Onkyo TX-NR7100 AVR Review

[tbob22]

Its a different revision of board. It might have a lower power chip in place now. Or they've just done the measurements to show a heatsink is not needed.

Onkyo didn't think heatsinks were needed on older models and that didn't turn out so well.

 

[antcollinet]

Onkyo didn't think heatsinks were needed on older models and that didn't turn out so well.

So what are we saying "They once didn't put heatsinks on a chip and it failed - so now they must put heatsinks on all chips, whether needed or not"?

Or "They made a mistake once, so they will always make that mistake"


My experience of engineering teams is once they make a mistake, they learn from it (especially when field failures occur - that is a very painful lesson), and usually don't repeat it. A quite likely learning point in the case you are describing is. "we don't want to put a high power dissipating chip in that location where it is difficult to cool anymore, lets replace it with a much lower power one"

 

[tbob22]

So what are we saying "They once didn't put heatsinks on a chip and it failed - so now they must put heatsinks on all chips, whether needed or not"?

Or "They made a mistake once, so they will always make that mistake"


My experience of engineering teams is once they make a mistake, they learn from it (especially when field failures occur - that is a very painful lesson), and usually don't repeat it. A quite likely learning point in the case you are describing is. "we don't want to put a high power dissipating chip in that location where it is difficult to cool anymore, lets replace it with a much lower power one"

Let's hope so and it's not just cutting corners.

 

[PGansz]

I had this AVR for a month before returning it. It made multiple loud pops when powering on and off, which got worse with time. My Polk Reserves sounded incredibly distorted with any volume level above 65db during a movie with a 5.1.2 setup.

After reading this review my experience makes a lot of sense.

 

[EWL5]

I had this AVR for a month before returning it. It made multiple loud pops when powering on and off, which got worse with time. My Polk Reserves sounded incredibly distorted with any volume level above 65db during a movie with a 5.1.2 setup.

After reading this review my experience makes a lot of sense.

Assuming your Reserves are low impedance, there are many who don’t believe limp mode exists for real-world scenarios.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

I had this AVR for a month before returning it. It made multiple loud pops when powering on and off, which got worse with time. My Polk Reserves sounded incredibly distorted with any volume level above 65db during a movie with a 5.1.2 setup.

After reading this review my experience makes a lot of sense.

was that before Oct 28th's firmware update? Sounds like a classic bad amp issue though. One of my Outlaw 7000X had this issue, but got it covered under warranty.

 

[PGansz]

was that before Oct 28th's firmware update? Sounds like a classic bad amp issue though. One of my Outlaw 7000X had this issue, but got it covered under warranty.

Yes I ditched it 2yrs ago. It was damaging my speakers.

 

[tbob22]

Yes I ditched it 2yrs ago. It was damaging my speakers.

Did you ever check temperatures in the web interface? Power is limited pretty hard once it reaches 61c.

 

[HappyCamper]

This is ridiculous. This is a fabulous product, and possibly the best value in any AVR today for those who do not need preouts. . For well under a grand, the unit offers full Dirac room correction. This is so wildly more important to good sound than any perceived shortcomings. Name me one other unit that had this or XT32 for the price. I'll wait.

In actual use, the power limiting will affect almost *no one*. To properly test that, the unit should be used with music with a reasonable crest factor just below clipping. If it shuts down, then fine, there is a problem. If not, this is *objectively* not a problem. As dlaloum noted, virtually no actual user has noted an issue. I strongly suspect there is not one.

Price needs to be kept in mind. For the price, this is an unparalleled value. Most of the measured deficiencies are highly likely to be inaudible on an average system, anyway. That Dirac will make all the difference in the world though.

As someone who bought one of these brand new, owned it for a few months, and sold it due to the power limiting issue I have to respectfully disagree.

I noticed the power limiting issue almost right away when I was listening to music in direct mode with my JBL L890 towers, and I tried again with my older JBL L100 Centuries (an even easier load on the amp) to confirm what was going on, and those old L100's were also able to suck this Onkyo amp dry and throw it into the power limiting mode, which makes the music sound weak and terrible with no mid-bass response. My 7100 never shut down when this happened, it just sounded weak and awful which is unacceptable.

More power to you if you are happy with such a terrible product, but for my money I expect proper performance. I replaced this with a Denon x6700H and it drives my speakers in stereo to loud volumes without any power limiting and sounds much better doing so.

 

[Doodski]

As someone who bought one of these brand new, owned it for a few months, and sold it due to the power limiting issue I have to respectfully disagree.

I noticed the power limiting issue almost right away when I was listening to music in direct mode with my JBL L890 towers, and I tried again with my older JBL L100 Centuries (an even easier load on the amp) to confirm what was going on, and those old L100's were also able to suck this Onkyo amp dry and throw it into the power limiting mode, which makes the music sound weak and terrible with no mid-bass response. My 7100 never shut down when this happened, it just sounded weak and awful which is unacceptable.

More power to you if you are happy with such a terrible product, but for my money I expect proper performance. I replaced this with a Denon x6700H and it drives my speakers in stereo to loud volumes without any power limiting and sounds much better doing so.

@ryanmh1 thinks this is a fabulous product and waxed poetically about it for days and maybe weeks. It's a terrible product made for a price point that is low.

 

[HappyCamper]

And the sad thing is that since I bought this, the price has actually gone up. I believe I paid $1298 CAD and right now it looks like it's around $1500...very poor value for the money.

 

[Power Pop 23]

I own a Pioneer Elite VSX-LX505 and can't help but wonder whether the firmware update of late October 2024 has changed the measured output power of select AVR's from Premium Audio Company. I am hopeful Amir will be able to measure an AVR with this firmware update.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

I own a Pioneer Elite VSX-LX505 and can't help but wonder whether the firmware update of late October 2024 has changed the measured output power of select AVR's from Premium Audio Company. I am hopeful Amir will be able to measure an AVR with this firmware update.

I'm debating buying the Integra 3.4 for my parents, and would send it to Amir if he wants it. A user earlier in this thread did say they measured a lot more power after the update.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

Did you ever check temperatures in the web interface? Power is limited pretty hard once it reaches 61c.

Where do you see that? When I log in it only has device name, comtrol4, change password, and network settings. Nothing else. The website & manual show the same thing. Where is the temperature?

 

[ban25]

Where do you see that? When I log in it only has device name, comtrol4, change password, and network settings. Nothing else. The website & manual show the same thing. Where is the temperature?

Login with username ciuser and password ciuser.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

Login with username ciuser and password ciuser.

wow didn't know about that, that's what I've been wanting. IDK why this page isn't just the main login page.

 

[dlaloum]

wow didn't know about that, that's what I've been wanting. IDK why this page isn't just the main login page.

Theoretically those userid's are sent out only to "custom installers" via the "custom installer channel" and are not supposed to be available to normal users....

they were shared a couple of years back.... shortly after they were announced on the "custom installer channel" - but yes, they aren't documented anywhere in the normal doc.

 

[andrewskaterrr]

Theoretically those userid's are sent out only to "custom installers" via the "custom installer channel" and are not supposed to be available to normal users....

they were shared a couple of years back.... shortly after they were announced on the "custom installer channel" - but yes, they aren't documented anywhere in the normal doc.

ya that's what I thought. It's BS though because it's just the same settings you get in the OSD, but WAY easier/faster to do, and save your configs. My JBL SDP-55 and many other AVRs do it too, so it's weird to hide a "basic" features like limited to installers. It's not even like a service menu for a Tesla, it's just basic settings.

 

[silverstreak_2006]

When the unit shuts down to protect itself, the web interface is not accessible...

The Status screen, on the web interface has a field which Onkyo/Integra calls "Protect" - and it has two possible statuses protected/not protected.

Protected, is the mode where the amp output is constrained, unprotected is the standard operating mode

So yes, their terminology is confusing! if there is a short on a speaker wire, the AVR will go into shutdown to protect itself... but this isn't what they call their "protect" mode.

To bring up that status screen, log into the web interface as UID=ciuser PWD=ciuser, and click on the "clipboard" icon on the top right hand side of the screen... scroll down to the "Amplifier" section.

The three items monitored here are:

• Protect
• Temperature
• Fan Speed

With my Gallo Nucleus Ref 3.2 speakers - I have never managed to trigger the "protect" mode where it power limits, however, you observed distortion rise at 10W.... and I observed subjective poor performance.... which was not present when I used external power amps (given mine is the Integra twin with pre-outs)... so I am not surprised to see (hear) that there is an early rise in distortion when driving 4ohm.
Given how "unhappy" these amp circuits get with 4 ohm loads, I do wonder whether the poor THD we are seeing would be present on an 8ohm load test.

It would be nice to see results/measurements of the Integra member of that family, as I have found it to be an excellent AVP, and its internal amps have been perfectly up to the task of running surround/height, once relieved of the primary load of L / R.

When the amp switches to the lower rail, you hear the relay for the transformer tap click, but the OS never tells you the state of play. If you don't trip current circuits to trigger then by the time it hits 60 deg C you will hear this, unless you have loud audio to not be able to hear this, and you see the unit start to cool down.

Try a 20Hz tone feed and watch the unit warm up, until it hits 60 degrees, you should be able to hear the relay, unlike a 1KHZ tone which if deafening at any given "volume".

Note I don't have the "dummy loads" to push to clipping to do a current limit test, but I have heard the relay do funny things inbetween, and the latest frimware, unless your on NET or watching a movie, any of the analog inputs, it will crank to the high supply above -22dB, then after a few seconds slip back. I have rolled back to the last firmware before the latest so I have some degree of control. admittedly most people listening to music don't need the dynamic headroom, and I guess the initial "trick" is to do this so it shows on a bench test, and gets more kudos.

What is the actual dB difference between 20 watts (40 watts at 4 ohm), and say the 136 watt at 8 ohm, 4 ohms dynamically, well.......


This is on an RZ50 as well, as it should be the same, the file sizes of the firmware match.