Sony, pioneer, or yamaha reciever?

Question

what do you think the best cheap reciever around is?

http://www.yamaha.com/yec/products/productdetail.html?CNTID=552126&CTID=5000400&RLTID=1504&DETYP=RELATION

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PUSA/Products/HomeEntertainment/AV-Receivers/PioneerReceivers/ci.VSX-517-K%7CS.Kuro

http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&langId=-1&productId=8198552921665061593

Answer 1

Receivers are the most important part of the home theater, as they interconnect and control everything. A bad receiver can ruin the signals from the best of components, so the choice of a receiver is of utmost importance.

I prefer Yamaha, the only other brand I would consider is Denon. Both give high quality performance and offer capabilities the others do not, (i.e. automatic speaker calibration, connectivity for presence speakers etc), both give great after purchase customer support, the manuals are decent and understandable, both incorporate the Burr-Brown 24-bit/192-kHz DACs – PCM-1791 2/8ch at their mid-level products which; 1) arguably produce higher quality audio and, 2) you won't see in most other products.

Spend as much as your budget will allow and to also allow  for future expansion of your system.

Answer 2

Stay away from Sony.

Pioneer is good for functionality, not audio quality (I.E. Even the lowest models will have multi-room support or the optimizer Mic input).

Harmon Kardan, which you didn't list, is excellent for pure audio quality, (They have a THD of as low as .07%!!!)  but not so much functionality.

Yamaha is the best all around.  If you spend about $300, you'll get a good balance between functionality AND audio.

And side note:  Yamaha is the only company that actually has their equipment tested by actual musicians and other sound professionals before they officially create each product.

Answer 3

Yamaha makes the best recievers.

Sony's are overpriced.

Pioneers are good and this one is less then the Yamaha, but the best value is still the Yamaha