to Japan again.

I lived in Ebisu Minami. There was a D&M office near where I lived. I walked by on leisurely walks with Mrs K and think someday I'll own a D or M product. One day, I bought a tiny 5.1 Denon system at BIC Camera. It was kind of a toy system but it was a good fit for my mansion (Japanese for condo).

Much later after I repatriated, I bought my Denon 6200 because it was made in Japan. Could have saved some coin and bought the 4200 but I wanted Japanese quality.

I know D&M has been through a couple of corporate owners since my Tokyo days but I still believe in Japanese quality.

 

[peng]

and throw an engineer to buy out Ratbuddysey and leverage open-source House curves to create an updated version of the MultEQ app, they will be able to capture the 2ch hi-fi world too.

Excellent idea, if they do that, it should get them within striking distance of Dirac Live.

 

[peng]

Pretty cool Tens of thousands... that's a lot. Pretty quick turn-around if they meet the deadline of the 29th.

That could be true if they count any and all tests of anything they sell.

 

[Orbit]

Response from Denon's support:

"A recent review was brought to the attention of Denon wherein the reviewer contrasted the performance of two Denon products—the Denon AVR-X3600H and the recently announced AVR-X4700H—against one another. The reviewer offered a variety of bench test results, the subsequent conclusion was not favorable towards the new AVR-X4700H. Denon engineering is currently recreating testing completed by the reviewer in discussion. While there are many unknowns as it pertains to testing criteria, we expect to have our own results available to the public the week of June 29. Before any Denon product is introduced to the market, it undergoes tens of thousands of tests ensuring the absolute best quality product. Denon unequivocally stands by its standards of excellence and strictly adheres to industry best practices. Denon will be in contact with the reviewer to ensure we’re all operating against a set of standardized conditions to guarantee consistency and clarity moving forward. "

A sizable number of future Denon Receiver sales are at stake with Denon’s response. Will Denon make the right choice to capture those sales?

Will Denon choose to be known for quality by acknowledging the issue, and committing to a path forward to fix the issue, even though hardware redesign is involved, and thus win the sales and loyalty of the many people out there who make purchases based on data about quality?
or
Will Denon use fancy words to try and say there is not an issue, or the issue does not matter, or make a firmware “fix” that doesn’t actually fix the real problem when we already have the objective test data in front of us proving there is an issue, and thus loose the sales of those who care about quality and research products before purchasing them?

There is no way for Denon to cover up the deficiencies of the 4700h relative to the 3600. The problems have been exposed to the world through the testing available on the internet that is available to anyone who wants to see it. Just google, 4700h review, and this review showing the deficiencies is the FIRST thing that come up. So every person that googles 4700h review will immediately see the deficiencies.

Denon – Make the right choice and fix the 4700h so that its performance is equal to or better than the 3600. And while your at it make sure you fix the 2700h, 3700h, & 6700h too.