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Review 1 of 6
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from friend Summary:
For a few years now, I've had a few surround sound set-ups. I've used Yamaha, Pioneer, Sony and for the exception for some older (1999) Yamaha digital surround receivers, today's digital receivers in the entry to mid-price (under $600) catagory are overrated in power output and frankly sound like crap. There's no deep bass impact and the highs are screechy and the mids are thin. My last receiver a Sony STR-DE585 was rated a 100 watts per channel but had a little transformer, tiny compacitors, and only weighed 15(!) pounds. The sound was thin and edgy especially in 2 channel stereo. It wouldn't even barely move the 10" woofers on my highly effecient Cerwin-Vega RE-25 speakers at high volume (and yes, I checked to make sure the front channels were on large.)
I used to watch movies alot but in the last year I really just listen to music but it seems none of today's receivers in my price range sound good in stereo with plenty of power and impact without Pro-logic II for a bass boost (which just muddies the sound). So, I had a friend who had this "Nak" whom an ex-boyfriend gave to her but she wanted surround sound. I was going to hook up her Nak to use the Pro-logic decoding but instead we traded receivers, even swap, the Sony for the Nakamichi.
Now she's happy with her surround sound (her family watches movies all the time) and I'm more than happy with the sound quality with the Nak. I'm not quite sure of it's power ratings (I think it's 80 watts x 4) but in stereo operation, I can't remember having a receiver with this much power (including a Denon AVR-3000 rated a 110 watts per channel.)
The bass impact and the depth of sound is unreal even at low volumes with no "loudness" and tone controls on flat. It provides more than enough power to drive my Vega's and at high volumes (about 10 to 11 o'clock on the volume dial), the lights in my house dimmed everytime the bass hits (that's a first).
The fan is a little noisy but I cannot hear it unless the room is quite and the glass door of my audio cabinet is open, not enough to bother me. I also love the look of this receiver, very different especially the orange (not amber) display and the orange LED's behind a black acrylic and plastic front panel (wish it was metal and glass though).
I don't find the sound too bright at all in fact, I would call it dark (similar to the Denon). Of course after a few years of listening to Pioneer's and Sony's my ears may have become more forgiving to the highs than some. To the reviewer to said the mids were congested a bit, as you stated, there's no comparison to those high-end amplifiers to ANY receiver much less a mid-priced one such as the Nak. To sum it all up the Nakamichi AV-300 is an awesome piece of audio equipment. It's reletively compact but fairly heavy, with a big tranformer and high quality parts to go along with the high quality performance that it's capable of. My music finally sounds like music to my ears. Thanks Paige and Nakamichi! Strengths:
High power output, great sound, unbelievable bass impact and definition, cool looking, simple design. Weaknesses:
Only front channels have binding posts, volume knob doesn't have a LED position marker Similar Products Used:
Sony STR-DE585, Pioneer VSX-D850, Denon AVR-3000, Yamaha RXV-795
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