The VSX-LX505 or TX-RZ50

[andrewskaterrr]

There are tiers in the brands themselves as well. The RZ50 is NOT lower tier, or low end, EVEN when compared to other brands. I'm curious. Do you think Pioneer ELITE is lower tier?

Personally I'm going to sell my DENON X3700H, with the better DACs, in the classifieds as soon as my RZ50 comes in, and I consider that an upgrade.

Honestly I didn’t know pioneer even made decent avrs anymore. For me it’s been x3700h as the cheapest option, Denon x8500/Arcam AVR as the medium, and AV40/SDP-58 as the high end. I just don’t know how much money I want to dump in. I’m half tempted to get the Onkyo since it’s so cheap, and go prepro later, but I’d feel like I’m wasting money. So I may wait for the new AV40 version with HDMI 2.1, then grab another 7000x and call it a day. I’m pretty set on getting front wides so I have to go higher up

 

[Geronimo.USMC]

Honestly I didn’t know pioneer even made decent avrs anymore. For me it’s been x3700h as the cheapest option, Denon x8500/Arcam AVR as the medium, and AV40/SDP-58 as the high end. I just don’t know how much money I want to dump in. I’m half tempted to get the Onkyo since it’s so cheap, and go prepro later, but I’d feel like I’m wasting money. So I may wait for the new AV40 version with HDMI 2.1, then grab another 7000x and call it a day. I’m pretty set on getting front wides so I have to go higher up

Hopefully, for you, they get their heads out of their asses and stabilize the firmware by then. It’s slim pickings in stable DIRAC HDMI 2.1 Quality Pre/Pro land right now, and the foreseeable future. I’m riding it out with the RZ50 till then. I got tired of bug ridden, beta quality units that shouldve never been put out to market for 3-4 times the amount of a properly, fully functioning, mature “lower end” AVR.

 

[wseroyer]

There are tiers in the brands themselves as well. The RZ50 is NOT lower tier, or low end, EVEN when compared to other brands. I'm curious. Do you think Pioneer ELITE is lower tier?

Personally I'm going to sell my DENON X3700H, with the better DACs, in the classifieds as soon as my RZ50 comes in, and I consider that an upgrade.

I know your not asking me, but Pioneer Elite is basically just Onkyo now days, sad how far they have fallen from what they used to be, why do you want to sell you x3700h?

 

[Subway2400]

Hopefully, for you, they get their heads out of their asses and stabilize the firmware by then. It’s slim pickings in stable DIRAC HDMI 2.1 Quality Pre/Pro land right now, and the foreseeable future. I’m riding it out with the RZ50 till then. I got tired of bug ridden, beta quality units that shouldve never been put out to market for 3-4 times the amount of a properly, fully functioning, mature “lower end” AVR.

Given that Pioneer and Onkyo AVR are pretty similar, and the poor measured performance on Pioneer units both on the preamp (low SINAD) and amplifier section (very quick drop in power even without too much stress), I'm not sure that Onkyo is a wiser choice than Denon.

For example the VSX-LX504 is the clone of the RZ840 : https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...d-measurements-of-pioneer-vsx-lx504-avr.8862/ - well, it's not a good AVR.

The HDMI 2.1 bugs are not a fault of Denon, it's the fault of the 2.1 chips supplier.

I'm eager to see measurements of the new Onkyo AVRs.

 

[hmt]

Without speakers connected SINAD is very good with the LX504.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

Hopefully, for you, they get their heads out of their asses and stabilize the firmware by then. It’s slim pickings in stable DIRAC HDMI 2.1 Quality Pre/Pro land right now, and the foreseeable future. I’m riding it out with the RZ50 till then. I got tired of bug ridden, beta quality units that shouldve never been put out to market for 3-4 times the amount of a properly, fully functioning, mature “lower end” AVR.

So I originally steered away from Arcam because of the notorious bugs, but I've heard a lot of the issues have been fixed with updates. What irritates me though is mid tier Denon's destroying PrePros in measurements. That's sad when the SPD-55 is 3x the price with no amps. I wish there was a processor with Decoding/Dirac/etc, then would send the digital signal over multiple Optical/USB outs that could go to 7x Topping E30s (~$1050), and then RCA to my amps. It would be a mess, but it might perform better than all AVR/PrePros out there, and potentially cost less.

 

[Geronimo.USMC]

I know your not asking me, but Pioneer Elite is basically just Onkyo now days, sad how far they have fallen from what they used to be, why do you want to sell you x3700h?

I already knew about ONKYO and PIONEER. I brought it up because of what the OP was referring to “lower end” because of brand. It was more of a question to see where their head was at as some people think PIONEER “ELITE” is a higher end brand just because they are slightly higher in price and the name.

I’m going for DIRAC. I have always wanted to try DIRAC , and ONKYO having it is an upgrade all around.

I’m tired and burned out of DENON/Marantz, and AudysseyXT32 at the moment. They also have a BBC dip baked in on their EQ that you cannot get out without paying $20 for an app?!? Why do I have to pay extra.

I also got a great price on my RZ50 pre order.

 

[Subway2400]

Without speakers connected SINAD is very good with the LX504.

Yes that's right, but when I buy an AVR, I expect it to perform correctly as an AVR, not as a processor only

 

[hmt]

Imo the Amp SINAD ist still OK.

 

[AllanMarcus]

Magnus is correct. You are reading it wrong. Look there is only one "crossover" setting. Magnus is saying that the PIONEER unit has a universal RIGID crossover applied to speakers set to "SMALL"

I can see how one can misread the manual. I did at first. I was thinking about the Elite VSX-LX505 until I saw that. My rear and ceiling speakers need a high crossover. Thanks for pointing that out.

I have a Yamaha RX-A3080, which I'm very happy with, but I also use Dirac *via MiniDSP) on a different 2.1 channel set up, and I really like Dirac. I have a buddy with an Emotiva XMC-1, and he raves about it. He spent many months fine tuning and really learning what Dirac does, but he's very happy, and his system sound awesome. I'm not sure about what sort of side grade the TZ-RZ50 would be for me, so I will need to wait to read reviews.

FYI: my system:
Yamaha RX-A3080 | LG OLED77C8PUA | Monitor Audio Gold GX100 mains
Monitor Audio Gold C350 | Orb ModX surrounds and Atmos overheads | SVS SB13Ultra sub | 7.1.4

 

[Subway2400]

Imo the Amp SINAD ist still OK.

It's not that good and it could be better, but the worst thing may be power dropping to 22W/channel pretty easily when under load. That's not acceptable and there is no excuse for it.

 

[valerianf]

Let us wait for Amir test of the Onkyo RZ50.
I expect it not to have the 2 bugs that are present in the Denon brand: down-mixing bug found by Amir and Rhye bug found by one of this forum reader.
I prefer a lower Sinad but without these two bugs.
An AVR is supposed taking whatever input signal is present and deliver an output without any flagrant distorsion.

 

[Geronimo.USMC]

Yes that's right, but when I buy an AVR, I expect it to perform correctly as an AVR, not as a processor only

I'm actually not going to use the onboard amps. I have a mono 3 in 1 PURIFI for the front, and an 8Ch NC252MP for the rest.

 

[Subway2400]

I'm actually not going to use the onboard amps. I have a mono 3 in 1 PURIFI for the front, and an 8Ch NC252MP for the rest.

Yeah in that case that should do it !

 

[andrewskaterrr]

I'm actually not going to use the onboard amps. I have a mono 3 in 1 PURIFI for the front, and an 8Ch NC252MP for the rest.

Man I just learned about the Buckeyes 8Ch NC252MP for like $1500. I would've gone with that instead of the Outlaw 7000x, but honestly I prolly wouldn't hear a difference lol. I barely pull 250w from the wall as it is with all 7 towers.

 

[hmt]

The Onkyo only has one trigger out. That's a bit meh for me. I don´t like messing around with Y-adaptors.

 

[Geronimo.USMC]

The Onkyo only has one trigger out. That's a bit meh for me. I don´t like messing around with Y-adaptors.

There are active trigger splitters out there. Also some amps have a trigger in and out.

 

[wseroyer]

I already knew about ONKYO and PIONEER. I brought it up because of what the OP was referring to “lower end” because of brand. It was more of a question to see where their head was at as some people think PIONEER “ELITE” is a higher end brand just because they are slightly higher in price and the name.

I’m going for DIRAC. I have always wanted to try DIRAC , and ONKYO having it is an upgrade all around.

I’m tired and burned out of DENON/Marantz, and AudysseyXT32 at the moment. They also have a BBC dip baked in on their EQ that you cannot get out without paying $20 for an app?!? Why do I have to pay extra.

I also got a great price on my RZ50 pre order.

I agree its stupid that you have to pay for the app after you spend thousands with them for the AVR, but from what Audysessy has said, the app gives you a much better calibration because it uses your cellphone's much more powerful processor to do all of the calculations and room corrections.

 

[Geronimo.USMC]

I agree its stupid that you have to pay for the app after you spend thousands with them for the AVR, but from what Audysessy has said, the app gives you a much better calibration because it uses your cellphone's much more powerful processor to do all of the calculations and room corrections.

I have read that as well, and the app should be a free download. So, now we buy a D/M AVR and pay extra to use our cell phone or tablet hardware. All of their other apps are free.

The DIRAC app is free, and "gives you a much better calibration because it uses your computer's much more powerful processor to do all of the calculations and room corrections."

See what I did there?

What is crazy is that the new 2021 ONKYOs and PIONEER ELITEs also come with the ACCUEQ, MCACC PLUS DIRAC...

 

[Ata]

I have read that as well, and the app should be a free download. So, now we buy a D/M AVR and pay extra to use our cell phone or tablet hardware. All of their other apps are free.

The DIRAC app is free, and "gives you a much better calibration because it uses your computer's much more powerful processor to do all of the calculations and room corrections."

See what I did there?

What is crazy is that the new 2021 ONKYOs and PIONEER ELITEs also come with the ACCUEQ, MCACC PLUS DIRAC...

The latest I heard is that the correction filter calculation is done in the cloud, regardless of which Dirac app you use. The primary benefit of the Dirac App on Windows/Mac is the better user interface and ability to calibrate an AVR tucked away far from the listening setup.