Yamaha RX-V385B 5.1CH Home Theatre AV Receiver

If you like various sound choices (3D surrounds sounds) then this is the receiver for you. Some of the choices include: 2ch stereo, 5ch stereo, DPL Movie, Hall in Munich, Hall in Vienna, etc. I use it for Movies, regular tv, and music. I don't necessarily have to have my sound loud, I am more concerned about the quality of the sound. For example, I'd like to hear every single instrument if it's a live concert/music. I actually traded an Onkyo (around the same price) for this Yamaha. I was impressed by the sound quality of this Yamaha receiver, for such an affordable price. Thank you Yamaha and Best Buy. Tip: For those of you that haven't figured out the Bluetooth yet, it is on pg 19 of your manual (included in photo). So you pretty much have to press the ... MoreIf you like various sound choices (3D surrounds sounds) then this is the receiver for you. Some of the choices include: 2ch stereo, 5ch stereo, DPL Movie, Hall in Munich, Hall in Vienna, etc. I use it for Movies, regular tv, and music. I don't necessarily have to have my sound loud, I am more concerned about the quality of the sound. For example, I'd like to hear every single instrument if it's a live concert/music. I actually traded an Onkyo (around the same price) for this Yamaha. I was impressed by the sound quality of this Yamaha receiver, for such an affordable price. Thank you Yamaha and Best Buy. Tip: For those of you that haven't figured out the Bluetooth yet, it is on pg 19 of your manual (included in photo). So you pretty much have to press the "memory/play" button for a few secs after pressing the "bluetooth" button. Then you can connect it to your cell phone. You only need to do this the 1st time, then just "bluetooth" and your phone will pick up the signal.

I moved into a new house, and the previous owner left behind an A/V system - nice Cambridge wall mounted speakers and a sub. The receiver was an old Pioneer unit, and I just couldn't get it to work with modern TV and blu-ray equipment. So I started shopping around for an inexpensive unit that would provide 5.1 channel sound and handle HDMI inputs and outputs. Enter the Yamaha! It does so much at such a low price point! It communicates perfectly with my Samsung TV, and decodes multi-channel audio from OTA TV, online streaming services, and blu-ray. I also love how the TV remote automatically controls the volume of the unit through the bi-directional HDMI connection. I also love the bluetooth audio feature - my phone paired easily and plays Spotify throughout the ... MoreI moved into a new house, and the previous owner left behind an A/V system - nice Cambridge wall mounted speakers and a sub. The receiver was an old Pioneer unit, and I just couldn't get it to work with modern TV and blu-ray equipment. So I started shopping around for an inexpensive unit that would provide 5.1 channel sound and handle HDMI inputs and outputs. Enter the Yamaha! It does so much at such a low price point! It communicates perfectly with my Samsung TV, and decodes multi-channel audio from OTA TV, online streaming services, and blu-ray. I also love how the TV remote automatically controls the volume of the unit through the bi-directional HDMI connection. I also love the bluetooth audio feature - my phone paired easily and plays Spotify throughout the living room. As an added bonus, the rear surround speakers mirror the fronts when playing 2 channel music - exactly what I would want to cover a room with background music. In short, an excellent priced unit without a lot of un-needed bells and whistles. You won't be disappointed!

Great entry-level AVR for both movies and music. I run a simple 2.0 setup with Polk Series III floorstanding speakers. I decided to upgrade my old, non-HDMI AVR for two reasons: 1) better sound quality for my 320 kbps music streaming, and 2) the ability to finally play audio from my Samsung Q60 TV through my stereo 2.0 setup (which also lacked an optical audio input). I also game on an Xbox One X and wanted to make sure that the AVR would be capable of smoothly passing through 4K HDR content. This receiver excels at all aspects. The music quality is surprisingly improved, particularly with the Compressed Music Enhancer function. I always thought all receivers would sound basically the same when it comes to simple music playback in stereo, but there's a noticeable ... MoreGreat entry-level AVR for both movies and music. I run a simple 2.0 setup with Polk Series III floorstanding speakers. I decided to upgrade my old, non-HDMI AVR for two reasons: 1) better sound quality for my 320 kbps music streaming, and 2) the ability to finally play audio from my Samsung Q60 TV through my stereo 2.0 setup (which also lacked an optical audio input). I also game on an Xbox One X and wanted to make sure that the AVR would be capable of smoothly passing through 4K HDR content. This receiver excels at all aspects. The music quality is surprisingly improved, particularly with the Compressed Music Enhancer function. I always thought all receivers would sound basically the same when it comes to simple music playback in stereo, but there's a noticeable improvement to my ears in terms of both detail and clarity. So far I prefer using the STRAIGHT preset in combination with Compressed Music Enhancer for listening to albums. On the 0-97 scale, I find 50-60 is generally loud enough for reasonable listening in my ~ 700 sq. ft. apartment living room. On the video side, I was able to get the HDMI ARC function working surprisingly quickly. I have the Xbox plugged into HDMI 1 on the AVR, and another cable running from HDMI Out on the AVR to my TV's HDMI ARC input. This lets me send consistent 4K HDR video signals from my Xbox, through the AVR and to the TV without any distortion or lag, and returns the audio through the speakers. Even though I don't have a surround setup, I typically use the Surround Decoder along with the Game preset for pretty good results. Audio from shows and movies streamed from my TV's various apps (Netflix, HBO etc.) also works well. I debated forsaking the video stuff and just getting a higher quality stereo amplifier, but the ability of this AVR to coordinate with my Samsung TV's Anynet+ features for media switching is what sealed the deal for me. Using the HDMI Arc setup described above, and after enabling HDMI control on this AVR, the AVR automatically 1) switches to TV audio whenever it detects a streaming app, 2) switches to the audio and video signals coming from the Xbox whenever I start it up, and 3) automatically switches to the audio channel I have my Chromecast Audio plugged into whenever I feel like listening to music. The AVR also passes the audio and video from my Xbox through while powered off - and the TV automatically switches on its onboard speakers when the AVR is powered off, no manual digging into TV settings required! The only potential drawback in terms of functionality is that using this ARC setup, the TV doesn't automatically switch in and out of Game Mode depending on the media source, since it's all being routed into the TV via the same single HDMI input. I don't mind leaving Game Mode on for movie streaming, but for those that would, you could alternatively connect your game system into another TV input rather than pass it through the AVR (though the game's audio would still be returned via ARC to your external speakers). The only other drawback so far is the YPAO calibration. It was easy to connect the mic and run the quick calibration, but the results were just awful! For some reason it turned my right (front) speaker down by 10dB, making music sound horribly tinny. I manually went in and restored it, now everything sounds great. I was hoping it'd automatically give me a more fine-tuned calibration on the order of a couple dB (without me having to figure it out by trial and error), but oh well. Overall a fantastic product, especially at this price.