I've read enough reviews to know not a whole lot of difference but before I pull the trigger I thought I would ask which one you guys like. I'm replacing my Denon 3312ci. I'm using B&W 603's and CC6 up front and B&W 602's in the rear. 5.1 is where I will stay. I'm 80% music and lots of SACD and DVD-A with my oppo 103. I know the biggest difference is Alpha Processing, and 20 extra watts per channel for the 4700. I play loud when I can{wife not home} LOL. So I keep stuff a long time as you can tell. Thanks in advance.
Denon AVR X3700H or Den AVR X4700H
- Thread starter shokhead
- Start date
Help Support QuadraphonicQuad:
I'm looking at both of these now since new models have arrived and prices have dropped. My goal is to go full Atmos so these are logical choices to get there. If you're going to stay with 5.1 setup, the extra channel amps will sit idle. Why not consider the AVR-X2700 or perhaps the AVR-X2800 and save some dough?
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I'd been holding back on a new AVR as I was hopping the Involve Super Pre-amp would have been released by now, and I could go for a cheaper model with no 5.1/7.1 analogue inputs.
The X4700H was one I was looking at as it can do Atmos as 5.1.4, though my room isn't massive 2.6m x 3.8m (11.8'x12.5'), as the house is a 1950s Semi-detached, so the ceiling isn't plasterboard, so not that 'easy' to add in ceiling speakers.
The X4700H was one I was looking at as it can do Atmos as 5.1.4, though my room isn't massive 2.6m x 3.8m (11.8'x12.5'), as the house is a 1950s Semi-detached, so the ceiling isn't plasterboard, so not that 'easy' to add in ceiling speakers.
Okay if that's important to you I get it. You can't go wrong if you buy the one that has it all.
Sidebar: I've been buying Denon AVRs since 1993; my experience and confidence with Audyssey has diminished with every subsequent unit. It was spot on when it started but does not deliver usable results for me anymore.
Two notes on Audyssey for me:
1) It destroys the high end for my setup. Makes a mess of my Paradigm tweeters. It works a whole lot better if I filter Audyssey from working on frequencies over 1.5Khz.
2) It is pure bliss for my subs. Before Audyssey MultiEQ XT32, I constantly futzed with levels for my dual subs. What sounded right for one source just was not right for another.
Since implementing Audyssey it's set and forget, the lows and mids all sounds great and never a futz anymore.
I love Audyssey, but know it's limitations.
YMMV.
1) It destroys the high end for my setup. Makes a mess of my Paradigm tweeters. It works a whole lot better if I filter Audyssey from working on frequencies over 1.5Khz.
2) It is pure bliss for my subs. Before Audyssey MultiEQ XT32, I constantly futzed with levels for my dual subs. What sounded right for one source just was not right for another.
Since implementing Audyssey it's set and forget, the lows and mids all sounds great and never a futz anymore.
I love Audyssey, but know it's limitations.
YMMV.
I had to decide between the 4700 and the 3800H. The 3800H dropped down to $1699 while the 4700 was around $1500. Because the 3800H did all of the new decodes, including the Sony 360RA, I decided to go with the 3800H. When I get it all together, I will report on the setup and eval. These are the current prices from the Denon website. I actually got my 3800 from Best Buy
The only thing I can add here is I recently bought a 4700H to replace my Marantz AV7703 PrePro which died in a lightning strike this summer. I use it in full preamp only mode, still using my stack of Adcom power amps that I love. It along with the Audyssey Editor app have combined to provide a very nice sounding room curve that makes me happy. I have dual subwoofers and the separate dual outputs along
with Audyssey's individual controls of them has done a great job of integrating the subs with my JBL towers. Very hard to go wrong with this unit, specially at the close out pricing.
with Audyssey's individual controls of them has done a great job of integrating the subs with my JBL towers. Very hard to go wrong with this unit, specially at the close out pricing.
First, does the 3312 have analog multichannel inputs? The 3700 and 4700 don't! No way to tie a Surround Master to them. Second. 20 watts per channel more won't be significant, since you'd have to double the power to get a mere 3dB more volume. I'm using a Denon AVR-3300, which is about 20 years old, and it still sounds amazing. I'm about 90% music, with Polk Audio speakers.
I think the biggest reason is to avoid these two (for anyone playing sacd) is that they don't do DSD
I upgraded to a 5.1.4 Atmos setup with the Denon X3800H from my Yamaha RX-V3800, which I still love, and has analog multichannel inputs for those with Oppos.
The one big difference I have found between the 2 companies is for automated Room sound setup. My room is small at 13’x13’ and the Yamaha does a perfect job with distances, volumes and tones with my thunderous Focal Towers, Klipsch Reference 504C Center/sun/Dolby Atmos floor standing rears, (and now the Klipsch Dolby Atmos front up firing). All of Audyssey with my Denon is worthless except for detecting distances. It virtually turned off my sub, while at the same time treated every other speaker as if they were small, and sent all middle or lower frequencies to the sub, which again, it tried to almost turn off. I had to manual EQ each speaker setup and most importantly balance volumes. At least for a smaller room setup, the current Audyssey algorithms suck hard!!!!
The one big difference I have found between the 2 companies is for automated Room sound setup. My room is small at 13’x13’ and the Yamaha does a perfect job with distances, volumes and tones with my thunderous Focal Towers, Klipsch Reference 504C Center/sun/Dolby Atmos floor standing rears, (and now the Klipsch Dolby Atmos front up firing). All of Audyssey with my Denon is worthless except for detecting distances. It virtually turned off my sub, while at the same time treated every other speaker as if they were small, and sent all middle or lower frequencies to the sub, which again, it tried to almost turn off. I had to manual EQ each speaker setup and most importantly balance volumes. At least for a smaller room setup, the current Audyssey algorithms suck hard!!!!
The AVR 3312 lacks analogs so nothing lost there. AVR 3310 and AVR 4311 were the last units in that range to have them.
I use HDMI for everything inc surround.
You should set all speakers to small if you have a sub.
That thinking of making all your speakers as "small" when you have a sub depends on how much control you have over your sub and the sound you want your bass to have. When I let the Denon set it that way, I listened to how my Yamaha and my Denon set the dynamics, and said, "oh my god this Denon sucks!!! Let me send it back as quickly as possible." That is how they tell you setup to make things easier with having just average fronts. If you have spent thousands, in my case over $3500 for 2 front speakers, they were designed for performance WITHOUT a sub, as just stereo speakers, period. In those cases, you have to do a lot of tweaking about what frequencies and cutoffs you set for each speaker including the sub. My Focal towers have 4 front firing 6" speakers and one dedicated floor facing 6" speaker that will out perform any speaker I have owned or heard, even at over 100 Watts continuous, but pairing them in a 5.1+ system takes some adjustments and can be more tricky.
My $750 Klipsch R-115sw Sub does NOT do a better job at reproducing from about 90-200 Hz than my Focals do, but in fact makes the bass sound muddy when it's taking all of the bass from all of the other speakers, and it makes perfect sense. A one sub system has to reproduce bass from multiple sources (speakers) at once and "sum" them, meaning when the speaker cone should be going "out" with one low note, it is being forced to go back "in" early to reproduce another channels low notes at different times and different frequencies. Hence the reason if you have a room big enough, my Denon will play 4 separate subs, each dedicated to it's own channel, and doesn't have to worry about "summing" all the channels bass sounds. My room is not that big. So, in some instances, like mine, I get much crisper, punchier low end bass down to about 80 Hz out of my Focals, and let the sub do its job below that.
My only point and complaint about Audyssey is that it does a really terrible job at really listening to not only your space, but your current speakers in your system, where my old 14 year old Yamaha 7.1 Natural Sound AVR does it perfectly, and if it could play Atmos, I would have never replaced it. The Denon is the way I had to go, with a $2000 price ceiling, and it plays so many other codecs other than Atmos, but head to head, the Yamaha still sounds overall crisper, especially low end, yet smoother and more "Natural" sounding than digitized.
My $750 Klipsch R-115sw Sub does NOT do a better job at reproducing from about 90-200 Hz than my Focals do, but in fact makes the bass sound muddy when it's taking all of the bass from all of the other speakers, and it makes perfect sense. A one sub system has to reproduce bass from multiple sources (speakers) at once and "sum" them, meaning when the speaker cone should be going "out" with one low note, it is being forced to go back "in" early to reproduce another channels low notes at different times and different frequencies. Hence the reason if you have a room big enough, my Denon will play 4 separate subs, each dedicated to it's own channel, and doesn't have to worry about "summing" all the channels bass sounds. My room is not that big. So, in some instances, like mine, I get much crisper, punchier low end bass down to about 80 Hz out of my Focals, and let the sub do its job below that.
My only point and complaint about Audyssey is that it does a really terrible job at really listening to not only your space, but your current speakers in your system, where my old 14 year old Yamaha 7.1 Natural Sound AVR does it perfectly, and if it could play Atmos, I would have never replaced it. The Denon is the way I had to go, with a $2000 price ceiling, and it plays so many other codecs other than Atmos, but head to head, the Yamaha still sounds overall crisper, especially low end, yet smoother and more "Natural" sounding than digitized.
After I use Audyssey I always go in and tweek it. I"m pretty sure most of us do. I wouldn't want my sub to do 90Hz and up. LFE, Low-Frequency Effects. It's not so much how low your mains play down, it's how useful that is. Mine B&W play down to 47 but it's not going to be a fraction as loud as my sub. Useful vs spec. I didn't want this to get into a this or that, just opinion on the 2 receivers I asked about.
Agreed. I have unfortunately had to spend many hours tweaking my Denon to get it right. Not used to having spend that much time, but it’s good now! Cheers
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