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"Great Sound! Fairly easy to set up." on by bps7772000
Pros: Bright orange and large text disply, great build quality, awesome remote...
Cons: HDMI from cable to reciever then HDMI from receiver to tv does not output audio. You have to use digital(toslink or rca) to get sound out of your surround speakers.
Summary: I love this reciever so far. Using toslink, it is a massive upgrade in sound output and quality from my old Sony DAV-S300 receiver/dvd module. I am running Definitive Technology BP-10 main speakers and a PF15TL subwoofer and the sound is amazing.
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"Fab receiver that compliments our Elite Pioneer Plasma" on by bushemi
Pros: Move up to entry level HD is a staggering upgrade. Marrying like products is in our other Elite components makes for an awesome system.
Cons: no upconversion, a bit of a learning curve in the manual
Summary: It's not VSX-1019AH-K, but we are talking '08. Have noticed a remarkable difference in sound and picture quality of course as in component to HD and the sound is very noticable with all due respect to our dated Yamaha. THX, iPod compatibility etc. Next a decent Elite Pioneer blu-ray.
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"Clean power and sound; rivals receivers costing 1k -2k!" on by imurbootydaddy
Pros: Layout; fit and finish; sound quality, midnight mode feature, and an array of high end inputs and outputs - optical, HDMI, DTS, 7.1,
Cons: The ONLY shortcoming in my opinion is that it is 110 x 7; dont get me wrong its GREAT power but i prefer 130 or so. The sacrificed the power output for sound quality so it all evens out. Still rocks and will shake your house however!!
Summary: Bang for the buck you cant go wrong with any Elite receivers; I owned one several years ago and it was amazing as well. The sound quality is unsurpassed by most other receivers; basically isn't that what we are REALLY searching for?! Yamaha and Sony ES models are OK, but if you want your system to to give you happiness for years to come...rather than just loudness...its a no brainer. Go with the ELITE; you wont regret it guaranteed!! Also, please buy nice speakers; you system is only as good as your wekest link. Enjoy!
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"Clarity and power in a solid platform" on by howdydude777
Pros: Power, Separation, Clarity, 7.1 Surround, HDMI 1080p, Multi Room
Cons: No HDMI audio decoding (as stated in the specs)
Summary: This is a fantastic receiver in almost every respect. With the right set up, the sound with both music and movies is better than all but the highest end receivers on the market. On clearance, this was simply a buy too good to pass up! Very happy.
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"HDMI appears to be an afterthought" on by moveson
Pros: Good sound; easy to set up; looks great
Cons: HDMI ports were useless for me; no upconversion
Summary: I bought the Pioneer VSX-90 intending for it to serve as the heart of my home theater system. I'm not on the cutting edge, but wanted to hook up DVD, VHS, and Apple TV. I was tired of switching sources on both my older Harmon Kardon receiver and my TV in order to go from one component to another, and I believed (based on the sales schpiel from the 23-year-old kid at the local Best Buy) that this would work for that purpose. Wouldn't it be great to have everything running into one place and just a single cable from the receiver to the TV?
First, to test the HDMI, I plugged the Apple TV into the unit and an HDMI cable from the unit to my TV. I get picture, but no sound. Odd. Then I notice the yellow piece of paper that accompanies my user guide, telling me that to get sound out of the receiver from an HDMI source, I have to run a separate optical cable from the HDMI source (my Apple TV) to the receiver. The Pioneer will pass the sound through on HDMI to the TV (and I can hear it through the crappy TV speakers if I want to) but it lacks the sophistication to pull sound data from the HDMI signal. OK, seems silly, but I can live with that.
It was about this time that I noticed the HDMI picture (I was watching a DVD-quality download of No Country For Old Men) looked worse on TV than the component video picture did. This could be because the video from the Apple TV was not HD, but still, I wouldn't have expected to see a degradation in quality.
Next, I hooked up the DVD player, an older model that has no HDMI but outputs component video. Plug it in and...no picture. Back to the user guide. After digging around for a while I discover that the receiver won't convert component video to HDMI or vice versa. So now I have to run a component video cable to my TV, and worse, I have to switch the TV source to go from DVD to Apple TV.
How about the old VHS player, which outputs old-fashioned composite video? Once again, no luck. It won't upconvert the composite to either component or HDMI.
Question to Pioneer: Why bother with the HDMI ports if they don't do anything? There are two HDMI-in ports and one HDMI-out, but the grand total of abilities of this receiver is to choose one of the ins and route it directly to the out, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. My TV has two HDMI ports on it, and I can get identical functionality by not using the receiver to switch video at all.
I understand that there are some very pricey receivers out there that may do what I want, but I'm not really ready to spend $1000+ on a receiver. So I returned the unit and went back to my old Harmon Kardon AVR 230, which does everything the Pioneer unit does.
This was a frustrating experience, and granted it's partially Best Buy's fault for misleading me as to the abilities of this receiver. I'll wait a year or two and see if any of the manufacturers can deliver on what HDMI is supposed to do.
Pioneer Elite VSX-90TXV user reviews
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