Great Surround Sound Receiver

Onkyo means "sound" in Japanese. It means great sound to your ears. I like Onkyo because I've never had a bad receiver. I am upgrading my old one because it lacked onboard digital decoders. Now that I am buying newer DVD players that lack onboard digital decoding, it was important to me that I buy a good receiver. the Onkyo TX-SR502 A/V receiver is rated at 75 watts per channel. It is a 6.1 system. Note it can decode for a center-rear channel. it will split your 5.1 discs into three rear-channel sound. I haven't tried that as I am perfectly happy with a 5.1 system. I like this system for a few things:
1. Speaker setup comes with the choice of small/large speakers in addition to the distance of each speaker from you and the noise calibration allows you to adjust the sound level on each channel in order to balance the sound. A spl (sound meter) is helpful here.
2. Each output on the back is clearly marked. They even give you labels to wrap on each wire so the labels match the color of the output connection.
3. The inputs are clear too. You can easily map your digital optical connections to your components.
4. Shifting between components is easy, as is adjust bass/treble settings.


http://www.onkyousa.com and click on the Products link, Receivers link and this models link then click Features. I pasted them below:


Power Specifications

Power Output* (8 ohm, 20 Hz-20 kHz, FTC) -

All Channel Discrete Outputs -

6 ohm Capable -

4 ohm Capable -

Front L/R 75 W/Ch

Center 75 W

Surround L/R 75 W/Ch

High Quality Extruded Heatsink -

Surround Back 75 W

Dynamic Power** -

3 ohm (Front) 160 W

4 ohm (Front) 150 W

8 ohm (Front) 95 W


Amplifier Design

Color Coded Speaker Terminals -

Identical Full-Bandwidth Channels 5

Reduced NFB (Negative Feedback) Design

WRAT (Wide Range Amplifier Technology)

Non-Scaling Configuration -

DACs 96 kHz/24-Bit x 6

High Current Low Impedance Drive

All Discrete Output Stage Amplifiers

Optimum Gain Volume Circuitry

Digital Upsampling

Comb Filter for Composite to S -


Home Theater Features

HDMI Video Upconversion -

THX Surround EX and THX Certified -

Cinema Re-EQ -

Extended Frequency Response (+ 1 dB, - 3 dB) 10 Hz-100 kHz

DTS, DTS-ES Discrete/Matrix 6.1, DTS Neo:6

Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic II

Dolby Digital EX -

A-Form Listening Mode Memory -

Composite and S-Video to Component Video Upconversion -

Composite to S-Video Conversion -

Multichannel Input 5.1

CinemaFILTER

Digital Soundfield Processing Modes 9

Late Night Mode

Color-Coded Speaker Terminals

On-Screen Display -

Adjustable Digital Delay -

Crossover Adjustment


Internet Features

Net-Tune -

Ethernet -

Number of Presets (Internet Radio) -

Front-Panel Optical -


Inputs

Audio and AV Inputs 2/4

HDTV-Ready Component Video Input/Output

Front-Panel Video Input (with S-Video)

S-Video Compatible Jacks Input/Output 4/2

Digital Inputs 3 Optical, 1 Coaxial

Digital Output -

Amp In -

RS-232 Control Port -

IR In/Out -


Pre Outs

Front L/R, Center -

Surround L/R -

Surround Back -

Time Base Correction (TBC) -

Subwoofer


Other Features

Dot-Matrix Display

Display Dimmer 3 Levels

Pure Audio Mode -

Zone 2 Composite Video -

Dual Banana Plug Compatible Speaker Terminals

Zone 2 OSD -

Zone 2 Subwoofer -

Sleep Timer (90 minutes; 10-min steps)

Phono Input -

Headphone Jack

Zone 2 (Multisource) Line Out -

Powered Zone 2 -

12 Volt Trigger -

A/B Speaker Drive A and B


Tuner Features

Number of Presets (FM/AM) 30


Control

RI-Compatible Remote Control Prepro

Macro Function -

Absolute/Relative Volume Display Absolute

Intelli Volume -