Denon AVR-X4700 AVR Review (Updated)

[alienmuppet]

Yes they were opened to take a look. It’s £300 off (so also £300 cheaper than the Marantz) - so saving £300 is a lot considering I’m already spending more than I originally intended. Plus I’m not convinced I’d get on with the porthole, hehe.
I am curious about the marantz “sound” as I am sensitive to any harshness, but wasn’t prepared to spend £300 to check that out. Maybe next time.

 

[peng]

Yes they were opened to take a look. It’s £300 off (so also £300 cheaper than the Marantz) - so saving £300 is a lot considering I’m already spending more than I originally intended. Plus I’m not convinced I’d get on with the porthole, hehe.
I am curious about the marantz “sound” as I am sensitive to any harshness, but wasn’t prepared to spend £300 to check that out. Maybe next time.

Sounds like you got yourself a reasonbly good deal. I don't believe the so called Marantz sound is real but to those who do, great for them.

In at least one Masimo/Audioholics YT review, as well as the owner's manual, the dac filter 1(iirc) offered by the AV10 and C30, was cited as the reason for that "sound". The C40 does not even offers the filter choice so it is supposed to offer the default Marantz sound only.

If that's true, you can use MultEQ editor, X, or Dirac Live to achieve the same effects anyway. That's only if you are curious to find out, otherwise just sit back and enjoy.

 

[alienmuppet]

Yeah I’m curious about Dirac. That’s another reason I didn’t want to spend more.. because I knew I’d want to try it at some point. Is the license per receiver same as audyssey multieq-x?

 

[jjurroz]

I went through the whole thread but may have missed the answer so I apologize in advance; Was the issue with noise through HDMI when running less than a 7.1 configuration ever fixed by Denon?

 

[Uixelas]

Interesting ... my purchased in October 2020 X4700H developed these EXACT same problems (and tried the same troubleshooting steps to no avail) ... only mine was just days OUT of warranty It did not however quite degrade to the point your did ... sometimes it would still work okay for hours. Other times it'd glitch every two minutes.

Took me a while on the test bench to figure out solid 'steps to reproduce' so I could pass them along to the repair center. I chose United Radio in NY even though they're like the furthest from me, based on quality CS of the person on the phone, a flat $200 to fix (+ parts), and the fact they charge nothing for diagnosis.

It's currently en route. When you received your X4700H back, had they repaired it or just replaced it? And if the former, did they, by chance, inform you as to what exactly they DID to fix it? I'd love to pass that along to United cause, well ... sooner I get it back, and working ... the better.

I discovered that the glitch is most likely to occur quickly if you try to operate the unit immediately after plugging it in.

Also very disappointed in Denon on this one, I have LOTS of pieces of Denon gear from the 90's and 2000's and they all still work flawlessly since the day I bought them.

Can I ask what were your steps to reproduce these symptoms? I bought a used x4700 a couple of months ago. At first it was working without any problems, but then month ago it started randomly developing these exact problems you and Steve Dallas as describing. I also tried cleaning the microphone port and doing all the suggested steps without help.

Last week I disconnected all the cables including speaker cables, made sure that they had no strains touching amplifiers case etc, and since then everything has been working fine without this problem occuring. But I'm far from convinced that this actually fixed the problem...

This is quite frustrating as I bought this unit from a private person and it is out of warranty.

 

[Miker 1102]

Denon has been owned by several companies throughout its corporate history. Let's look at Denon ownership since 2000.
2001 - Denon was spun off as a separate company with 98% held by Ripplewood Holdings and 2% by Hitachi.
2002 - Denon merged with Marantz to form D&M Holdings.
2008 - Bain Capital acquired D+M Holdings for $445 million in Japan.
2012 - D+M Group rebranded from D+M Holdings as part of an aggressive corporate makeover that included major shakeups across its top brass, reducing its independent rep count from 32 to 18.
2017 - D+M Group, was sold to US private equity firm Sound United. AVR prices increased significantly and service location options were revamped. Covid hit and parts availability became limited but interest in Home theatre had a resurgence.
2022 - Masimo closes acquisition of Sound United paying $1.025 billion which includes both Denon and Marantz.

After the acquisition of Sound United by Masimo, their stock price experienced a significant drop. It plummeted by 37% to $144.20 following the $1.025 billion acquisition of Sound United. This drop represented a loss of nearly $5 billion in market value for Masimo, with the stock failing to recover to pre-announcement levels more than two years later. These turbulent times at Masimo include a proxy battle with Politan Capital Management, which led to the election of two new directors to Masimo's board and raised the possibility of a sale or spinoff of the Sound United consumer audio division. The acquisition has been met with investor skepticism and concerns about the strategic direction of Masimo.

It will be interesting to see what the future holds. AVR prices are at all time highs. Covid is no longer the threat it once was. People are getting out more and the demand curve for AVR's may be slowing again. Was the Masimo acquisition a $5 billion dollar mistake? Time will tell.

Masiomo didn't aquire the brand for its avr but it's audio distribution becaue they had tech that is revolutionary to monitor human vital signs. They are in court with apple. I tbought it was an interesting move and doable. Look at Wiim ..they carry these in Target. That's huge scaling. The combo of the masimo tech and the distribution made sense to me if the product was killer.

 

[brettjv]

Can I ask what were your steps to reproduce these symptoms? I bought a used x4700 a couple of months ago. At first it was working without any problems, but then month ago it started randomly developing these exact problems you and Steve Dallas as describing. I also tried cleaning the microphone port and doing all the suggested steps without help.

Last week I disconnected all the cables including speaker cables, made sure that they had no strains touching amplifiers case etc, and since then everything has been working fine without this problem occuring. But I'm far from convinced that this actually fixed the problem...

This is quite frustrating as I bought this unit from a private person and it is out of warranty.

Sorry for the lag, just saw this mate. Unfortunately it really was not 'reproducible' until it got 'bad', like as in, most of the time, it was going to Audyssey setup (or just shutting off).

Prior to that, for say, months ... it would occasionally glitch, but over time it became 'almost always, and quickly'. At that point I could most reliably get to glitch if I unplugged it for a bit, then turned it on immediately after plugging it in and started playing music. If I just plugged it in but didn't turn it on for awhile (like hours) it would occasionally work fine for hours. But then unplug/replug/turn on immediately, the issue would be back, within minutes in most cases.

Bottom-line, the people at United Radio know this problem, they know how exactly how to fix it, they took great care of my unit, it came back perfect, and has been that way for months now. They didn't tell me exactly what they actually did, but the parts were super cheap. They'll probably charge you $200 for the repair.

 

[Uixelas]

Can I ask what were your steps to reproduce these symptoms? I bought a used x4700 a couple of months ago. At first it was working without any problems, but then month ago it started randomly developing these exact problems you and Steve Dallas as describing. I also tried cleaning the microphone port and doing all the suggested steps without help.

Last week I disconnected all the cables including speaker cables, made sure that they had no strains touching amplifiers case etc, and since then everything has been working fine without this problem occuring. But I'm far from convinced that this actually fixed the problem...

This is quite frustrating as I bought this unit from a private person and it is out of warranty.

Update on this.

It's been over a month and I've had no problems whatsoever. So after all it propably had a bad connection or a strand touching the amplifier's case. I will update if the problem makes a comeback.

 

[brettjv]

Update on this.

It's been over a month and I've had no problems whatsoever. So after all it propably had a bad connection or a strand touching the amplifier's case. I will update if the problem makes a comeback.

Yeah sounds like a different problem. Mine could exhibit this problem with absolutely nothing connected. Possibly has some kind of 'short' as the underlying cause ... yours external, mine related to some internal shorting. But ... early on I did have times where I didn't see the problem for over a month. Not trying to jinx you, just sayin'.

 

[andreas987]

Not sure if this is useful but I just measured the front LR pre out of my AVR-X4400H since there was so much diverging info online, and it looks good at 0dB (vol. 80). Bang on at 2Vrms with no signs of clipping. Test tone 40Hz and amp in 11.2.4 mode with front LR in preamp mode. I have an Apollon Hypex Ncore NCx500 power amp powering KEF R11 and it sounds awesome.

I have two massive SVS PC4000 subs and didn't even notice that they were not active after setting up the new power amp and re-running Audyssey. The bass of my R11s improved massively with the new amp!

Anyways - super happy with end result, even though there is a very slight static coming from the speakers. Only audible about 50cm away. I strongly suspect the Denon as the Hypex is supposed to be dead quiet.

 

[peng]

Not sure if this is useful but I just measured the front LR pre out of my AVR-X4400H since there was so much diverging info online, and it looks good at 0dB (vol. 80). Bang on at 2Vrms with no signs of clipping. Test tone 40Hz and amp in 11.2.4 mode with front LR in preamp mode. I have an Apollon Hypex Ncore NCx500 power amp powering KEF R11 and it sounds awesome.

I have two massive SVS PC4000 subs and didn't even notice that they were not active after setting up the new power amp and re-running Audyssey. The bass of my R11s improved massively with the new amp!

Anyways - super happy with end result, even though there is a very slight static coming from the speakers. Only audible about 50cm away. I strongly suspect the Denon as the Hypex is supposed to be dead quiet.

It won't clip at even 4 V anyway. I heard no hiss at 0 even with ear touching the tweeter's grille. May be your speakers sensitivity is much higher than mine.
At +10, I could hear a little, but still just barely. My Hypex is of the low end type so it would be noisier than yours
With my AV8801, I could hear hiss at -10 or even lower, so much for those extra copper shields lol..

 

[little-endian]

Yep. An Alternative would be compression of dynamics. This is what 2ch outputs of blu ray players do. When I employed a 2.1 setup years ago as a student I used AC3 Filter with a normalised matrix to mix 5.1 to 2.1. The penalty was that I had to turn my AVR much louder and noise floor was around 20 db higher.

Another one, at least technically, is using a two-pass approach for downmixing, just like the valuable tool "eac3to" does it. Depending on the actual channel utilization, the required loudness reduction may be minimized.

Unfortunately, it is hardly suitable for downmixing anything "on the fly".

 

[Uixelas]

Update on this.

It's been over a month and I've had no problems whatsoever. So after all it propably had a bad connection or a strand touching the amplifier's case. I will update if the problem makes a comeback.

And the issue is back! Kind of.

It doesn't trigger Audyssey any more, but just randomly goes to protect mode a couple of times a week. It can trigger after two minutes of listening to stereo music or two hours in to a movie. When this happens the power light is blinking rapidly and protection history shows "DC". Low or high volume, cool or warm device, doesn't matter.

Of course I've gone through all the wires, added a fan for cooling etc. It's hard to troubleshoot because the problem comes up so randomly.

Frustrating. The earlier owner only used this amp in a stereo setup and had no problems. And my problems started a few months after purchasing this amp second hand.

 

[peng]

And the issue is back! Kind of.

It doesn't trigger Audyssey any more, but just randomly goes to protect mode a couple of times a week. It can trigger after two minutes of listening to stereo music or two hours in to a movie. When this happens the power light is blinking rapidly and protection history shows "DC". Low or high volume, cool or warm device, doesn't matter.

Of course I've gone through all the wires, added a fan for cooling etc. It's hard to troubleshoot because the problem comes up so randomly.

Frustrating. The earlier owner only used this amp in a stereo setup and had no problems. And my problems started a few months after purchasing this amp second hand.

Sounds like the amp section has developed a fault causing excessive dc at the output. Have you checked the dc offset with a multimeter yet?

One thing to try is to see if the preouts are working, using preamp mode. If the power amp section is in fact failing, you would have to send it out for troubleshooting/repair, or just use the unit as a preamp/processor if you don't want to go through the trouble of going through the repair process and/or avoid the cost if it is out of warranty. Or, if you have the knowledge/skill yourself to troubleshoot/repair then go for it.

 

[Brambo67]

And the issue is back! Kind of.

It doesn't trigger Audyssey any more, but just randomly goes to protect mode a couple of times a week. It can trigger after two minutes of listening to stereo music or two hours in to a movie. When this happens the power light is blinking rapidly and protection history shows "DC". Low or high volume, cool or warm device, doesn't matter.

Of course I've gone through all the wires, added a fan for cooling etc. It's hard to troubleshoot because the problem comes up so randomly.

Frustrating. The earlier owner only used this amp in a stereo setup and had no problems. And my problems started a few months after purchasing this amp second hand.

Exactly had the same issue with my 3700. Had to take it in to the LBS for repair, can't exactly remember what it was. I got an offer on a 4700 with the 'upgraded' HDMI board and 'degraded' DAC-board. I decided to take it and it has been playing faultlessly ever since. The 3700 later appeared online as 'refurbished' item without mentioning what had been refurbished. Also took time before it gradually deteriorated. Initially going into protection mode once a month until it wasn't possible to use it any longer.

 

[Uixelas]

And the issue is back! Kind of.

It doesn't trigger Audyssey any more, but just randomly goes to protect mode a couple of times a week. It can trigger after two minutes of listening to stereo music or two hours in to a movie. When this happens the power light is blinking rapidly and protection history shows "DC". Low or high volume, cool or warm device, doesn't matter.

Of course I've gone through all the wires, added a fan for cooling etc. It's hard to troubleshoot because the problem comes up so randomly.

Frustrating. The earlier owner only used this amp in a stereo setup and had no problems. And my problems started a few months after purchasing this amp second hand.

A week ago I decided to open the amplifier to see if I can spot something wrong inside. Only thing I spotted was fair amount of dust, so I cleaned the insides thoroughly with compressed air. After that I performed factory/logic reset and setup the ampflier from the scratch. Ever since it has been working perfectly. I have been watching movies and playing music daily.

I really hope the issue is now gone, but I probably cursed it by writing this message.

 

[peng]

A week ago I decided to open the amplifier to see if I can spot something wrong inside. Only thing I spotted was fair amount of dust, so I cleaned the insides thoroughly with compressed air. After that I performed factory/logic reset and setup the ampflier from the scratch. Ever since it has been working perfectly. I have been watching movies and playing music daily.

I really hope the issue is now gone, but I probably cursed it by writing this message.

I hope so too, but I think it will be back and not because of any curse obviously. The thing is, too much dust wouldn't likely cause a DC fault, but then again, anything is possible.

 

[Sal1950]

I hope so too, but I think it will be back and not because of any curse obviously.

That was mean. JK

I really hope the issue is now gone, but I probably cursed it by writing this message.

Uixelas, I'm sending you my 2 finger Sicilian curse buster (the horns) and your Denon will now give you 20 years of trouble free operation.
I hope. Good luck.

 

[Uixelas]

That was mean. JK

Uixelas, I'm sending you my 2 finger Sicilian curse buster (the horns) and your Denon will now give you 20 years of trouble free operation.
I hope. Good luck.

Hahaha, thanks man. I will report back if the device is cursed or not. Time will tell.

 

[Deleted member 79113]

Would it still be worth getting this Denon 4700 (1500€) on account of the better measurements than the 3800 (1000€) and 4800 (1500€)?
Or is the surround technology changing so fast that this model has been rendered obsolete?
In my case it would be used for music, the source being Spotify and cd's (so I would use an upmixing option)
Thank you very much for reading