Who's running flagship AVRs? Do tell why.

I'm no longer in the 'club' as it were, having sold my DSP-Z7 on Sunday. I shall miss it but the A-S1100 with which I replaced it is making me

 

I posted earlier about my Denon AVR-5803. I thought I would mention that I have a Yamaha RX-V1000 that I use to power my decade old JBL 3way outdoor monitors. The Yamaha was not the flagship but I believe the 2nd rung. Bought it new when it first came out and it still works fine as well as the remote. What a waste of 5.1 power and space.

 

So, I've also found a Yamaha RX-Z9 that should arrive this week. I'm curious to know if it will accept a Toslink signal directly from my PC's motherboard.

If not, does anyone have experience with these new XMOS USB bridges mentioned in this thread: Experiences with USB to SPDIF converters?

I'm not looking to spend more than $100 bucks on one of these things, so the F-1 is out, but perhaps the X-1 would be worth trying!

 

Do reason to think it wouldn't accept your TOSLINK signal. It has 7(!) optical inputs. I run TOSLINK to my Sony STR-DA4400ES from my PC motherboard without issue

 

That's good to know! I'll start by trying one of those glass strand optical cables. After reading up on this a bit, I've become a little concerned about issues with jitter and clock timing and such without a good USB receiver. Hopefully, Yamaha has designed some type of circuitry in their Z9 to sort that out

 

I wouldn't worry about that. I'm running optical to my Sony DA4ES and it works awesome. (though I'm not running optical from the built-in realtek sound on the motherboard - I'm running from a studio grade sound card - E-Mu 1212m.)

 

I have the 2090's little brother; the RX-V990! And if your 2090 sounds as good as the 990, I can understand why you run it solo. Fantastic receivers.

 

I actually started with my previously mentioned Yamaha RX-V990. Plus, it's companion DDP-1 (for AC-3 laser disc support). Next, a DSP-A3090, a RX-V3000 ($50 used), and now, a Yamaha RX-A3030. I still have 'em all, and they still sound great.

Personally, I like top A/V receivers for their sound quality, and their integration. All-in-one units, including DACs. Hard to fault for their simplicity. The RX-A3030 uses the ESS Sabre32 DAC chips, which are pretty sweet. The receiver produces a wide sound stage, with excellent detail, and a warmer sound than my past Yamaha's. Excellent steering too, when used in surround.

 

Well, I finally got another Z9 hooked up and I'm enjoying it more than I remember from the original I briefly owned some years ago. Feeding it with digital optical from my PC, the sound is clean and dynamic - which seems to do better with fast paced and busy genres opposed to my Chinese SE 300b integrated. In what is probably an unfair comparison, the SS Yamaha doesn't quite have the smoothness and liquid feeling of the tube amp, but it's 90-95% there. I wonder if adding a tube pre-amp would smooth out some of the stridency from the SS Yamaha, just a thought though! Cheers!

 

I don't know what all the DAC alphabet soup means on my Pioneer Elite,

"Freescale™ and Texas Instruments Aureus 24-Bit Digital Engine."

My ears tell me it sounds great.

 

Using the Chord Mojo with the Z9 is absolute bliss!!!!

 

I swapped out the 5005 with the 6009, and was unimpressed. I tried it with both the internal phono amp and the external CA one I have, sounds the same as far as I can tell. The 6009 really sounds like something is missing compared to the 5005, it sounds nice but just not complete somehow - I tried it in pure direct but didn't make much difference. I put the 5005 back in service and the sound came back to life.

So for now I'll stick with the analogue 5005 and just use external kit to get Spotify routed into it, it means more boxes but it's not worth the compromise.

Whats more , on the 5005, I've ditched both the CA external phono stage and the Schiit headphone amp, no loss in sound from those changes that I can hear, so for now I think I have a very nice combination of relatively modest kit which will keep me happy for a while yet.

 

Add a Yamaha RXZ9 to that mix.I have my KEFs and Vandersteens but this is going to power a set of JBL 112 and Cerwin Vega 317P Rockers for the punch and dynamics that this setup will do.

 

I'll add another RXV1 to the list.Just can't get enough of these but these will more than likely be the last.