Note I am no Trinnov guru and after a week or two of initial setup early this year have not had time to play with it more. Following my thoughts as a noob and off the top of my head so may be off on some points (been a while since I actually dug into it).
It implements more DSP modes and tends to get new SW standards a little more quickly for the newer Dolby etc. stuff. It has all the usual format decoders and such, with some of the newest stuff coming out a little ahead of most manufacturer's production cycles. And of course since it is all running on a regular processor (not a consumer DSP chip) they can implement things pretty quickly and push a SW update instead of waiting for the next product marketing cycle. Note the SDP-75 does not have the Trinov remapping feature that allows you to create "phantom" speakers between your physical speakers. That is nice when you have say Atmos and Auro discs but physically only e.g. an Atmos layout (nice of the two formats to define different physical speaker locations, eh?) It has all the usual processing features you'd expect.
Feature-wise room correction is a geek's delight with incredible control over the DSP for things like filters (FIR and IIR), individual control of speaker response including crossover, phase, frequency response curves, etc. You can adjust # filter taps and response, and set min/max cut/boost over frequency so you can say limit the amount of bass correction to avoid overloading your main or surround speakers. It can handle multi-way speakers with individual control (amplitude, frequency, delay/phase) of each amp/driver (no external crossover needed as long as you have enough channels), bass management includes the ability to route the bass to the nearest sub or all of them, etc. You can do things like use a height speaker with limited LF response, redirect its bass to the nearest base speaker, then route the signal at the base's LF crossover to the sub(s). The Optimizer has way more features, flexibility, and control than anything else I have used (that does not include things like Accourate and such, but beats the pants off Audyssey, Dirac Live, MCACC, and YPAO). It has a Wizard that walks you through a basic setup so you can get running without a PhD, but will keep the PhDs happy for a while if you want to dig deeper. Their special calibration mic allows you to locate speakers precisely, and the display provides 2-D and 3-D views of your layout with fine detail about the positions of each.
All analog IO is balanced, convenient for me since I switched to balanced amps and subs a few years ago. I doubt it bought me much in SNR or noise rejection at my place, but solved a ground loop issue. It has 16 XLR outputs plus D-subs (also differential) for all 32 channels (if you have them -- I went for the 16-channel version though ended up with 24, not complaining).
Sound-wise, I honestly could not say. Measured performance after running the Optimizer and tweaking a bit is comparable to a little better than I was able to achieve with Dirac Live. Frequency response did not look all that different but measured impulse response is better. After setting it up it sounded different than my previous XMC-1 with Dirac Live and it handled the subwoofer integration better. I still have some work to do with subwoofer placement and integration, however, as I moved things around a bit and need to optimize sub placement again. I'd like to say it sounds much better, of course, but since it was about a week to do the changeover I could not really say. Very subjectively the center seems more "present", and there is more bass than I remember, but that could be (probably is) my bias speaking. My speakers are pretty good by themselves and my room is somewhat challenging. It sounds great, but it sounded great to me using any one of several other processors at the time, so who knows?
Frankly, especially at my age and lack of any serious listening the past few years (except on stage), I was influenced by Kal's (
@Kal Rubinson) positive review in
Stereophile as much as anything on the sound. I like Kal's reviews, appreciate his more realistic (to me) stance on things (the guy's smart as all get-out), and he's been very helpful over the years when I have asked him for advice (bearing in mind that if it's in
Stereophile he'll simply point me there, and that's fine too).
HTH - Don
