Onkyo TX-SR706 7.1 Channel Home Theater Receiver (Black) Review

This is my third Onkyo receiver, and I really have had no complaints about any them. The one I replaced with this receiver gave me over ten years of service.

I decided to upgrade because this receiver brings me into the digital age. This unit sports four HDMI inputs and an HDMI output for the TV. Now I can pipe the A/V from the cable box DVR to the receiver and from the receiver to the HDTV while staying in the digital domain the entire path.

When I first hooked up the unit, I hooked it to a standard definition TV via component video inputs/outputs (there are two component inputs and one output). The resulting picture was much better than with the S-video I used on the previous unit. - I was surprised with the picture improvement. This receiver also supports 7.1 channel surround allowing me the use of two surround back channels. I find that the surround sound quality is definitely improved over the previous unit. I attribute this to the extra back surround channels, the multitude of listening modes, the THX certification, and the Audyssey MultEQ automatic speaker setup.

Briefly, the Audyssey system did a good job of setting up the speakers. It automatically calculates speaker distance, performs equalization on each speaker, sets the high pass cutoff frequency (if necessary for small speakers, my small back surrounds were set to 150Hz for example), sets the level, and did I say it does this all automatically! I double checked the SPL settings via a Radio Shack sound pressure meter and the levels were all very close. I did increase the LFE channel 1.5 dB, however. Also, Audyssey said my subwoofer was thirty feet away. This was the only error. My subwoofers are built into my left and right front speakers which are about nine feet from the listening position. I simply changed this value via the menus.

I also want to mention the large number of listening modes. There is a slew of Dolby, DTS and THX listening modes in addition to a number of DSP modes. Check the online manual to see just how many there are on the Onyko website.

This unit comes with a 119 page manual covering all aspects of the receiver, and believe me, there are many.

Overall, I am well pleased with this receiver. Excuse me now; I have a movie I want to watch.


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