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"Great Receiver for the money - BTW, it DOES work w/ PS3" on by DJRIFFE
Pros: Great sound and connectivity. The unit has seven HD inputs, including four HDMI inputs and it is compatible with 24p True Cinema technology video signals and has full HD upscaling via HDMI.
Cons: Very slow when switching between inputs. I"m not sure why, but there seems to be a 10-15 second delay when going from say, an XBOX-360 to Dish, or from Dish to Antenna (TV) modes.
Summary: I bought this to replace my old Onkyo receiver, which was good for its time but outdated now. Specifically, I wanted a receiver that could switch between various HDMI signals and could handle the new audio modes (Dolby® True HD and dts Master Audio, etc.). I also have a Sony STR-DA4300ES in my family room, and this unit does pretty much the same as that unit (although the sound quality is a tad better on the ES unit). I have the unit hooked up to a DISH HD receiver, a PS3 and an XBox-360 through the HDMI inputs, and all work flawlessly. So ... I'm a little confused by one of the other reviewers stating that it won't work with the PS3. I have had absolutely no problem in this regard. My wife and son are the gamers of the family, and both have stated that they're hearing things on the games that they never heard before. As a matter of fact, we've watched several Blueray disks through the PS3 (going through a Visio 47" 120Hz LCD), and both the picture and sound were spectacular (I should note that the speakers were Speakercraft 8" Five series units). In my opinion, this is the best AV receiver on the market for the price. Not quite as good as the Sony ES series in regard to sound quaity but then again, my Sony ES cost three times for than this unit. About the only negative that I have with this unit is the time that it takes to switch from one input to another -- Can't imagine why it would take 10-15 seconds to do so.
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"Terrific receiver, rotten manual" on by Anachronistic
Pros: Awesome sound, good upgrade quality from component to HDMI, nice looks, easy and effective auto calibration, lots of flexibility in assigning and naming input.
Cons: Poorly written and laid out manual. Unable to assign HDMI to audio and video inputs on alternate keys. Takes a while to change video inputs.
Summary: This receiver was bought to upgrade my ageing Sony STRDE-985. I bought it because it was a Sony, as my system is Sony from end to end, because it has HDMI, because it has upgrade capability from S-video, composite and component video to HDMI, and because it offers 7.1 surround sound with a Total Harmonic Distortion of 0.09%. I also bought it because I was able to buy it at a reasonable price from a reputable mail order shop.
I have found the sound this unit produces with the appropriate Sony speakers - tower front, 3 way center, 12" sub woofer, bookshelf side and rear - transcendant. As good as the STRDE985 was, and it was very good in its day, this upgrade just blows anything else I have ever heard, theaters included, into the weeds. Once one masters the poorly written, illogically laid out, over complicated manual, and applies some level of common logic to the remote and the on-screen GUI menu, the system is quite easy to work with.
I am using this with an old Sony 52" LCD projection TV with 1080i native resolution, and although the handbook recommends against outputting HDMI to DVI, the DVI is the only digital input that this TV has. The output though from the HDMI to the DVI is such that it represents a visible improvement in sharpness and clarity over the previous blue/green/red video input. As my Blu-ray does not necessarily play all non-blue-ray DVD's, I have a second DVD player attached, which uses co-axial sound and blue/green/red video, upgraded and output through the HDMI feed to the TV DVI input. The picture and sound from this DVD, while not in the same class as the blu-ray, is still really good, good enough to be a significant upgrade in its own right.
So what's not to like? First of all, the manual. Sony try very hard to set expectations in a negative manner by means of the manual. When I first read the manual, II saw so many apparent technical flaws, tha tI almost put the receiver back in the box and sent it back to the retailer. But knowing Sony as I sdo, I chose instead to work through each issue, and as it turned out, many of the warnings were really for people who would probably be extremely demanding, technically naive and completely lacking in common sense. For instance, that an HDMI inpout to a DVI may result in a lack of souond out of the TV speakers (duh). Or that to enjoy soound from the TV through the speakers attached to the receiver, you need to output thesound from the TV to the receiver independently from the HDMI output to the TV, and so on. The wording thoughmakes it look like the Sony simply has a bunch of shortcomings which turn out to be non-existent.
One small beef I did have, though, is that from an electronic design perspective, it really looks like they took what was a very good, well thought out component video receiver and added HDMI as an afterthought. This is apparent when you get into the inout assignment, which only allows you to assign HDMI audio and video to a pre-assigned field such as DVD or blu-ray. The outcome is a minor inconvenience, for instance I have assigned an optical audio input and HDMI video to the Blu-ray button on the remote so the technically challenged in my family can push the "blu-ray" button on the remote instead of the "HDMI 3" buttin it is also assigned to. But for me, I have programmed the HDMI 3 button to run the blu-ray and allow me to enjoy that AWESOME hdmi audio blu-ray sound. The final, minor, shortcoming is that the remote does not seem to have a setting to control my Moorola HDTV PVR box. But that's ok, at least I am down to no more than 2 remotes.
Overall, I love this receiver, it is good looking, produces awesome sound and video, and is resonably weasy to work with. I am sure this will give me years of listening pleasure as all of my prior Sony receivers have done. -
"Best receiver at this price. Period." on by AudioDesigner
Pros: Dedicated IR codes. The automatic sound setup is surprisingly fast. Upon critical listening, the sound is more accuately adjusted than manual adjustments I could make...and, it adjusted the subwoofer with similar accuracy.
Cons: Tree different audio room measurements can be stored in three selectable memories...too many...confusing for average clients.
No Tape Out. There is a SACD Output (which may actually operate as a "tape out" of sorts... not tried it yet).Summary: I have used this unit in three systems to date, and in all three, my clients recognized the sonic accuracy almost immediately. The biggest plus of this unit is clearly the automatic room correction setup function. In fact, it is so good, one could almost use any "average" speaker system because the DN1000 will correct any imperfections in the room and speaker with an accuracy I have never witnessed before in any receiver near this price. Here I must make note to say that in all of my system designs, all of the speakers are identical and I rarely use satellite speakers with a woofer larger than 6 inch, and all of the subwoofers I use go down to at least 28Hz (-3dB).
HDMI functionality is very good. And, with 4 HDMI inputs, most average sized AV systems can have above average applications.
The unit looks classy and high tech...always a plus. Functionality is standard Sony, but the on screen GUI is definately improved over previous Sony models in this price range.
Best receiver value under $1000, in my opinion. -
"Best mid-range receiver for HD Audio" on by spacesheep1
Pros: Looks great, excellent sound quality, all HD decoding, auto-calibration works exceptionally well with included mic, GUI menus, lots of connections, easy to setup, good remote, price
Cons: on screen GUI menu doesn't overlay, slow response, beware of TV+AMP HDMI audio setting
Summary: I don't conciser myself an audiophile, so when I decided to replace my aging Yamaha receiver I spent about 2 weeks researching AV receiver that could fit my needs. I wanted something inexpensive that can support both DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD which is now standard on Blu-ray discs. I have a very modest $200 5.1 Sony speaker setup so I was looking for something that can accommodate this and didn't really have need for 7.1 receiver and I didn't want to spend much more than $300. Sony STR DN1000 seems like a perfect candidate, it had great reviews, price and all the features I needed (and some that I didn't).
One thing I noticed out of the box, is how great this receiver looked. Pictures don't do justice. Although shiny front of the DN1000 is a fingerprint magnet, I can't imagine too many people complaining about it. Why would you want to touch your receiver? It goes into a cabinet next to the TV and you suppose to use either included or universal (i.e. Logitech Harmony) remote.
Setup was somewhat easy. Menu system is more or less intuitive and I was able to find all the settings without looking at the manual. However I did have few gripes with Sony's GUI menu system. Biggest one is that it doesn't overlay over existing HDMI signal, so when you switch to it, you loose image and sound coming from your HDMI source. So if you are watching movie you have to pause it first. Logic wise, settings that needed the most were buried furthest, and arrowing thru them was very slow and frustrating. Things like source selection should'v been on the bottom of the menu because it has dedicated button on the remote so you won't be switching it from the menu, while other important settings such as switching HDMI audio from AMP only to AMP+TV should really have dedicated button on the remote. Speaking of which, it took me a while to figure out that setting HDMI audio to AMP+TV will disable any kind of decoding! I like sound to come out of my TV when I'm watching regular TV programs, but apparently I can't really have both and it's a real chore to switch it off every time I want to watch a blu-ray.
STR DN1000 comes with calibration microphone which has a very long cable. It was enough for my large living room to reach all the way to the couch. Calibration itself worked great, and all my speakers were detected correctly with exceptionally precise distance measurement. I did have to bring dB value of my sub-woofer manually because of the neighbors.
HDMI switching worked well. There was a few second delay when changing from one HDMI channel to another but I had no issues with connectivity even with old Category 1 HDMI cables.
Speaker cables can be slightly difficult to connect unless you have banana plugs (which I strongly suggest).
And finally audio quality was good in my opinion. Decoding worked great, you see LED light on the receiver when it detects multichannel audio. Even with stereo audio STR DN1000 does pretty good job simulating surround sound. -
"Unit quit working after 7 months!" on by tonykharper
Pros: When it worked it was great!
Cons: Called Sony Customer Service. Got a return number, paid to sent unit to the repair facility. They wanted $104.94 to repair the unit or they would return the unit without repair. I took that option and I'll never buy anything Sony again.
Summary: If you buy Sony, hope it never breaks.
Sony STR-DN1000 user reviews
Where to Buy
MSRP: $399.99
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