Yamaha HTR-5860 XM-Ready 7.1-Channel A/V Surround Receiver (Black)

Yamaha HTR-5860 XM-Ready 7.1-Channel A/V Surround Receiver (Black) Review

Yamaha HTR-5860 XM-Ready 7.1-Channel A/V Surround Receiver (Black) Feature

• 95 watts x 7 channels (20 to 20,000 Hz): front left/right, surround left/right, front center channel, and 2 rear-center channels
• Dolby Digital EX, Dolby Pro Logic IIx, DTS-ES Discrete 6.1, DTS Neo:6, and DTS 96/24 surround processing for rich, enveloping sound
• YPAO (Yamaha Parametric Room Acoustic Optimizer) with supplied microphone optimizes your system for your room quickly and easily
• Offers Yamaha Digital ToP-ART technology, 40-station XM presets, and 40-station AM/FM presets
• XM-Ready. Requires Audiovox CNP-1000 digital antenna to receive XM signal.

Amazon.com Hands-On Review Yamaha's relatively affordable and amazingly high-quality HTR-5860 XM-ready surround receiver is a treat for both music lovers and movie buffs. As the nexus for either a two-channel/stereo listening system or a surround-equipped home theater, the 7.1-channel HTR-5860 is a virtually unqualified success. It underscores both the incredible convenience of having a central component to manage the audio and video signals from many other components and the profound importance of high-quality audio to the enjoyment of recorded music and home cinema.

Click to view the Yamaha HTR5860's connections.

Yes, we'd recommend this receiver even for a simple left/right stereo system. For one thing, it gives you the freedom to expand into surround sound at a pace of your choosing and with a solid foundation. But the bigger factor recommending the HTR-5860 as an integrated stereo amplifier is the receiver's coolest and most sophisticated feature: the Yamaha Parametric Room Acoustic Optimizer (YPAO). Don't get us wrong--it's truly great to have 95 watts per channel across seven channels for dynamic home theater. It's wonderful to have a wealth of surround and extended surround formats at our disposal. And XM Radio-readiness? Superb! (More on that in a minute.) But it's the rare "surround" feature that has immediate benefits for the two-channel world, and this is one of them.

YPAO calibrates the receiver for optimal performance in your actual listening room and through your actual speakers, whatever and wherever they are. And it does this in mere seconds. Depending on the sonic characteristics of your speakers and your room, the results can be profound. In our case, YPAO was responsible for making the HTR-5860 outperform a higher-power, multi-thousand-dollar surround preamplifier and amplifier combination.

To take advantage of YPAO, you simply hold or mount a supplied microphone at your primary listening position and hit "start" on the remote. The receiver pumps a series of test signals through your speakers and "listens" via the mic, comparing what it hears from your speakers and your walls to what it already knows about the source signals. The resulting analysis is the basis for a complete and nearly instantaneous system calibration that encompasses everything from sophisticated equalizer settings for each channel to individual speaker-level adjustments for up to nine speakers (seven main channels plus two "presence" speakers and a subwoofer). You're free to manually modify any aspect of the settings, and you can reload previous settings at the touch of a button.

We heard the biggest improvement from YPAO in the quality, not to say quantity, of bass supplied by our test system. In fact, the post-YPAO bass output was lower, since the receiver's careful adjustments to the level, the crossover frequency (the point where low-frequency sound transitions from the front left/right speakers to the subwoofer), and low-frequency equalization resulted in greater clarity for both deep-bass sounds (drums, dino feet, etc.) and upper-bass sounds (bass guitar, cellos). Bottom line: speakers in living rooms behave differently than speakers in test rooms, and having an AV receiver capable of tailoring its output to your room accounts for a lot.

The receiver also performed commendably in all other areas. Its XM Satellite Radio readiness is as seamless as could be hoped for: plug in your XM antenna, hit the XM/FM toggle button, and lose yourself in the service's 150-plus news, entertainment, and commercial-free music channels. (Use of this feature requires a subscription to XM Satellite Radio--.95 per month, no contract required--and a compatible XM antenna, such as the Audiovox CNP-1000.) XM Radio offers the best satellite-radio sound quality, and we've never heard XM sounding better than it does through this receiver.

Notably, the receiver offers a whopping 40 XM station presets on top of its 40 AM/FM presets. XM presets are stored in five banks of eight (A1 to E8), which proves handy for grouping similar programming or for diplomatically allocating presets to different family members.

Component-video up conversion takes composite- and S-video signals and converts them to a component-video signal. This means you need only one connection to your high-definition or other compatible TV rather than a separate connection for each video format. When you switch from watching your VCR to watching your progressive-scan DVD player, one click of the receiver's remote is all it takes to call up the DVD player; you don't also have to select an alternate input on your TV.

Other sonic refinements come from Yamaha's Digital ToP-ART (Total Purity Audio Reproduction Technology) amplifier design (which ensures high signal purity) and the receiver's wide-range audio frequency response, specifically accommodating cutting-edge audio media like DVD-audio and SACD. The HTR-5860's digital-to-analog converters operate at an extremely high-resolution 192 kHz/24-bits. There's even a feature called Pure Direct, which bypasses all circuitry not essential to audio playback, including the display. --Michael Mikesell

Pros:

• An amazingly high-value product
• Great for stereo or surround listening
• Terrific room and system calibration feature
• Excellent sound quality via both analog and digital inputs
• Extremely versatile hookup and listening options
• XM Satellite Radio-ready (hookup, navigation, presets)
• Abundant surround-processing options
• Extensive user-adjustable parameters for bass management, sound fields
• Well-designed universal remote control
• Well-written user's manual
• HD-capable video switching
• Convenient front-panel AV inputs

Cons:

• No phono input
• Flimsy volume knob
• Speaker terminals do not accept spade-lug-terminated cable

What's in the Box
HTR-5860 receiver, remote control, remote batteries, YPAO optimization microphone, FM and AM antennas, a user's manual, warranty/registration information. Yamaha Superior Performance, High Powered 7.1-Channel 770W (110W x 7) A/V Receiver. It features Yamaha's unique CINEMA DSP for outstandfing home theater performance, as well all Dolby formats and all DTS formats. It has YPAO which automatically sets the best sound for any room, with any speaker placement. It has Quad-Field CINEMA DSP and 14 Surround programs. It also features Night Listening Enhancer (Cinema/Music) and Silent Cinema. It has Component Video Up Conversion (Full) It is XM Satellite Radio ready. It also features on-screen display. It has an 8-Channel External Decorder Input.