Onkyo TX-SR606 7.1 Channel Home Theater Receiver (Black)
by Onkyo
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List Price: Our Price: $179.99 You Save: $319.01 (64%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Speakers See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Onkyo TX-SR606 7.1 Channel Home Theater Receiver (Black)
Customer Review: Great mid-level Receiver
Summary: 4 Stars
After a couple of months of research and price checking, I finally bought this Onkyo 606 HTR. I almost bought the Sony 920 when it was on sale. But I had a very nice Onkyo home audio system back in the 90's. When I saw the price of the 606 drop to about $330 on Amazon, I jumped on it. While this unit is not THX certified; it had just about everything I wanted:
7.1 capability--right now I'm using 5.1 (Polk 6750 from Amazon for $278)
Lots of connection options -- HDMI 1.3 being important
DVD upscaling -- wanted 1080p but settled for this units 1080i because of price
I have the receiver connected to a 37" Sharp Aquos LCD ($700 on sale at Dell) and an older Samsung DVD/VCR combo unit. I have problems with Digitital Audio out on this unit; but will be picking up a Phillips 1080p upscaling DVD player at Wal-Mart next week for $50. This will bring the total cost to around $1360. That is not bad for this mid-level system.
The TV is connected directly to cable (no cable box) and I won't go to the cable company's digital package as I am paying $15/month and we don't watch any regular network programming. The Onkyo receiver does just what I need and the upscaling works great. I won't know about the audio until I get the DVD player with HDMI and I'll also need a new Fiber Optic cable to get the audio out from the TV to the receiver for cable viewing.
I would have given this unit five stars if it was THX certified and had 1080p upscaling. In my case these things were not that important. I am not much interested in having the best in audio or video. This set up is very good and I have had no problems with the Onkyo. I highly recommend it for anyone wanting Home Theater on a smaller budget. Watch the price and buy when it is under $350.
Customer Review: Very good, with one small exception...
Summary: 4 Stars
All-in-all, the receiver met my expectations. The setup is straight forward, though the techniques to re-establish the speaker settings is hidden somewhere in the deep, dark bowels of the manual (first time's a snap). The sound is great and even the FM reception, using the supplied wire antennae, worked well.
My complaint is how one configures the second set of speakers. The good news is that the "B" speakers can be set to a different source than the "A" speakers. This is kind of neat if you want one audio source in one room (say where you're watching TV) and another elsewhere (say, listening to FM). The complaint is that the "B" set can only be driven by analog input. So if you're watching TV in one room (via HDMI, for example) and want to catch the sound elsewhere (say, on your deck while you're flipping burgers), you're out of luck. I couldn't say how many would be affected by this, but I was. And I went to lengths to find a receiver that could support multiple speakers so this was a bit disappointing.
The only other negative I can think of is the remote's ability to control other devices, specifically my Scientific Atlanta HD/DVR cable box. Most things work as expected, with the one exception being the inability to bring up the list of recorded shows. The cable's remote has a dedicated "My DVR" button to do this and there doesn't seem to be a way to persuade the Onkyo's remote to do likewise. Otherwise, the remote seems to support the typical cable, DVR, and DVD buttons (including the cables, A, B, C, and D buttons).
If these nuances aren't important to you, go ahead. I bought the receiver on Amazon for about $100 less than in typical retail stores.
Customer Review: Truly amazing performance at the price point
Summary: 5 Stars
This is my second go-around with an Onkyo home theater receiver in the past year. My first purchase was Onkyo's HTIB system that included the TX-SR506 7.1 receiver, speakers/subwoofer and single-disk DVD player. My family really enjoyed the first receiver until our satellite dish got struck by lightening and took out the receiver. Yeah, that sucked. Fortunately (and miraculously) the DVR, DVD and new plasma TV were untouched. The TX-SR606 was purchased this past November to replace the zapped one.
If it's possible, I think the SR606 has better sound quality. We hooked it up to the same Onkyo speaker and sub set, but this model has improved on the low-volume spacial sound quality. It really is amazing. Just use the automatic speaker calibration (which is a piece of cake) and you're done! Incredible sound quality at both high and low volume. We watched "Ironman" on DVD last week and nearly cracked our foundation. Whoof! While it may not satisfy audiophile purists with it's music reproduction, we find it to be quite good for music. But if you're looking for a rockin' home theater amp, you found it. I can only imagine how good it would look/sound with Blu-Ray.
If I had to ding anything, it would be the video upscaling of standard-def signals. It's not that great...especially from VCR. With our large (50") plasma, VCR tapes looks pretty crappy. The upscaling creates some artifacts that make the picture look less pleasing than if it didn't upscale. So far I haven't found a way to bypass upscaling other than running the VCR video signal straight to the TV. DO NOT let that influence your purchasing decision. This is a fantastic bargain that I highly recommend.
Customer Review: Top Notch Receiver at a Great Price!
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased this receiver to replace an older Pioneer that did not have the capability of decoding some of the newest sound fields like True HD and Master HD. With a Blu-Ray and HD player hooked up to this receiver that could at least bitstream all of these sound fields I needed a new receiver that could decode them - that was the main reason for the purchase. I also wanted a receiver with as many HDMI inputs as possible - this one has 4 and I have already used 3. Add all the other features of the receiver and for less than $400 you have an unbeatable bargin priced receiver. I own an Onkyo 705 as well and I can honestly say that in many ways I like Onkyo's 606 better, especially the lower price, nearly identical features and an extra HDMI port. I don't take advantage of the units ability to upcovert to 1080i, but the reviews I have read from othe users have been positive about this feature as well - but don't expect it to offer the quality of a receiver costing hundreds more that utilizes a Reon for upconversion - for example Onkyo's 875/876. The final point I would make is that last year's verison of this receiver, the 605 received a lot of great reviews, this years replacement takes things to a much higher level fixing a few bugs that the 605 had - well documented bugs - go to AVS Forum for more details. The unit runs cool, not hot, after 4 or more hours of use it is only warm to the touch and my receiver is located in a enclosed cabinet. Prices vary on Amazon, so check often and you will be surprised at the great price you can get this feature packed receiver for - best of all it will be all you need for many years to come and Amazon does a great job of standing behind their products.Customer Review: Full HD, HDMI Splitter, 7.1, Onkyo name, why pay more?
Summary: 5 Stars
I replaced a 9 year old JVC 5.1 system with this after buying a PS3 to use as a Blu-Ray player. I wanted to take advantage of the new hd audio standards, and was tired of not having enough HDMI inputs on my 52" Samsung 1080P tv. The 4 HDMI inputs and 1 HDMI output work perfectly, switching as needed.
Rundown:
Hookup: Easy, everything is well labeled and there is ample space to work my fat fingers. Read the instructions if you only have 5.1 speakers instead of 7.1, you have to use specific hookups (what I'm saying is don't guess like I did and then wonder why it didn't work... the instructions are very clear if you bother to open them!) :) I have the following inputs hooked up through it right now: FiOS HD/DVR TV Receiver (HDMI), XBOX 360 Elite (HDMI), PS3 (HDMI). Everything feeds out to my TV via HDMI.
Configuration: Simple after you read the instructions. The microphone they provide to "tune" the system, coupled with the on-screen walk through setup system is very nice.
Use: Couldn't be better, they've done a great job of giving you the right buttons and LCD display features/text. My Logitech Harmony 880 remote has the configuration for this receiver in the database, and controls the receiver perfectly.
Audio quality: Amazing, noticeably better than my JVC 5.1 in 5.1 mode, and once I added the other speakers for 7.1 it is fantastic! No more distortion when I crank up the volume in Call of Duty 4 or during a loud movie scene.
Video quality: Everything looks great in 1080p!
Bottom line: For well under $400 shipped, this model competes with some of the much, much more expensive units.