Hi all,
I have now owned 3 Denon / Marantz receivers with HEOS (3500, 3600, and SR6012). I always discounted it as a solution for the lazy or as a Sonos replacement, never thinking it was up to snuff for my “serious” (lol) listening practices. I previously used a Chromecast Audio into a DAC into the CD analog input on my receivers.
Well, after running Audyssey on my new 3600 I thought I’d give it a test just to mess about.... holy hell! It works incredibly well and has integration with practically every service out there! Upnp shares, Plex, Tidal, Spotify, SoundCloud, Amazon Music, TuneIn radio, USB drives, and more! It supports absurd bit/sample rates up to 24/192. No weird RaspberryPi quirks, no random drop outs like the CCA, just rock solid performance across all the services I used.
I find the app pretty intuitive. It’s not graphically beautiful, but for Tidal you get access to the music discovery playlists and all your saved music in a logical order. For the Plex / upnp section it really shines. Album art is pulled correctly and you have almost unlimited options for sorting your music if properly tagged.
Combining this practically ubiquitous source compatibility and the simplicity of using the Denon 3600H as a preamp and DAC all controlled from your phone! The pre outs let me run my mains off any absurd power amp I choose. It even has a 12v trigger!
As has been proven through testing, the 3600 has an impeccable DAC and (often overlooked) incredible preamp section along with Audyssey DSP. Add Airplay 2 support to all of this and I cannot figure out how this isn’t the default all in one solution for the vast majority of digital audio nerds out there.
PS prices for the 3600/3700 are distorted right now because of COVID, but historically you could get the previous years Denon model refurbished for $450-600 all day long. The 3400 and 3500 followed this price path. Although even at $1000 I think it’s a very solid deal, forgetting about the fact it is an excellent home theater receiver and has a quite good internal amp section.