JBL MA7100HP AV Receiver Review

[amirm]

Disappointing. I really don't understand why JBL spent the money to include a phono section when (a) I assume only a small percentage of users will hook up a turntable, and (b) decent and even excellent external phono preamps are now readily available at very reasonable prices. If only they had directed those resources to delivering higher performance in this AVR's primary functions...

As mentioned, it is a nod to the past as to say they are hip. I would be shocked if one in 1000 is using turntables with an AVR. To be "hip," one would need to get a stereo setup for LP playback.

 

[kyuu]

To go back to the alternative using separates discussion here, the best option I was able to come up with that meets my requirements was a miniDSP Flex HT paired with a Buckeye NC502MP. This combination would undoubtedly get me to what I consider "end-game" peformance for my home theater in terms of power and measurements, and Dirac Live for room correction. Two two boxes in combination wouldn't eat up too much space and the cabling would be... manageable. Still, I'm already at double the price of the JBL, and I'd still need a streamer for my Tidal/UPnP music, so tack on a Wiim Pro/Ultra. You'd think the PS5 would be able to handle that, but nooooo.

Still, talking about $2500-ish for end-game electronics between three not obnoxious boxes isn't too terrible, now that I think about it.

 

[617]

Amir is too kind, considering the bench performance. As noted, with all of that industrial beauty it's hard to understand why this unit renders the Level indicator smaller than my 22-year-old Pioneer (which benches better).

Looks like it might be time for Samsung to exert its influence on JBL electronic engineering.

I owned a Samsung dishwasher and it was so bad I will never buy a JBL product.

 

[restorer-john]

Likely from the same great industrial designer.

Ah, that explains it! He got one of those Toy Story 3 cameras for his 6th birthday and now, 14 years later he landed his first dream job in JBL's 'design' labs.

 

[JDS]

As mentioned, it is a nod to the past as to say they are hip. I would be shocked if one in 1000 is using turntables with an AVR. To be "hip," one would need to get a stereo setup for LP playback.

I'm hip! I'm hip!

 

[ROOSKIE]

Disappointing. I really don't understand why JBL spent the money to include a phono section when (a) I assume only a small percentage of users will hook up a turntable, and (b) decent and even excellent external phono preamps are now readily available at very reasonable prices. If only they had directed those resources to delivering higher performance in this AVR's primary functions...

Well just to shoot the shyte a bit, I think it is smart. It likely costs them almost nothing to add this in. In fact I suspect it literally cost pennies, certainly under 1 or 2 bucks. There are no resources to redirect.
The whole point is this serves to introduce folks to home theater and just audio in general in the living room. Bring the Ikea-Pottery Barn-Crate and Barrel-Wayfair-maybe even 'West Elm' types to HT. They want one single cool box. One extra box beyond the TV is actually already a stretch for many.

I firmly believe that 95-99% of turntable users could really care less about fidelity. They enjoy vinyl for more important and I think realistic reasons as high fidelity is not the domain of vinyl in 1st place in 2024. I'd be willing to bet that 95+% of turntable users have no interest in buying an external pre-amp at all. They will either buy a turntable with a built in pre-amp or use the one built in here. Well actually a huge number of them will use Bluetooth. Often non-hifi people I see using turntables these days are actually using a Bluetooth connection. Or they are using dads old table because dad died and they like having it and playing his old records and maybe buying one or two every couple months.

Take a look at the best selling tables on Amazon, you can see the rough sales in the last month. Bluetooth and mid-fi table sales in the USA alone @ Amazon likely dwarf worldwide sales of more expensive hifi stuff. As well look at what BestBuy is selling. These are going to be 100 up to 1000-1 units sold vs something more likely chosen by a hobbyist user here or 'loved' at a subjective turntable site.

But at any rate I really see the cost to add this as negligible and it did not influence performance one bit. It was lack of engineering effort that did that. Realistically though not one person who buys this will hear any meaningful issues of any kind at all. So yah it measures very mediocre but mediocre measurement in 2024 is still often really good subjective sound and it looks cool and it is more or less an all in one electronic box. Just add speakers and a source or two or three. Do not underestimate the look factor and sales.

I did look at these at BestBuy, they look great. I would very much consider buying this or the lower priced models for my living room due to that if I was a casual HT enthusiast(if I was in my 20 or 30's).

 

[JDS]

Here's a slightly higher resolution copy of the same image:

View attachment 394180

Still can't make out chip marking for the most part though, beyond ESMT on one and what looks like the Cirrus Logic logo on another.

My pre-switch mode PS brain does a double take every time I look at one of these images, wondering "where are the big power supply filtering caps and beefy transformer?"

 

[dlaloum]

Disappointing. I really don't understand why JBL spent the money to include a phono section when (a) I assume only a small percentage of users will hook up a turntable, and (b) decent and even excellent external phono preamps are now readily available at very reasonable prices. If only they had directed those resources to delivering higher performance in this AVR's primary functions...

It is for that younger generation that have rediscovered "vinyl"... good marketing, and well targeted

 

[GXAlan]

As mentioned, it is a nod to the past as to say they are hip. I would be shocked if one in 1000 is using turntables with an AVR. To be "hip," one would need to get a stereo setup for LP playback.

I wonder if the JBL MA series itself will have a higher propensity of users using turntables, based upon target market, etc. The electronics are good enough for vinyl and the improvement over a soundbar from having proper floorstanders like the Stage 290 probably results in a pretty good home experience.

At some point I would expect Samsung to try to bundle their televisions with JBL consumer products. They are running Harman largely independently, but you are starting to see Samsung advertise JBL products at Samsung.com

Explore JBL speakers & headphones with Samsung products | Samsung US

Together with Samsung products, JBL headphones & bluetooth speakers' true, unfiltered sound inspires like no other.

www.samsung.com

They haven’t merged the soundbar R&D though.

Ah, that explains it! He got one of those Toy Story 3 cameras for his 6th birthday and now, 14 years later he landed his first dream job in JBL's 'design' labs.

1) What’s the nicest looking *shipping* AVR/AVP in your opinion (at any price)?

2) What’s the nicest looking $1000 component in your opinion, shipping or vintage *adjusted for inflation*?

I think I am struggling to imagine a nicer looking product for use in a modern IKEA or Zara Home environment which is likely to be the target market.

Some products like the StormAudio have zero remotes and I consider a good thing if the company has enough confidence in their HDMI CEC testing to let you skip a lot of the remote control features. I like my true premium remotes as much as like my overbuilt CD drawer mechanisms, but this is a pretty low priced product in the grand scheme of things.

 

[Miker 1102]

That's a bit unfair. These results are soundly in typical AVR terroritory, and actually a bit better in many respects than most of the Onkyo/Pioneer competition. And it doesn't have undocumented power limiting modes. Or compare it to NAD's more expensive attempts at the AVR category. We were really just hoping these would be pushing the category upwards in performance rather than just being more of the same but with a nice aesthetic and class D amps. It's still certainly above soundbar territory.

And Wiim doesn't really compete in this category (rather wish they did, could probably build a killer AVR for a reasonable price). If I was just setting up a 2.0 or 2.1 system for music, a Wiim Amp or Wiim Pro/Ultra plus standalone stereo amp would absolutely be at the top of the list.

Wiim is heading in this territory is my theory. Out the door they are making mucj better products than long standing audio companies. Thier streaming app is as good as anything out there. Give them a few more years and we might see the real thing.

 

[Miker 1102]

If I was in the market for an AV, I would refer you to Amir's previous review of the Denon AVR X6700H. These are now 5 years old but have good overall performance, and would search for a second hand one and add a power amp.

Denon AVR-X6700H AVR Review (Updated)

This is an updated review of the Denon AVR-X6700H. I tested an early production 6700H a few weeks ago and found lower than expected performance. Denon Engineering traced this to a faulty capacitor( or capacitors) used in the initial run of this AVR. I requested an updated unit which the...

www.audiosciencereview.com

Have a look at the Buckeye range of power amps - Daniel will mix and match and you can get 4 channel hypex amps in a single box for US$1,000 comprising 2 x MP502 and 2 x MP252 or 6 channel if required.

Buckeye Amps

Buckeye Amps utilizes the most advanced audio amplifier technologies available. Authorized seller for Hypex and Purifi Class D amplifiers. Based in the US. Free shipping and worldwide service!

www.buckeyeamp.com

With some effort you can put a decent pre/power AV system together for about $2k.

I respect that but why all that

When people respond to a review for an AVR with advice to just get a different, larger, older AVR to use solely for its pre-outs and then combine that with some separates, I think they've lost sight of why people were looking at AVRs in the first place. I'm well aware I could get better performance (that's largely inaudible) by using separates.

If I was looking for separates, I'd definitely be looking at Buckeye. I'm not, however, for my living room system.

Lack of pre-outs is not a concern for me. I really wonder how many people, outside this forum, buy AVRs to bypass the internal amps and run separates. I really think that's an exceptionally small slice of the AVR market.

It is also almost always a waste of money as well. Most systems don't need the extra power of sperates.. I am sure there will be a higher end avr wirh class d soon that will meet asr standards. This hobby is at an end for me so I want to purchase something the wife will like when we downsize into my other home. I will miss listening at 87 dB at 2am tho.

 

[dlaloum]

Wiim is heading in this territory is my theory. Out the door they are making mucj better products than long standing audio companies. Thier streaming app is as good as anything out there. Give them a few more years and we might see the real thing.

Yes, Wiim is very promising (I purchased one of their streaming amps for my sons bedroom)...

But an AVR is an order of magnitude more complex... you go from Stereo to 5.1/7.1/7.1.4 - that's a LOT more amps... and a much bigger power supply to feed it all - and then you have the licencing fees for all the decoders.

Something like the Onkyo NR7100 is actually astounding value - especially once discounted... it is roughly the price of 2 WiiM amps, while having 10 channels of processing and 9 channels of amps.... if you had 4 WiiM's it would be roughly equivalent.... and would cost more than the NR7100 does.

If and when Wiim decides to step into the AVR/AVP game, I would expect their pricing to be on a par with D&M or O&I&P.... or JBL, etc...

 

[jayapple]

The effect does not seem to be very good, only to reach some low-end Japanese AVR level,
JBL can do better, of course, this product is not very high price.

 

[dlaloum]

The effect does not seem to be very good, only to reach some low-end Japanese AVR level,
JBL can do better, of course, this product is not very high price.

This is clearly (IMO) targeted to the mass market... JBL already have the Synthesis range to cover the high end market...

And their recent onboarding of the ex-Dirac CEO may indicate they are about to re-adjust their AV ranges... changes are overdue in the Synthesis range too!

 

[Sashoir]

Also supports UPnP.

Although I've learned to my cost that the UPnP "standard" is not particularly well-standardised (setnextavtransporturi, I'm looking at you!).

 

[DrStranger]

The effect does not seem to be very good, only to reach some low-end Japanese AVR level,
JBL can do better, of course, this product is not very high price.

Whats the price on your end? If i convert mine its $ 1600

 

[Sashoir]

I owned a Samsung dishwasher and it was so bad I will never buy a JBL product.

Absolutely not disputing your experience, but we got a samsung clothes-washing machine on special and are exceedingly happy with it four years in: that being said, our alternatives would have been from manufacturers nobody outside the clothes-washer industry had heard of due to our budget constraints.

As an aside, I think a lot of people are aware that buying inferior, cheaper goods does not make sense in a "lifetime cost" sense (or an environmental/resource sense), but are constrained by cash-flow to spend x every three years rather than 5x for something which will last for 30 years.

 

[ryanmh1]

So. Bad. Rare product among mass market "mid tier" AVRs that is so bad it arguably might have audible distortion or noise. Blech. It's -60/.1% THD+N 1kHz at 1W with HDMI/4R and the volume knob not set to full blast (likely use case). Granted, that's with the volume down. On full blast it's -70.

To be clear, while this thing appears to be slightly better than some competition on the SINAD chart, it's arguably not if you look at the curve closely. It has an unusual and fortuitous dip that allows it to do better at 3W. At 1W, RZ50 is -76 on the same curve. STR-DH190, -75. RX-A1080, -75. Nad T758? -55. So, there's that. It beats one of the noisier things ever tested. But it falls behind all the other mass market AVR competition, were it not for that weird dip. And it's so noisy. 10dB or worse than the others. So awful it seems likely to be audible on most speakers. The distortion you might not hear but the noise seems a real issue.

 

[kyuu]

The distortion you might not hear but the noise seems a real issue.

I'll report back if there's audible hiss on my speakers when I hook this thing up.

 

[Martin]

Well... That's unfortunate. I was really hoping for better performance. I guess I'll hang on to my Pioneer Elite SC-LX801. I watched Gladiator on HD Blu-Ray this weekend and was quite enamored with it's performance.

Martin