This is a review and detailed measurements of the Marantz AV10 Audio/Video Processor (AVP). It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $7000.
My picture doesn't do justice to the nice look of the unit. It is a massive step up from past Marantz AV products. I am still not a fan of the port hole and little information it shows but at least it now blends in with the rest of the unit. This thing is extremely heavy for a processor as well. I had to double check that it did not have amplifiers in it! The user interface is high resolution and relatively easy to use. One nit was that even though I had the HDMI out to my monitor, it would not bring up the full setup if I had it on CD with Toslink input. It required an HDMI input to do that. Strange.
An attractive metal remote control is provided. Usually these metal ones are not ergonomic but this one is.
Back panel shows the myriad of connectors due to 15.4 processing capability of this unit:
Watching technical video of the unit from Marantz, I was smiling ear to ear seeing measurements that closely mirror mine!
Clearly company put focus on them to deliver a better performing product. Let's measure and see if that is so.
Marantz AV10 Processor DAC Measurements
I tapped the front left and right XLR/RCA outputs on bottom left above and fed the unit Toslink digital input. Volume was set to 82.5 to achieve 2.0/4.0 volts on RCA/XLR respectively (same as all Denon/Marantz AV products which is nice):
This is a big step up from previous Marantz processors I have tested. Performance remains the same for XLR as that is derived from unbalanced output:
SINAD is about 1 dB better than company measurements although their noise floor is cleaner than mine. I rechecked the unit later after it warmed up and SINAD had dropped a bit to 106 and change. To give benefit of doubt, I went with 107 which places the AV10 at top of every AV processor tested so far:
Testing with HDMI was more problematic as if I just plugged it in, noise floor would go up independent of which input was actually used. Here is that with HDMI as the source:
Company measurements again don't show this as they likely use the Audio Precision as HDMI source rather than my testing which uses a Windows PC GPU HDMI output. I like to see the company investigate this but for now, let's use Toslink input unless stated otherwise.
The processor is capable of far higher output than what I set it to. Alas, performance drops. Here is what happens if you change the digital input and sweep that at three different volume control positions:
But you won't be using the unit that way. Instead, you crank the volume up and down so here is the same sweep but now I am turning the volume control to change output:
As you see in both graphs, optimal output is more or less what you see in the dashboard. So don't go getting a very low gain amplifier thinking you are coming out ahead. Likely a medium gain amp is the best combination.
EDIT: Noise performance is quite good for an AV product:
Multitone performance is excellent for an AV product even though I used HDMI (sample rate is 192 KHz which Toslink doesn't support):
The noise spikes did interfere with my linearity test though:
You can see the impact of HDMI noise in Jitter test:
The spikes are at 1 kHz which tell me they are USB noise (my analyzer uses that to communicate with the source PC). Your standard AV product may not have that issue.
IMD test shows very good performance for an AV product:
I was so pleased to see Marantz take our input and provide an alternate to their default, almost no filter setting of the DAC:
As you see, they are exposing a second filter that is the typical default one in DAC ICs. This nicely gives us flat frequency response now:
Our wideband THD+N test naturally depends on filter setting:
Marantz AV10 Phono Input Measurements
Let's start with our standard dashboard and RCA Output:
Gain is a bit on the low side but output is very clean, landing an above average position in our SINAD ranking:
XLR output gives higher gain of 41 dB with similar performance:
RIAA equalization could be a bit better though:
Headroom could be higher but good news is that it remains essentially the same across all frequencies (many phono stages drop like a rock at higher frequencies):
Marantz AV10 Headphone Measurements
I used Toslink input and measured the headphone output at 300 ohm:
This is good performance and passes my target of 100 milliwatts of power. 32 ohm load causes strain, resulting in too little output for mains operated device:
The reason for that becomes obvious as we switch loads:
Those graphs should all start from the same point. When they keep going backward with decreasing load, it means the output impedance of the headphone amp is non-zero, causing power loss. Not good if you have a headphone with variable impedance (non-planar).
Conclusions
Ever since my initial contact with Denon & Marantz, I had hoped that they would target proper measurements and work to improve fidelity of their products. It is clear that they have done so in this Marantz processor, pushing the line's noise and distortion way down, landing at the top of our AV chart. In addition to that, the industrial design has been enhanced taking the processor from last place to top of the class. Even the remote control has benefited from this.
Phono stage is good enough but headphone amp could use some work. I suspect the latter gets little use so I am not worried about it. If you can afford to spend $7K on this processor, you can spend another $200 to get a proper headphone amp.
People who said AV processor can never be improved to perform, are proven wrong now.
It is my pleasure to recommend the Marantz AV10 AV Processor. Expensive, yes. But at least now performance goes with the increased cost.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
My picture doesn't do justice to the nice look of the unit. It is a massive step up from past Marantz AV products. I am still not a fan of the port hole and little information it shows but at least it now blends in with the rest of the unit. This thing is extremely heavy for a processor as well. I had to double check that it did not have amplifiers in it! The user interface is high resolution and relatively easy to use. One nit was that even though I had the HDMI out to my monitor, it would not bring up the full setup if I had it on CD with Toslink input. It required an HDMI input to do that. Strange.
An attractive metal remote control is provided. Usually these metal ones are not ergonomic but this one is.
Back panel shows the myriad of connectors due to 15.4 processing capability of this unit:
Watching technical video of the unit from Marantz, I was smiling ear to ear seeing measurements that closely mirror mine!
Clearly company put focus on them to deliver a better performing product. Let's measure and see if that is so.Marantz AV10 Processor DAC Measurements
I tapped the front left and right XLR/RCA outputs on bottom left above and fed the unit Toslink digital input. Volume was set to 82.5 to achieve 2.0/4.0 volts on RCA/XLR respectively (same as all Denon/Marantz AV products which is nice):
This is a big step up from previous Marantz processors I have tested. Performance remains the same for XLR as that is derived from unbalanced output:
SINAD is about 1 dB better than company measurements although their noise floor is cleaner than mine. I rechecked the unit later after it warmed up and SINAD had dropped a bit to 106 and change. To give benefit of doubt, I went with 107 which places the AV10 at top of every AV processor tested so far:
Testing with HDMI was more problematic as if I just plugged it in, noise floor would go up independent of which input was actually used. Here is that with HDMI as the source:
Company measurements again don't show this as they likely use the Audio Precision as HDMI source rather than my testing which uses a Windows PC GPU HDMI output. I like to see the company investigate this but for now, let's use Toslink input unless stated otherwise.
The processor is capable of far higher output than what I set it to. Alas, performance drops. Here is what happens if you change the digital input and sweep that at three different volume control positions:
But you won't be using the unit that way. Instead, you crank the volume up and down so here is the same sweep but now I am turning the volume control to change output:
As you see in both graphs, optimal output is more or less what you see in the dashboard. So don't go getting a very low gain amplifier thinking you are coming out ahead. Likely a medium gain amp is the best combination.
EDIT: Noise performance is quite good for an AV product:
Multitone performance is excellent for an AV product even though I used HDMI (sample rate is 192 KHz which Toslink doesn't support):
The noise spikes did interfere with my linearity test though:
You can see the impact of HDMI noise in Jitter test:
The spikes are at 1 kHz which tell me they are USB noise (my analyzer uses that to communicate with the source PC). Your standard AV product may not have that issue.
IMD test shows very good performance for an AV product:
I was so pleased to see Marantz take our input and provide an alternate to their default, almost no filter setting of the DAC:
As you see, they are exposing a second filter that is the typical default one in DAC ICs. This nicely gives us flat frequency response now:
Our wideband THD+N test naturally depends on filter setting:
Marantz AV10 Phono Input Measurements
Let's start with our standard dashboard and RCA Output:
Gain is a bit on the low side but output is very clean, landing an above average position in our SINAD ranking:
XLR output gives higher gain of 41 dB with similar performance:
RIAA equalization could be a bit better though:
Headroom could be higher but good news is that it remains essentially the same across all frequencies (many phono stages drop like a rock at higher frequencies):
Marantz AV10 Headphone Measurements
I used Toslink input and measured the headphone output at 300 ohm:
This is good performance and passes my target of 100 milliwatts of power. 32 ohm load causes strain, resulting in too little output for mains operated device:
The reason for that becomes obvious as we switch loads:
Those graphs should all start from the same point. When they keep going backward with decreasing load, it means the output impedance of the headphone amp is non-zero, causing power loss. Not good if you have a headphone with variable impedance (non-planar).
Conclusions
Ever since my initial contact with Denon & Marantz, I had hoped that they would target proper measurements and work to improve fidelity of their products. It is clear that they have done so in this Marantz processor, pushing the line's noise and distortion way down, landing at the top of our AV chart. In addition to that, the industrial design has been enhanced taking the processor from last place to top of the class. Even the remote control has benefited from this.
Phono stage is good enough but headphone amp could use some work. I suspect the latter gets little use so I am not worried about it. If you can afford to spend $7K on this processor, you can spend another $200 to get a proper headphone amp.
People who said AV processor can never be improved to perform, are proven wrong now.
It is my pleasure to recommend the Marantz AV10 AV Processor. Expensive, yes. But at least now performance goes with the increased cost.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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