Welcome to AVS Forum “Recommends”—the holiday shopping season is almost upon us, so we turned to our friends over at the AVS Forum to help out our readers. We’re surveying them each week over the next 10 weeks for suggestions in some major electronics categories, so if you’re planning on doing some first-time buying or upgrading, you’ve got a sense of what this group of A/V enthusiasts and DIY theater builders put their trust in.
Since we know not everyone has an unlimited budget, especially this year, we’ve tried to put a cap on your spending. First up: A/V receivers for under $1,000. We’ll be including MSRPs in the slideshow captions (View Slideshow here), but of course some of you will find much better pricing out there (and if you do, please let our readers know in the comments below).
We’re narrowing down the AVS members’ choices—their responses were open-ended—to the eight most common receivers they suggested (we’ll skip calling them vote-getters officially because they weren’t voting on one receiver over any other).
It was pretty clear that Onkyo is considered the reliable, affordable, and quality receiver of choice. The company’s models gathered four of the top six spots, with those four receivers combined recommended by nearly 40-percent of those surveyed. Tops among the Onkyo models was the TX-SR606, followed closely by the TX-SR805.
More than 30 individual models were noted by AVS Forum members, so you can be assured that there are plenty of A/V receivers for you to check out while you’re shopping. If you have some other suggestions—if you’re an AVSer and wants to reiterate your recommendation—please add in the comments below, and why you love the receiver. Check out our slideshow for some features (how many HDMI inputs do you need? looking for 1080p upscaling?) plus some Forum members’ comments about why each receiver rocks.
Manfinger,
Your comment is intriguing, but anyone can say of any product that better alternatives exist for the same price. Naming specific models, and reasons they’re better than Onkyo, could lend credence to your opinion.
So, which specific receivers do you regard as better for the same price as the Onkyo?
After purchasing several Onkyo products over the years, I can say with certainty they are overpriced and overrated.
Better products exist for the same price so there is no reason to follow the sheep in front of you. The only product I would consider a good item was the Onkyo 3 head cassette deck (yes, I know...cassette) that never sees use any longer.
When will HD Radio tuning and/or networked media sharing come to this price range? The Denon 4308CI had everything I want, plus a bunch of stuff I’ll never use.
Crow:
thanks for the suggestion. I’ll take a look at OPPO.
update: OPPO only offers a 3 in 1 out hub.
I need something with 2 outs. Currently everything plugs into the Onkyo to get processed, but I have to swap the cables on the out between my tv and projector depending on what I want to use. I guess I should have been more specific, I guess I need a splitter, not a hub.
Gefen makes a 1 to 4 splitter, but it’s $650 CDN.
Does anyone know of a less expensive splitter that works well?
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Electronic House is now available in a digital edition. Learn more.
i hope they stop trying to make remotes,
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I bought a Onkyo 606 and hooked it up with component cables and had black lines and flutter on the video.
I got another 606 and same problem.
Bought a Denon avr 888 on close out and solved the problem. It does not run nearly so hot but has world’s worst manual.