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The sound configuration takes some figuring but is sheer beauty when done. You won't find this technique employed by Sony, Panasonic,. The 7.1 signal processing works wonderfully.
My unit performed perfectly for about 4 weeks. Unfortunately, the component output completely stopped working without any warning and I am left with a large "boat anchor" in need of several hundred dollars of repair. Read the reviews of other Denon Products and see how many agree.BE CAREFUL WHO YOU BUY THIS FROM -- MOST etailers are NOT on Denon's approved list -- and they will NOT honor the warranty if bought through them.
Denon will have NO MERCY if you buy thru a non-authorized dealer, despite having sold to them in the first place. Denon has two tiers of product marketing: very high price thru an "authorized" dealer and warranty support or low price thru an "unauthorized" dealer with no warranty support. Visit Denon.com to view the limited authorized supplier list.
I'm pretty discouraged.
I am generally satisfied with the quality albeit, I was shocked to know that this is a discontinued product. This means, there is virtually no chance of Denon offering any updates/patches on this product.I hold Amazon is high esteem but I am very surprised to find it discontinued products on the catalogue. I bought this receiver a couple of months ago. For couple of hundrer dollars, I could have bought something is HDMI switching right on this website.
This beast (3805)is a different story, the remote doesn't make sense, the manual is impossible to figure out, and what a pain in the butt to program every input to the format you want to use (i,e, analog, coax, optical, VHS, S-VHS, component, composite --you get the jist) And if you want to plug something else in temporarily (like my car Sirius recever in its home dock) you're going to get a migraine trying to figure out what to unplug to plug the Sirius in before the program's over. Up until the 5700, I never had to read a manual in my life (62yo), and even that wasn't too bad except the 5700's remote wasn't very friendly). I am proud owner of one of these, hooked up full THX with (big) Bose (not the tiny uppie systems for people who want to hide their speakers) and Snells. It replaced a 5700 when I added the 2 extra channels. SOUNDWISE THIS UNIT IS FABULOUS--MORE THAN MATCHES THE 3 LEXICONS I'VE OWNED, but finally gave up on because of their total lack of versatility for use in the real world.BOTTOM LINE I ENTHUSIASTICALLY LOVE THE RECEIVER, HATE THE REMOTE, AND ALWAYS TAKE MY SHOES OFF WHEN I CHANGE ANY SETTINGS SO I WON'T BE TEMPTED TO KICK THE #### OUT OF IT IF IT STILL DOESN'T WORK AFTER THE 3RD TRIAL SETUP
But, when you start using multi-zone, etc. As an engineer, I find it reassuringly heavy (high quality), so this is a positive to me.Setup took ridiculously long because of the manual (2 hours to get a Denon CD changer to output sound to zone 2/3). It was a bit of a jump from an older Denon receiver (still perfect after 13 years), but we need surround sound and 3 zones of music. it gets very involved. I'm an engineer in a high tech company with tons of electronic integration experience, so I don't think it's me.
If you only hook up the 5.1/7.1 speakers with a DVD player and a couple of stereo inputs it shouldn't be bad. Sound quality is amazing and build quality is better than I thought was available from a large manufacturer.The interconnect options are unbelievable. I just installed this receiver over Christmas. Other than no DVI (which a friend who's a pro camera man recommends), it's got everything.It does everything as advertised.The negatives:It's heavy (44 pounds) Watch your back. My observations on the cause:First, there are many undocumented limitations (E.G., which input formats will drive which outputs for audio multi-zone).Second, the manual was apparently translated from Japanese to English by someone who spoke neither Japanese, nor English.
We basically used all of the surround sound and multi-zone features in this unit.The positives:It performs as well as could be hoped for. It's a confusing mess.I talked to a local Denon shop and they said they send a tech out to do the setup with every unit they sell.My overall opinion: It's a beautiful piece of work, but prepare your significant other for 2-3 days of immersion in the project if you are going to use all the system capabilities.
Denon AVR-3805Pros:+7.1 surround (this is a con for your bank account)+Clean pure sound without coloration+Nice display+Automatic room EQ settings via microphone+Lots of connections+Good build quality+Pre Ins/Main Outs+None of the costs went to George Lucas or Creative Labs for a now meaningless THX rubber stamp+Overall build and sound quality are much better than the price would suggest+Not BoseCons:-Remote usability sucks--most Denon remotes do so you may expect that-Because remote lights up whenever touched, it eats through batteries quickly-Amps could not drive my main speakers that were 6ohm (but sometimes likely dropped to much lower)-I solved that by adding an external amp to drive the mains, but then the automatic room EQ setting did not work at all-Somewhat difficult to navigate the UI from the display alone, somewhat dependent on the on-screen display-No DVI switching or pass through
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