YAMAHA RX V573 7.1 Channel Network AV Receiver (Discontinued by Manufacturer)

After the retirement of my 1994 SONY GX900ES after some loud parties, I was determined to get a receiver that would last as long. There is a wide selection of full featured receivers all of which I suspect have decent sound qualities. But, most have numerous reviews concerning defects.Two things stood out with the YAMAHA RX-V573: 1: It didn't have a visually well developed on-screen interface; 2: RELIABILITY seemed very good. Sacrificing the visually pleasing on-screen interface for YAMAHA quality was a clear choice.There were some comments in reviews that the remote is hard to understand and use. I find it very useful and convenient. I also like the controls on the face of the unit. Overall, the unit has a high quality feel and appearance.The simple YAMAHA on-screen interface is certainly effective and does all that's needed IMO. The overall quality and numerous up-to-date features (listed in the Amazon product description) are excellent. I am very happy with the purchase. Shipping took a little longer than Amazon's usual, but the order was combined with something rare that probably slowed processing. Regardless, Amazon has ALWAYS been excellent in all my purchases and related issues.In my search for a new receiver, I noticed many reviews commented on different sound quality of various receivers. It's hard to compare without going to a showroom. But, I can say that the RX-V573 couldn't sound better IMO. I "think" it sounds better than my old SONY 900ES which is an excellent receiver that still sells for $250 - $350 on ebay.I'm using an iPod Classic with Infinity Crescendo 3006 shelf speakers (in cabinets 6' above the floor) and Polk RM6751 satellites on channel "B" on the floor (to fill the wall out) with a separate 10" subwoofer on the floor. The sound is incredible. Completely full, and extremely clear and discriminating. I am sure the YAMAHA RX-V573 has a lot to do with the outstanding sound.A few things that nail down accuracy, which the RX-V573 achieves amazingly well:These all sound eerily real..... completely lifelike....Classical piano soloSpoken voicePink Floyd's jingling coins on "Money"and.... Karen Carpenter's voice (the sweetest sound I've ever heard while not even being a fan of the genre)Most all else doesn't really require a whole lot of accuracy... Clash, Metalica, Foo Fighters, Gaga, country, AC/DC, dance music, Latin music, etc,... all sound good as long as they can get loud without distortion.... which the YAMAHA RX-V573 also does extremely well.With the sound and function of the RX-V573, and the reviews establishing trouble-free surround sound, networking, WIFI connection, set-up, RELIABILITY, etc.... I feel very confident in my purchase. And... power is also very important in getting good sound at normal volume. At normal volume, the amp is not even coming close to distorting and has a very low S/N ratio.The RX-V573 is an extremely good quality and reliability choice. Nobody wants to suffer through warranty claims and post-warranty repairs.

Had it about a week now and played with it for a couple of hours each night tweaking the settings and trying out various streaming music, tv shows and HD movies. This was a replacement for an Onkyo HTIB system that was 7.1 also, but did not have HDMI switching or DTS-HD/DD-TrueHD abilities. Thus far I can say I really like the basic function of the amp and the SCENE feature.Pros:-Near future proof with 4k passthrough-Every codec known to mankind (including DSD for SACD* Bonus)-Power off HDMI switching (very useful if you listen to audio through the tv speakers sometimes like I do when wife is sleeping. Extra bonus is the audio does not pass through to the TV speakers while the AVR is ON, but automatically does once it's turned off. This means you don't have to mute the TV while you have the home theater system on and then turn up the volume after you turn it off)-Options Galore including an 8-band frequency adjustment on every channel independently which means you can tonal match different brands of speakers or compensate for a lacking speaker like I had with a muddy center channel.-App for mobile devices. I used the iPad app and found several settings much easier than using the standard on-screen menu.-Network airplay. SUPER easy to stream music from the iPad or iPhone and the sound filtering works very well to get rid of that compressed sound of low bitrate MP3 audio.-Setting for initial volume, max volume. No more turning on the amp after listening to that Saving Private Ryan DVD the night before and getting blasted across the room from Wolf Blitzer when you get home and turn on the system. It defaults to your preferred volume and you can set the max output so the kids can't blow your speakers while you're at work.Cons:-Confusing and near difficult to turn off all the extra 3D sound field, DSP and venue effects. Sometimes you just want to listen to things clean. Even if you turn off DSP in the menu, there are still sound field effects on. Enhancement, auto level, 3D field, DSP, etc... it's just a bit much to grasp out of the box if you're not a Yamaha customer previously. The iPad app REALLY helped me understand which did what and finally realize I wanted STRAIGHT and all the other stuff off to listen to the DTS-HD audio. The sound is good with all this stuff on although some settings sound worse than others depending on your input source (2 ch stereo, 5.1 surround, streaming audio, Blu Ray DTS-HD, etc...).-On Screen Menu feels like playing an old DOS game in 16 color graphics. Update it to match the app Yamaha.-Settings change every time you change input source. Seems that once you get things set the way you like, once I eject a Blu Ray from the BD Player and switch to streaming audio the sound field defaults back to some setting I don't want and I have to return it to the clean setting. Whether this is a permanent issue or a setting somewhere I'm not sure yet but it's annoying to have to tinker with things all the time.-Remote layout. No backlighting or glow buttons? No color coding for main areas? My Onkyo remote gave you color coding so you could see where you were pressing at least in low light conditions and had glowing buttons for the main volume and inputs. And why would you put the main volume button right next to the scene buttons that change the input? I keep hitting the Radio input when I'm trying to turn up the volume during a movie. So fun.-No auto switching to preferred setting per input type. Seems it would be easy to have a menu to set what sound settings you want when listening to a 2 ch stereo input, 5.1 DD input, 7.1 DTS-HD input, or streaming 2.0 PCM input and let the receiver do what you want.That said, the pros far outweight the cons once you get a feel for things. The networked ability to stream home media servers and update the firmware is really nice and given the 4k passthrough, I'm not worried about getting left behind this time when something better comes along in a couple of years. The Zone B ability also means I can expand my setup in the future to control another room and use the app to control the AVR from another room.The sound quality is very good and listening to a SACD with DSD decoding is so much easier than using the old connections on my Onkyo.This feels like a big boy AVR rather than straight bells and whistles play to a price point. I lucked out with an open-box special for $150 less than retail that actually was a sealed box and mint so I feel even better than most, but that said I wouldn't feel bad now if I had paid full price. If you don't care for the network features or don't have 7.1 check out the 373 model. SUPER value for a 5.1 setup.

I am usually skeptical of first release technology (Airplay) on a newly released product. I waited almost a month before I found this item in stock after the pre-release press. After hooking the device up to my network, and connecting the 7 speakers, I had the Yamaha app downloaded and running airplay in less than 5 minutes. My Android, IPOD Touch, and IPAD2 all worked without any issues. I have the receiver in a media room with 7 speakers and it beats the Dennon hands down. I have had two Dennons and both were plagued with problems and I will never buy another. I can control this device from anywhere in the house (as long as I am withing WI-FI connect).The only downside I see so far, is the device does not support Pandora for music streaming, but I can use an IPOD touch on a different AV source to solve the Pandora streaming. Not all the remote functions work with the app but the major items such as inputs, sound selection, work great.Also, I see that the receiver already has a new firmware available, but I am not going to download the firmware until I find a problem that needs to be fixed.I know its only been 1 week, but so far, I am impressed and plan to order a second receiver. I will follow-up on this review if I have any future issues or problems since it has only been 1 week.In my opinion, this is the best network receiver, with smartphone app remote, airplay, and 7.1 sound for the money. The Polk speakers and Polk sub with this receiver make the media room thump!

Fair sound quality, but dos like interface, just having wired network no wireless. 4 hdmi inputs maybe too few for somebody