Marantz AV10 AV Processor Review

[Galliardist]

Frankly, for the money, this should be included by default...

Performance is pretty much excellent across the board. It better be for this price. I still hate the overall new design, but could live with the porthole. They should really reconsider that silly leaky filter. The only reason to have it is to make the thing sound different. Most of this will be filtered out anyway, as soon as you run the room correction.

Without the silly filter, no subjective reviewer will ever be able to imagine discover the amazing, warm traditional Marantz sound!

(Well, maybe they would, given the name is written on the front.)

Buyers should watch that though, especially in case it defaults back to that filter after changing to filter 2, either randomly, or if power to the device goes down.

 

[thewas]

Marantz engineering team: "How many inputs and outputs should it have?"

Marantz marketing team: "Yes"

 

[Mikycoud]

107db SINAD for such a complex,multifunction machine powered by traditional linear PSUs is a miracle.
The absence of USB is bad somehow,I don't know if the network ability can replace it.

Copper screws inside is a nice traditional touch.

Thanks Amir!

I do wonder in what sense NEtwork ability would make up for a missing USB. What are we talking about here? USB for control/setup/automation?
Well in that case there's well enough that can be made through other interfaces (amongst which network interfaces which you mentionned)
If it's USB audio input you're referring to, how could network abilities be a replacement for that? It's a different thing altogether, right?
What am I missing in your statement?

 

[Sokel]

I do wonder in what sense NEtwork ability would make up for a missing USB. What are we talking about here? USB for control/setup/automation?

To tell you the truth I have no idea.
Streaming maybe?

AVs is not my thing (yet)

Edit:It seems so:

Network AV 10

manuals.marantz.com

Edit 2: It does have a USB port after all,only it's on the front panel (for USB sticks,etc)

 

[Mikycoud]

To tell you the truth I have no idea.
Streaming maybe?

AVs is not my thing (yet)

Edit:It seems so:

Network AV 10

manuals.marantz.com

Edit 2: It does have a USB port after all,only it's on the front panel (for USB sticks,etc)

View attachment 330853

Yep it does, well, after a fashion at least. It's a USB port aimed at storage access, not audio input , which is, I reckon, what other posters were referring to.
Well, anyway, plenty of other options to get some digital audio source in on this unit.

 

[D!sco]

Really good review and a surprisingly good device, for an appropriately reprehensible amount of money.

Was the quality post surround processing tested? I’d be really curious to see a comparison. Throughput is remarkably clean, but I’m under the impression that the decoders are proprietary and difficult to improve.

 

[iLoveCats]

Marantz engineering team: "How many inputs and outputs should it have?"

Marantz marketing team: "Yes"

Marantz marketing team: "Everything but USB"

 

[TonyJZX]

Marantz engineering team: "How many inputs and outputs should it have?"

Marantz marketing team: "Yes"

Marantz marketing team: "Everything but USB"

https://imgur.com/a/Nzxunme

but again maybe this isnt a thing anywhere

they expect you to pipe a pc thru hdmi

 

[mash]

Well, its nice that Marantz seems to finally be paying more attention to measurements than Audio marketing snake oil but the price is killer....and how many people actually use 19 speakers in their Home theater? If they can take the same level of performance, package it in a smaller 9.2 or 7.2 box, cut the price in half...I'd buy it in a min to replace the older AVP that I run my home theater off of now.

 

[muslhead]

This + Buckeye Amps and you’ve reached endgame.

I did just this.
Thank you Amir for the review and the outcome i was hoping for buying sight unseen.
The other thing to mention is it just works. Set it up and turn it on. Such a wonderful change from the emotiva POS i owned previously

 

[Drengur]

Nice to see good results for a AV-product, doesn't happen that often. I voted fine simply because of the price-tag. I guess the regular-joe is looking forward to buying this used for 1200$ in a few years. The HDMI ports seem to be 2.1, which should last for a while.

 

[cyclo]

Waiting for Marantz to launch AV20... hopefully at 1/3 the price... less would be better. I still have the AV7702 processor which have served me well over the years. I am mostly using it to decode Atmos nowadays (via ARC), relegating HDMI switching to my LG TV.

 

[mctron]

Great to see in a Marantz. Hopefully we can have some trickle-down to the cheaper models and Denons.

 

[Open Mind Audio]

Well, crap. Just when I thought AV separates were hopeless and I should throw in the towel and return to using a basic little AVR, you suck me back in.

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[sealman]

I did just this.
Thank you Amir for the review and the outcome i was hoping for buying sight unseen.
The other thing to mention is it just works. Set it up and turn it on. Such a wonderful change from the emotiva POS i owned previously

I am taking a hard look at this as well since my XMC-2 just died for the second time. Thankfully it is still under warranty but I have lost all of my patience with it.

 

[Thomas_A]

Wish to Marantz. Scale it down and make a pure pre AV in slim line format.

 

[Killingbeans]

Copper screws inside is a nice traditional touch.

They look fancy, but that's all they do... besides driving the poor people, who do repairs on it, nuts.

 

[ban25]

I actually see this as a half-price Storm ISP Core 16, particularly when DLBC and the heavily rumored ART arrive. In many important ways, it's better than the Storm, especially with a full complement of 40 Gbps HDMI 2.1 ports (Storm claims 18 Gbps). It's a fantastic deal for a no compromise 16-channel processor with class-leading performance!

 

[Irwinroad]

Any comment on the brewing debate on whether or not the AV 10's analog inputs bypass the onboard DAC?

I apologize for the cross forum quote but the issue is explained much better.

My analog inputs measurements proves there is a true analog bypass mode on the AV 10. It's likely when you spoke to someone at Marantz, they weren't very familiar with the product. Note the straight ruler frequency response to the limit of my Audio Precision. There is no ADC happening in these measurements. I'm sorry if some people don't want to believe in facts but that doesn't make them untrue.

 

[ban25]

Any comment on the brewing debate on whether or not the AV 10's analog inputs bypass the onboard DAC?

I apologize for the cross forum quote but the issue is explained much better.

There is no brewing debate. That thread has nonsense spewed by a poster who is clearly ignorant of the English language and short on cognition in general! Gene settled the issue quite definitively.