Big news coming from Sound United in 2023!

[tjcinnamon]

I think if they can fit Dirac in the 7 series they will. I’m sure Denon gets a cut of the Dirac sales. It’s a passive source of income. They can add it later to not canabilize 8 series

 

[Masza]

I doubt x700 series could be fitted with Dirac if it wasn't planned from the get-go.

 

[Sancus]

The official Denon product pages are now up:

AVR-X4800H | Home Theater Receiver

The Denon AVR-X4800H is a 9.4 Ch. 125W AV receiver for breathtaking home theater with Dolby Atmos, 8K Ultra HD, DTS:X, and HEOS® Built-in streaming.

www.denon.com

https://www.denon.com/en-us/product/av-receivers/avr-x3800h (you can buy this now, but not the others)

AVR-X2800H | Home Theater Receiver

The Denon AVR-X2800H is a 7.2 Ch. 150W AV receiver for upgraded home theater with Dolby Atmos, 8K Ultra HD, DTS:X and HEOS® Built-in streaming.

www.denon.com

I admit, I'm rather puzzled with what they've done with the X4800H. It has the same amplifier and preout counts as the 3800H, which is the same as before, but they've trickled Auro3D down to the 3800H now, and also removed the front HDMI port from 4800H, which was a nice convenience of the 4000-series for doing external(REW, etc) measurements.

As far as I can tell you're paying $800 USD more for... +20W better amplification and +1 rear HDMI port??? This makes very little sense to me, neither of these things are worth $800.

Can anyone else spot any other significant difference?

 

[Martin]

Still waiting for someone, anyone, to release a reasonably priced AVR with DIRAC and Class D amps...

Martin

 

[ryanosaur]

Still waiting for someone, anyone, to release a reasonably priced AVR with DIRAC and Class D amps...

Martin

It will happen... I think we are within 3-5 years for this, though. ...Unless Onkyo does it sooner, as they are most likely next up for a refresh.

 

[DrStranger]

The new feels more like a cough or a sneeze. They hardly mention DIRAC and they gave the 3800 MPEG-H that might become the standard for surround for digital tv broadcast, previously on 4700 and up. But what else is new and justifies the price increase except components price increase (if really that much)? Its way too much money for me at least. Crossing my fingers for the other brands to give some positive surprise, at least pricewise. The 4800 will be build in Japan and all below models in vietnam?

 

[Masza]

Page for 4800 says designed and manufactured in Japan, 3800 does not.

 

[DrStranger]

The official Denon product pages are now up:

AVR-X4800H | Home Theater Receiver

The Denon AVR-X4800H is a 9.4 Ch. 125W AV receiver for breathtaking home theater with Dolby Atmos, 8K Ultra HD, DTS:X, and HEOS® Built-in streaming.

www.denon.com

https://www.denon.com/en-us/product/av-receivers/avr-x3800h (you can buy this now, but not the others)

AVR-X2800H | Home Theater Receiver

The Denon AVR-X2800H is a 7.2 Ch. 150W AV receiver for upgraded home theater with Dolby Atmos, 8K Ultra HD, DTS:X and HEOS® Built-in streaming.

www.denon.com

I admit, I'm rather puzzled with what they've done with the X4800H. It has the same amplifier and preout counts as the 3800H, which is the same as before, but they've trickled Auro3D down to the 3800H now, and also removed the front HDMI port from 4800H, which was a nice convenience of the 4000-series for doing external(REW, etc) measurements.

As far as I can tell you're paying $800 USD more for... +20W better amplification and +1 rear HDMI port??? This makes very little sense to me, neither of these things are worth $800.

Can anyone else spot any other significant difference?

Nope!

 

[ryanosaur]

Nope!

I was just on the site and all are listed.

AV Receivers - Home Theater & Cinema Systems | Denon US

Denon

www.denon.com

 

[DrStranger]

I was just on the site and all are listed.

AV Receivers - Home Theater & Cinema Systems | Denon US

Denon

www.denon.com

I was saying no to his question.

 

[peng]

Denon (Marantz too I assume..) must have listened, even the AVR-X3800H has the feature to disconnect each power amp channel individually. This is good news for those who don't want to use the preamp mode that is all or none, because they may want to use external amp for the LR, or LCR only.

Edit: Sorry, the manual is now available and what I said about the improved amp assign feature was false. I reported that because I read it from a seemingly reliable source but don't remember where it was, thought it was from one of Denon's.

Regardless, according to the manual, the power amp to pre out disconnect feature is only applicable to the FL, FR or the surround/heights. That is disappointing as it should have been easily enough for them to make a small change so the center channel can be disconnected too.

 

[ryanosaur]

Nope!

I was saying no to his question.

Agreed.
For some reason, I thought perhaps the 3800 was maybe not going to be Dirac enabled; that those options were going to be reserved for the upper tier offerings. *shrugs Of course I cannot find where I saw that being the possibility. There is still a lot of questions I'm not seeing answered at this stage, though the new designes for D&M look promising.

 

[Peluvius]

That's the same as in my X4700H.

"Set “Assign Mode” to “Pre Amplifier” if connecting all
channels to the Pre-out connectors using an external
amplifier. (v p. 232)
This stops operation of the internal power amplifier of this
unit, reducing interference in the pre amplifier created by the
power amplifier."


It was in the menu of my Marantz 7703 pre/pro, and I used it to install the $200 Auro upgrade.
BTW, also in my Denon X4700H
It's a long time entry for upgrades.

I didn't realise this was a current capability, now just need Dirac in there and I think my next upgrade is clear.

Do you use yours as a Pre? and if so, do you notice an improvement with the amps off?

Still waiting for someone, anyone, to release a reasonably priced AVR with DIRAC and Class D amps...

Martin

I would be fine with reasonably priced and Dirac, not even using the Amp! Almost down the MiniDSP route but then these appeared on the horizon....

 

[peng]

Do you use yours as a Pre? and if so, do you notice an improvement with the amps off?

Keep in mind that as mentioned many times before, with the power amps "off" (actually not off, but disconnected from the pre outs), SINAD or "On" won't make a difference in SINAD unless the pre out voltage is at or higher than about 1.5 Vrms. I think most people don't push the pre out voltage that high. For me, it would be well below 1 V most of the time even when I listen quite loud.

With pre out at 1 V, an amp that has 29 dB gain will output 100 W. At 1.5 V, it would be at 223 W already and that's for 8 ohm load.

 

[Peluvius]

Keep in mind that as mentioned many times before, with the power amps "off" (actually not off, but disconnected from the pre outs), SINAD or "On" won't make a difference in SINAD unless the pre out voltage is at or higher than about 1.5 Vrms. I think most people don't push the pre out voltage that high. For me, it would be well below 1 V most of the time even when I listen quite loud.

With pre out at 1 V, an amp that has 29 dB gain will output 100 W. At 1.5 V, it would be at 223 W already and that's for 8 ohm load.

I wouldn't know but I don't usually listen loud so probably not. I notice an improvement to sound quality when I use pure direct mode on my current AVR so maybe there are other internal impacts? I would be surprised if I could reliably hear a SINAD difference if the device is above 96dB, maybe lower.

 

[wseroyer]

That's too bad if HDMI devices are limiting chroma and not just bandwidth. This seems equivalent bandwidth wise if we compare apples to apples:

View attachment 229534

Sounds like the consumer gets screwed if they are just doing 4:2:0 for 8K when it looks like the bandwidth should be able to support 4:4:4. Thanks for making me aware of this. I'll have to double check once I upgrade my surround sound processor and TV, or stick with EARC so at least the receiver/processor isn't a weak point.

There's no TV's with 12 bit panels currently, so it doesn't matter that much right now. unfortunately I feel that HDMI 2.1 is already becoming outdated because companies like TCL are coming out with 144hz panels for their TV's and in a few more GPU generation 8K gaming above 60hz will become a reality. I wish they'd just put DisplayPort on TV's and AVR's and consoles, it would be so much better. HDMI really should not even exist, because DisplayPort does it so much better.

 

[DrStranger]

There's no TV's with 12 bit panels currently, so it doesn't matter that much right now. unfortunately I feel that HDMI 2.1 is already becoming outdated because companies like TCL are coming out with 144hz panels for their TV's and in a few more GPU generation 8K gaming above 60hz will become a reality. I wish they'd just put DisplayPort on TV's and AVR's and consoles, it would be so much better. HDMI really should not even exist, because DisplayPort does it so much better.

YES!

 

[Chromatischism]

Keep in mind that as mentioned many times before, with the power amps "off" (actually not off, but disconnected from the pre outs), SINAD or "On" won't make a difference in SINAD unless the pre out voltage is at or higher than about 1.5 Vrms. I think most people don't push the pre out voltage that high. For me, it would be well below 1 V most of the time even when I listen quite loud.

With pre out at 1 V, an amp that has 29 dB gain will output 100 W. At 1.5 V, it would be at 223 W already and that's for 8 ohm load.

If you're right, my 4ohm speakers which are connected to my NCore NC252MP would be taking 100w at only 0.5v. That seems high...

 

[Chromatischism]

There's no TV's with 12 bit panels currently, so it doesn't matter that much right now. unfortunately I feel that HDMI 2.1 is already becoming outdated because companies like TCL are coming out with 144hz panels for their TV's and in a few more GPU generation 8K gaming above 60hz will become a reality. I wish they'd just put DisplayPort on TV's and AVR's and consoles, it would be so much better. HDMI really should not even exist, because DisplayPort does it so much better.

DP carries audio?

 

[Doodski]

YES!

Thunderbolt 4 is coming. It's on my ASUS Z690 motherboard as a header. I'm not a Thunderbolt 4 expert but it seems OK.