Anthem AVM90 AV Processor Review

[GXAlan]

Dolby Cinema subwoofers cannot go lower than 40Hz (technically they can go lower but lack the power for the SPL to fill the theater) but instead give you the D-Box shaking seats so you think the subs are getting below 20Hz.

Is this measured or specified anywhere?

This would be really interesting since I have found that running my HT “full range” down to about 30Hz with subs running LFE only works just as well or better than Dirac Live Bass Control where you try to use subwoofers to fill the octave below the main speaker capabilities. My bias is that the content I am listening to (movies) just doesn’t contain that much low frequency information in the LCR/surround channels anyway.

The Director’s Guild of America’s theater has 12 X800C’s (24 total 18” woofers). The spec at 1m is 133 dB per subwoofer). I am not sure how big the room is, but there are 21 rows and it seats 600.

 

[mglobe]

I can’t even run the cables on my stereo setup without creating a bowl of spaghetti. Looking at the backs of these devices makes me glad I went the soundbar route.

 

[ban25]

Nice to see an A/V pre/pro with this level of performance; however, I am disappointed to see no legacy video connection options. As someone who enjoys retro video gaming I do like having a couple of composite/s-video inputs to connect the old SNES or Playstation. Annoying to have to have a separate analog-to-HDMI box on top of a $6k pre/pro.

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[SuicideSquid]

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I'll stick with my A/V receiver that has a couple of analog video ins.

 

[375HP2482]

Everything is seemingly programmable down to deciding if plugging in a headphone turns off the speakers or not.

That's a lot of dough for a headphone amp. Especially when you'll need a long cable from the gear closet this unit is destined for.

I guess it allows for another checkmark in the Versatility column.

 

[yanm]

I firmly believe that we are in a place where the current surround formats (DTS:X, Atmos, Auro3D etc.) are good enough to never be outdated unless the powers that be simply stop supporting these formats. As a matter of fact, any home theater with this level of 15.4 $6K processor and matching speaker/sub would sound BETTER than 99% of the movie theaters today being beaten only by the top tier Dolby Cinema and even then, having 4 channels of flagship 18" subwoofers in your theater will get you lower than any movie theater because they cannot pressurize the theater due to inadequate amplifier power - Dolby Cinema subwoofers cannot go lower than 40Hz (technically they can go lower but lack the power for the SPL to fill the theater) but instead give you the D-Box shaking seats so you think the subs are getting below 20Hz.

I second that, I’ve an Anthem MRX720 that I bought more than 7 years ago: I don’t feel any need to upgrade. The sound formats have basically not changed much since then. The only things that is ‘missing‘ is the latest HDMI supports. Anthem ARC software (for room correction) is still supporting the MRXx10 series, which was released more than 10 years ago.

When my Anthem finally dies, I will likely go again for them for their longevity and because all their products measures well enough (others AVR/PRO manufacturers seem to have products measuring all over the place: from sometimes better than Anthem to abysmal). The only thing that irk me is that they massively increased the price of their processors compared to their receivers (it used to be that the processor costed the same than the receiver - now the the processor are massively more expensive). It is at the point where I actually do not see the point of getting a processor over an AVR - the latter can be used as a processor.

 

[Fidji]

Nice to see an A/V pre/pro with this level of performance; however, I am disappointed to see no legacy video connection options. As someone who enjoys retro video gaming I do like having a couple of composite/s-video inputs to connect the old SNES or Playstation. Annoying to have to have a separate analog-to-HDMI box on top of a $6k pre/pro.

What you want is a RetroTINK 4K:

RetroTINK-4K | RetroTINK

Restock Expected late April/early May. Thank you for your patience! Please Join the RetroTINK Discord or follow us on Twitter @retrotink2 for the latest updates. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The RetroTINK-4K is the...

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As long as it does not support Japan SCART it is not good enough . How else do you want to replay your cherished betamax collection of vietnamese pirate copies of kungfu movies?

 

[JasonC331]

Would love to have seen an analog bypass Measurment too, for its stereo use. One feature that isn't shown is its web Ui. We still don't have Roon yet, this is from the AVR but the web Ui is the same on these. Its setup is easy, and you can rename and make like 30 virtual inputs.

 

[peng]

If we look carefully, the AVM 90 beats the AVM 70 in SINAD mainly because of its much lower noise floor. In terms of distortion, audibility aside, I actually prefer the AVM 70 as it clearly has much lower higher order harmonics. It is academic though as we all know distortions at such low level is not much of a factor in terms of audibility. That's as long as people don't claim the 90 has a warmer sound haha (no one has yet)... The 2nd and 3 rd harmonics are probably about the same as the 90. It looks like the so called upgraded audio circuitry of the 90 succeeded in lower the noise, but not the distortions. Good to see that Amthem's claim wasn't just marketing hype.

This is assuming the RCA output is exactly 1/2 that of the XLR's output. That is a reasonable assumption (Amir said "I asked Anthem if the XLR output was derived from unbalanced and they said that was the case"), though it may still not be 100% sure as it could still somewhat depend on implementation.

 

[peng]

Would love to have seen an analog bypass Measurment too, for its stereo use. One feature that isn't shown is its web Ui. We still don't have Roon yet, this is from the AVR but the web Ui is the same on these. Its setup is easy, and you can rename and make like 30 virtual inputs.

View attachment 336521

View attachment 336522

One cautionary note on this otherwise excellent UI. That is, if you make changes, such as setting Anthem Room Correction from on to off, off to on, it does not always take effect even after you click on "apply". This bug had been fixed in one of the FW update, since ver 76 iirc., but I noticed it's back after updating to the latest ver. 80.

Before the latest update, to ensure changes to take effect, you could just temporarily change input to another one and back, or power cycle the unit, now that won't work anymore, not consistently anyway as it seemed to work sometimes. I have tried even pulling the power cord and it would still get stuck in one stage. Eventually I found that if power cycling and input changing doesn't work, I could use the App to also make the same change, in this case I tested the ARC button (on/off) and then it works.

I am sure a lot of users do not this and they could have thought they disabled ARC for whatever reason, without knowing that actually have not done anything. It is disappointing that after more than two years, such bug still exist. You just don't get this kind of thing with the big brands like D+M, or Yamaha afaik.

 

[peng]

At 300 mV it has the highest SINAD among your tested AV devices. Shouldn’t this mean that with high gain amplifiers, (29 dB), that you are getting the maximum transparency in most homes and most speakers at common listening levels? @amirm

The tricky part is that all of these AVRs use a mix of analog and digital volume control, so playing with this to get an apples to apples comparison is so hard.

But I was looking at these two curves.

View attachment 336303
View attachment 336306

I just thought of something:

We are comparing the output levels of the AVM 90's RCAs versus the AV10's XLR. Based on the way they typically implement unbalanced to balanced, it means your reference of 300 mV SINAD on the AVM 90 will be 600 mV on the AV10's graph. In that case, the two would have the same SINAD after all, even based on the two graphs you posted.

 

[ClaudeJ1]

Same critique like I always have for AVR and AV processors: $6k for 10 years before it is outdated.

Great performance but for $6k, it's not something I would stand up to clap my hands for encore.

Used, or new Yamaha CX-A5x00's are the best performance per dollar from a "shut up and listen" point of view in a real world application. I have 3.

 

[Jim - where is The Abyss]

Not sure why all the non-home theater crowd feels the need to post a bunch of ignorant nonsense in this review thread. I'm not going to bother calling out specific posts, because there are too many. Yes, the SOTA in modern home theater is 7 to 9 bed channels with 2 to 6 upper channels (ie, Atmos). Multiple subwoofer channels allow for achieving a flatter response from the subwoofer channel over a larger number of seating positions. If you don't care or need this capability, why bother posting?

I've actually found many of the comments in this thread quite shocking. Never would have expected this on ASR.

 

[Atmosphered]

Dolby Atmos (not sure if there’s a DTS equivalent) sort of changed the game for channel count since it’s an object-based format instead of a pre-mastered for a certain number of channels format.

So if you’re streaming or using a disc with an atmos soundtrack it will automatically adjust to use the channels you have, whether that’s 5.1 or 9.4.6, or anything in between.

The caveat is that home Atmos encodings may be of the fixed/static variety like many Disney 4k Blu-ray releases up until the most recent. That basically means they told the Atmos encoder to create a 7.1.2 or 7.1.4 channel-based track rather than one with scalable, dynamic 3D objects. If that's the case and you have an Atmos processor with more potential speaker outputs than the fixed Atmos soundtrack, some speakers will remain silent.

It can be a crapshoot, unfortunately.

When mixed and encoded properly, Dolby Atmos can be fantastic.

DTS has DTS:X, but the home version is limited to 7.1.4. DTS added DTS:X Pro that uses upmixing techniques to expand the speaker output capability.

Sadly, Anthem decided not to include DTS:X Pro to their greater than 7.1.4 decoder products.

 

[ban25]

As long as it does not support Japan SCART it is not good enough . How else do you want to replay your cherished betamax collection of vietnamese pirate copies of kungfu movies?

Hahaha, but in fact it does support JP21. Works great with my Japanese Neo Geo CDZ!

 

[Rottmannash]

I'm confused, not being an AV enthusiast. Have a Sonos soundbase under my TV.

What are all the channels for? Who needs/uses 7 HDMI inputs and 4 subwoofer outputs???

I have a Roku Ultra, a Chromecast with Google TV, a BluRay player and a streamer all connected via HDMI to my AVR.

 

[Rottmannash]

Good to see Anthem is still happy to have their products tested by a 3rd party and thanks for the measurements Amir.

Pics;

View attachment 336234
View attachment 336236

View attachment 336235


JSmith

Lots of empty space.....could hide your bag of weed in there.

 

[GXAlan]

I can’t even run the cables on my stereo setup without creating a bowl of spaghetti. Looking at the backs of these devices makes me glad I went the soundbar route.

The same way your 2 ch setup sounds better than a sound a portable Bluetooth speaker, a dedicated home theater adds a level of performance beyond the soundbar. That said, I do have a Sonos Arc system which I enjoy in a bedroom setup. I think many small rooms do great with a soundbar. It’s really larger rooms where you benefit the most from a dedicated system since the demands on the speakers are logarithmic not linear.

I just thought of something:

We are comparing the output levels of the AVM 90's RCAs versus the AV10's XLR. Based on the way they typically implement unbalanced to balanced, it means your reference of 300 mV SINAD on the AVM 90 will be 600 mV on the AV10's graph. In that case, the two would have the same SINAD after all, even based on the two graphs you posted.

We don’t know since the AV10’s RCA and XLR look the same so it’s hard to know.

Used, or new Yamaha CX-A5x00's are the best performance per dollar from a "shut up and listen" point of view in a real world application. I have 3.

+1

In real world applications, I *believe* typical voltages are low and the Yamaha is great up to about 0.5V. Low noise, high distortion (which is less obnoxious). The surround decoders are excellent given their DSP and 3D microphone measurement.

At 300 mV, it’s about 94.5 SINAD which puts it in the same class as the Anthem AV90 and Marantz AV10.

300mV + 23 dB gain = about 4.5 watts into 4 ohms.

A THX Dominus speaker like the Perlisten is 92.2 dB/2.83V and that gets plenty loud

Peak SPL Calculator

 

[peng]

We don’t know since the AV10’s RCA and XLR look the same so it’s hard to know.

Could you please explain what you meant by that?

My point is simply this:

When you look at the SINAD vs output level graphs you posted, Amir clearly stated that the AVM90's voltage was measured on the RCA output whereas he measured the XLR outputs on the AV10. So, when picking the output level on the AV10's graph, you have to look at 600 mV, in order to compare apples-to-apples with the AVM90's graphs 300 mV. Do you agree on that or not?

Edit: I think I know what you mean now, you may be thinking that if the AV10 was measured on the RCA outputs, the SINAD will be the same. That is absolutely not my point, my point is about picking the output voltage level to compare with AVM90's 300 mV output level. That's the level you pick, but you have to pick 600 mV on the AV10's graph because that would be the 300 mV point if you measure it on the RCA outputs. It has nothing to do with SINAD in terms of RCA vs XLR, and in that case, yes I agree the SINAD would be the same for the AV10 either way.

In other words, if you connect another pair of interconnects to the AV10's RCA output, you will get 300 mV, when the XLR is at 600 mV. I am sure you agree on that right?

 

[Beershaun]

The caveat is that home Atmos encodings may be of the fixed/static variety like many Disney 4k Blu-ray releases up until the most recent. That basically means they told the Atmos encoder to create a 7.1.2 or 7.1.4 channel-based track rather than one with scalable, dynamic 3D objects. If that's the case and you have an Atmos processor with more potential speaker outputs than the fixed Atmos soundtrack, some speakers will remain silent.

It can be a crapshoot, unfortunately.

When mixed and encoded properly, Dolby Atmos can be fantastic.

DTS has DTS:X, but the home version is limited to 7.1.4. DTS added DTS:X Pro that uses upmixing techniques to expand the speaker output capability.

Sadly, Anthem decided not to include DTS:X Pro to their greater than 7.1.4 decoder products.

Where is this in the Atmos spec? I have never heard that there are options to "hard code" an Atmos file for a specific configuration. That seems to go against one of the primary benefits of Atmos tools. To just place the sound where you want it and let the client system determine the discreet channels at run time.