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Denon AVR-X4700H 2020 AVR Review

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polmuaddib

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I was thinking more for THD/SINAD/linearity than ultimate power output. While it would be nice to know what all-channel power actually is, I don't think it's worth testing to destruction. The reason is this line in the Emotiva A-500 review:

That to me seemed to nullify the importance of any test preceding it, because who is buying those to run stereo? That's a massive deviation in performance when used as intended.
I recently found out that some people are buying AVRs (usually Onkyo brand) for their All Channel Stereo option and are runnning multiple speakers that way. The claim is that they fill the room with sound and get a better stereo image in the whole room. They don't care about surround sound. When i had onkyo i did, sometimes, use all channel stereo for party, because i found that i didn't have to amplify too much.
But in those cases, i don't think that nuances in sound quality matter.
 

Promit

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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.
It's not your viewpoint I have a problem with, it's the condescension and generally bad attitude. You don't care about movies or surround. Good for you, by all means pursue what you enjoy. But the amount of time you spent in this post tearing down the very idea of enjoying surround audio, or movies? You can take that right back under the bridge where it belongs. It's not necessary for you to understand or appreciate the hobby, but the disrespectful, dismissive tone of your comment is emblematic of everything that is wrong with the audiophile community today. And I mean that sincerely.

It is important to me to build one system that performs well at everything - two channel music, surround music, movies, and games. That is my entire reason for reading here, participating here, and sending Amir two pieces of equipment so far. The AVR reviews are huge for me. I feel it's important to counter the viewpoint, expressed by someone in nearly every AVR thread on ASR, that a surround processor just needs to make noise and worrying about the numbers is pointless. I care a lot. A lot of people care a lot.
 

LTig

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*Edit: I forgot to mention that the tracks played for the DBT were at same volume levels on the AVR.
If a newbie to the audio world can hear the difference, you Sir, can surely discern it better :)
Was it the same volume setting or did you measure the output level with a voltmeter or another suitable instrument?
 

LTig

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I hope you are right. My concern is with so many companies having left the budget AVR business it is reduced competition which only leads to reduced quality.
My bigger concern is that too many seemingly competing companies belong to the same holding, reducing real competition much more than one thinks.
 

polmuaddib

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It's not your viewpoint I have a problem with, it's the condescension and generally bad attitude. You don't care about movies or surround. Good for you, by all means pursue what you enjoy. But the amount of time you spent in this post tearing down the very idea of enjoying surround audio, or movies? You can take that right back under the bridge where it belongs. It's not necessary for you to understand or appreciate the hobby, but the disrespectful, dismissive tone of your comment is emblematic of everything that is wrong with the audiophile community today. And I mean that sincerely.

It is important to me to build one system that performs well at everything - two channel music, surround music, movies, and games. That is my entire reason for reading here, participating here, and sending Amir two pieces of equipment so far. The AVR reviews are huge for me. I feel it's important to counter the viewpoint, expressed by someone in nearly every AVR thread on ASR, that a surround processor just needs to make noise and worrying about the numbers is pointless. I care a lot. A lot of people care a lot.
I agree. I love multichannel music and when the mix is done right it offers so much more then 2 channel version. I also enjoy 2 channel music very much and care for stereo soundstage and understand the appeal and simplicity of it.
But i think that everybody that feels that surround sound is a gimmick is missing out on a beautiful experience. I don't want to name a lot of examples, but the fact that a lot of classical music is done in mch is telling something.
When done right, surround sound just adds to 2 channel mix, it expands it. But there are mixes that puts you in the middle of a band and that does sound gimmicky and presumably that is something that made people avoid mch music. OTOH, a better example of surround mix that puts you in the middle of music are Pink Floyd's Wish you were here and dark side of the moon where there is more sense in listening the album surrounded by music and effects poping out all over. I believe those surround mixes for some music make sense more then regular stereo mix. They were originally inteded for quadrophonic, if i am not mistaken.
The old argument "I have two ears and the band is always playing in front of me, never behind me" is just that, old. Whenever i attended live event, amplified or not, never was music and all sound just in front of me. You always hear something in surround, whether reverb or audience...
As for gear, I hate the fact that i have both the stereo preamp with ht bypass and a AV system integrated instead of a good AVR or AV prepro. But of all the AVRs I tried (granted, not a lot, but some) they sound awfull in 2 channel reproduction. AVRs sound like a toy comparing to a good stereo system and that is the also the reason most audiophiles shun surround sound.
 

Fillius

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Is it possible some of the measured problems can be fixed with a firmware update if Denon were willing to put the effort in?

From the review:
"There is a common processing library these companies are using that causes multi-tone test to also be reproduced horribly"

This is despite that measurement being taken in pure-direct mode. So any unnecessary additional processing should be skipped. Wouldn't that just leave the HDMI signal interpretation and DAC?

Has anyone confirmed which DAC is used in the 2020 lineup?

X4500 used AK4458VN, from the product page:
"the AVR-X4500H features advanced reference-class 32-bit AKM AK4458VN D/A converters on all channels"

From the X4700 product page:
"The AVC-X4700H features the latest AKM 32-bit D/A converters"

I know these are just marketing terms, but the 'latest' AKM DAC's are listed here:
https://www.akm.com/global/en/products/audio/audio-dac/

The AK4468VN looks like the successor to the AK4458VN.

If this is the case, between the brand new HDMI board and the new DAC, wouldn't we expect some early lifecycle teething problems which firmware could improve?
 

Aerith Gainsborough

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But i think that everybody that feels that surround sound is a gimmick is missing out on a beautiful experience.
Hmm...
To be perfectly honest? I have yet to be impressed by surround sound.
My friend built a nice surround system using speakers from Focal's Aria line for all channels. While the speakers sound fantastic in a 2.0 setting, in movies, the rears are barely active. Yeah sure you get the odd bullet impact or the mandatory helicopter flying above your head but that's pretty much it. 90% of the movie it's just the center speaker blaring at you. "Gimmicky" is precisely the term I would use for most movies.

As far as music is concerned, I feel that imaging suffers a lot with surround sound. Stuff just sounds "all over the place", fuzzy, unfocused, indeterminate.

Maybe the movies/mixes were badly done, I don't know. It's difficult to find surround music in the first place, indicating to me that if we want the surround experience to be better, we need to start with high quality source material. At no point did I have the feeling that his Pioneer AVR (a device that would probably get another headless Panther) was the limiting factor.

That being said: I do love AVRs for the convenience and functions they provide and I wholeheartedly agree with @Promit that one device should be able to deliver both: great surround and stereo performance.
 

MZKM

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Just to confirm, if I use Hypex based amps for 3 ch duty, it's better to power rest of the channels externally as well so that overall distortion is kept to a minimum, right?
Another option is to power LCR with something like Emotiva or Outlaw audio amps and leave the rest to be handled by the AVR amps?
Yes.
 

Dimifoot

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Hmm...
To be perfectly honest? I have yet to be impressed by surround sound.
My friend built a nice surround system using speakers from Focal's Aria line for all channels. While the speakers sound fantastic in a 2.0 setting, in movies, the rears are barely active. Yeah sure you get the odd bullet impact or the mandatory helicopter flying above your head but that's pretty much it. 90% of the movie it's just the center speaker blaring at you. "Gimmicky" is precisely the term I would use for most movies.

As far as music is concerned, I feel that imaging suffers a lot with surround sound. Stuff just sounds "all over the place", fuzzy, unfocused, indeterminate.

Maybe the movies/mixes were badly done, I don't know. It's difficult to find surround music in the first place, indicating to me that if we want the surround experience to be better, we need to start with high quality source material. At no point did I have the feeling that his Pioneer AVR (a device that would probably get another headless Panther) was the limiting factor.

That being said: I do love AVRs for the convenience and functions they provide and I wholeheartedly agree with @Promit that one device should be able to deliver both: great surround and stereo performance.
Your friend needs better calibration or/and better RoomEq software, or even speaker positioning.
 

Baff

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Has anyone confirmed which DAC is used in the 2020 lineup?

X4500 used AK4458VN, from the product page:
"the AVR-X4500H features advanced reference-class 32-bit AKM AK4458VN D/A converters on all channels"

The AK4468VN looks like the successor to the AK4458VN.

The 2020 Denons are still using AK4458VN. Though the 4700 uses dual DACs, the 3600 did not.
 
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carlob

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I guess that most AVR have the same subsystems outsourced from common suppliers, I don't think the engineering is done in-house anymore. They put boxes together as many parts are not under their control, it's the sad state of the industry. You can't mess with HDMI, can't mess with Dirac, can't mess with Dolby, just put those boxes together and pray.
The whole HDMI mess has been a terrible disservice to the industry.
 

carlob

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The level of standardisation of these devices is clear, all of them measure pretty much the same. 2 channels devices are another beast, there are thousands of possible designs, schematics, topologies, but they don't have to pay royalties to anybody.
At the end of the day the only ones trying to do something different and take control of the engineering somewhat are the small companies like Emotiva, with all the issues they have. Anthem maybe. Big corporations could not care less. Look at Arcam, it used to be a small respected company years ago. After the Samsung/Harman acquisition now is just another brand like the others.

I have an Arcam Alpha 7se CD player I got probably 1998, it still works
 
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You could have done your research before your first post, couldn't you?
Now, look at that horrible multitone test - that's a test tone that's said to best resemble real music. I am not sure that it can't be heard, or that is an appropriate performance of a 1700$ AVR in 2020.
edit- unlike many others, at least you had balls to acknowledge Amir's work and intentions. To be constructive (as polmuaddib suggests), you could take the message back to where it is appropriate to change the situation for better.
You are correct . I should have done more research. That is my fault. I was wrong. My desire is that Amir went about using his measurements in a more constructive way than just denigrating a 110 year old brand that many people, myself included, have enjoyed for decades. If we are really into measuring then use the knowledge and expertise to isolate the issue and offer possible solutions as to why this is happening. But I was wrong in my approach. I can see from Amir replies and the devotion and love from his members that he really is on the consumers side.
 
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My bigger concern is that too many seemingly competing companies belong to the same holding, reducing real competition much more than one thinks.
You aren't wrong. The brand being just a faceplate anymore is a valid concern. It has brought price down at the expense of quality. Not ideal . But more people can afford these items than at anytime in the industry but most AVR are no longer reliable for 2 channel music reproduction . Once again I apologize for having caused so much drama here. I was upset to see my beloved Denon being raked over the coals. Not an excuse for my behavior just being honest. I can understand people not wanting to buy one product for home theater and another for music reproduction. I hope a firmware update can indeed address these issues.
 

carlob

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I hope your right but IME they never seen to get their software bugs worked out before moving on to the next product. I've had high hopes for Emo but have been continually disappointed.

Me too. They have been terrible, selling half baked products, turning their customers in beta testers. But I have been lurking on their forum and it seems they are making progress. I think Dirac is pretty much sorted, is in beta now and should be released soon, also most of the software kinks have been ironed with the last firmware update. If they can get it right maybe, just maybe, we will have a decent AVR (or pre-pro) on the market. Also after a bit of drama they have taken criticism raised here in a constructive way, and measurements are ok in the context of home theater devices so maybe there is hope.

Obviously the trade-off is that it is not going to be a $1,699 device anytime soon
 
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