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harman kardon worth the extra $?

F

fugu

[H]F Junkie
Joined
Apr 2, 2000
Messages
10,668
I've been looking around at receivers and have noticed that the HK ones tend to be more expensive with less wattage than say an Onkyo receiver with comparable features. I've heard that HK makes good stuff and they tend to be more conservative with their power ratings since they're "better." However, I can see how that might be a pretty subjective term when we're talking about audio...

Anyway, if I were to pick up the 5.1 Rocket ELT set from AV123, would it be worth spending the extra cash on an HK receiver over an Onkyo? What are you paying for when you get the HK?
 
How about the wattage difference? Is 55W per channel enough to fill a small living room? Also, are Onkyo and other brands padding their wattage ratings?
 
dandragonrage said:
You're paying for better sound. I'd take HK over Onkyo any day.
Click to expand...

Any model HK over a High-end ONKYO :confused:

Depending on models I would usually take an ONKYO myself.

Price doesnt always reflect quality of product (see BOSE).
 
Onkyo does pad them more than HK, but they are still a good company. Onkyo is not giving you numbers 5x higher than they could ever go like cheap companies. But they do pad more than HK.

As for whether it'll be loud enough, that depends on how loud you want it and the sensitivity and placement of your speakers.

Overall, my recommendation is to listen to both and see what YOU like.
 
fugu said:
How about the wattage difference? Is 55W per channel enough to fill a small living room? Also, are Onkyo and other brands padding their wattage ratings?
Click to expand...


I had a 35 watt amp running extremely inefficient speakers. I never ever got the amp to clip. Poeple get real caught up in power. If the speakers don't pull alot of bass then they will not require significant power. Even so I've used 60 & 80 watt amps for home theater subs and never had an obvious issue. This was in 10'x13' rooms to. These poeple bragging that 2000 watts in there car doesn't get loud enough (while in the car) are crazy.

Look at NAD ratings, they have long been pathetic compared to similar products, but the truth is that they are still plentiful.


The real question is will the power supply be able to handle it. The power chips themselves may be able to hand out 50 watts or whatever, but when 3 or 4 channels all start asking for that the cheap power supply may say no and short change them.
 
Yeah, NAD has great amps, able to go down to 2 ohms and sometimes lower. But my T-752 (which is in the shop) is rated a respectable 80x5, so it doesn't even look too bad.
 
westrock2000 said:
I had a 35 watt amp running extremely inefficient speakers. I never ever got the amp to clip. Poeple get real caught up in power. If the speakers don't pull alot of bass then they will not require significant power. Even so I've used 60 & 80 watt amps for home theater subs and never had an obvious issue. This was in 10'x13' rooms to. These poeple bragging that 2000 watts in there car doesn't get loud enough (while in the car) are crazy.

Look at NAD ratings, they have long been pathetic compared to similar products, but the truth is that they are still plentiful.


The real question is will the power supply be able to handle it. The power chips themselves may be able to hand out 50 watts or whatever, but when 3 or 4 channels all start asking for that the cheap power supply may say no and short change them.
Click to expand...

Okay, thanks for the info.
 
I have an HK AVR330 receiver powering my 4 polk LSI speakers and they do a fine job doing so. I know that the HK receivers have astounding high current amps under the hood and can power these speakers up to beyond room filling sound - keep in mind that these LSI are harder to drive than those av123 speakers (being at 4 ohms impedance).

Also, lets not forget the super awesome HK customer service. I bought mine from ebay (USED) and they still accepted my warranty. Repaired it at a local shop for no charge, too!
 
Pinipig523 said:
I have an HK AVR330 receiver powering my 4 polk LSI speakers and they do a fine job doing so. I know that the HK receivers have astounding high current amps under the hood and can power these speakers up to beyond room filling sound - keep in mind that these LSI are harder to drive than those av123 speakers (being at 4 ohms impedance).

Also, lets not forget the super awesome HK customer service. I bought mine from ebay (USED) and they still accepted my warranty. Repaired it at a local shop for no charge, too!
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Nice. I'm looking at the AVR 335 right now, so that's reassuring.
 
Why not just get one of the recievers that av123 sells? They sell quite a few models...
 
Gluegun said:
Why not just get one of the recievers that av123 sells? They sell quite a few models...
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I see one Kenwood, but for the other stuff would I need to mix and match an amp with a digital decoder?
 
I have an AVR-235 and it works great. I had an older Kenwood with my JBL HT4V's - and with the AVR-235 it's a lot better sounding.

I'd go with another HK, no questions asked when I need to upgrade.
 
I used to have a mid-to-high-end Kenwood (the 3090 or 4090 something like that, the first one with the gigantic touchscreen remote). It was rated at 100w or 110w / channel. Loud passages in movies really sounded bad now and then. This was with powered subs, and after some experimentation, i found the subs were fine, it was the mains that were howling (Energy e:XL-28P). I had to turn down certain movies to avoid the high volume screeching. ;[

I recently got an HK 325, rated at i believe 55w / channel, and it's quite a bit nicer. I don't have the screeching anymore, and things just sound a lot smoother. The Kenwood sounded pretty good until the screeching started bothering me, but with the HK, everything seems less harsh, like maybe the Kenwood had odd frequency peaks in a few spots.

After some research, i found that the two were rated differently (the Kenwood was rated with one channel driven i believe, while the HK was rated with all channels driven, and at a lower distortion). That's typical of most electronics companies, since as long as they put in somewhere how they're rated, they can manipulate ratings to give them whatever numbers they want (1000w @ 2 Ohms, 1KHz, 50% distortion could be a totally valid rating, for example). Ever seen those computer speakers advertised for $15 that claim to have 1500W of power? They can probably put out that much power for .0001 second with some incredible distortion with no resistance. Same thing with home theater, only the numbers tend to be more reasonable.

Anyway, the HK would also regularly try to draw too much power and shut itself down, hehe (it's a 35 year old house). I had to rearrange how things are hooked up so that one of the subs is on another circuit. How's that for power? :cool: It doesn't do that any more, btw.
 
beast said:
Ever seen those computer speakers advertised for $15 that claim to have 1500W of power? They can probably put out that much power for .0001 second with some incredible distortion with no resistance.
Click to expand...

Ya its called PMPO for Peak Music Power Output. It basically means how much power can this thing handle without vaporizing. Go to a small enough time interval and yes you can get some very impressive numbers. If you plan on listening to music longer than it takes the sunlight to make the journey from your window to your bed you may be left disatisfied.

Like I said earlier its usually the power supply that short changes an amplifier. Most every amp works very simply. You have transistors or an opamp that multiplies the incoming voltage by a certain amount, say 10x. So say your incoming signal is 0.2 volts, the amplifier will try to output 2 volts. Now opamps and transistors are not 100% efficient, so it may take 3 volts to get 2 volts at the output. The problems get to when the input voltage starts getting into a couple volts and although the electronics themselves have no problem putting 20 volts but may require 25 or 30 volts themselves to that, the power supply says hey look I can only give you 15 volts individually because your pulling too much current all together. This is when the distortion starts to kickin.

My H/K PA5800 has a massive toroidial transformer up front, the thing alone probably weighs a good 5 pounds. Its bigger than any tranformer I've seen in any reciever I've owned and its only rated at 80 watts x 5. My Sony reciever on my computer is rated at 120x7 and it the whole thing only weighs about 4 or 5 pounds.

Lately there have been some new megawatt amps, such as Bob Carvers Tracking Down Convertor in the Sunfire brand and other digital amps. These amplifiers really can deliver 500 to a 1000 watts because in a very simple way of explaining they take the voltage directly from the AC plug and kind of modulate it to the incoming music signal. So at that point your talking about 100+ volts on tap. Watts is defined as (among other ways) as V² / R. So 100V² / 8 ohms is 1250 watts....impressive ehh :D

However the catch here is that these are generally powering subwoofers with extremely stiff surrounds and spiders, so they need alot more "umph" to get them going. Most find that even 20-25 watt amps can fill a medium sized room with normal speakers.
 
Power is overrated.

Only time you need big power is when driving massive or disturbingly inefficient loudspeakers, such as anything with 10 or more drivers per speaker, or electrostatics.

Aside from that, a clean 50 watts per channel is enough for most anyone. To put it in perspective, a single pair of Dayton BR-1s fed 45 watts per channel (actual watts, not market-hype watts) is well into "hey bro, the police are here to tell you to turn it the f--- down" territory. And those are pretty inefficient as far as modern 2-way 2-driver loudspeakers go.


There are amps that can dish out the power. Crown Intl. makes a 2000w 2-channel amp...however it's professional gear meant for use in concerts and requires retarded levels of input power to get there....use it in a house and you will throw breakers.....last time I merely tried to power it up it tripped the breakers. Carver is an exception due to their odd power supply design....however that design is also pretty much subwoofer specific, much like how class-d amps are considered "subwoofer use only". If that has any technical merit I have no clue, but that's just how the industry is right now, usually using class a/b amplification for non-subwoofer apps.
 
beast said:
Anyway, the HK would also regularly try to draw too much power and shut itself down, hehe (it's a 35 year old house). I had to rearrange how things are hooked up so that one of the subs is on another circuit. How's that for power? It doesn't do that any more, btw.
Click to expand...

????? explain, please...

<imo>

if it was trying to draw power that the circuit couldn't deliver and overloaded the circuit, i most certainly hope that your circuit breaker was tripping (s/b a breaker, 35 years old isn't THAT old, and i'd be greatly surprised if it's not at least a 15 amp circuit)... if not, i'd get an electrician in there PRONTO... that's kinda the concept behind circuit breakers/fuses....

now, if the unit was trying to deliver power to the speakers that it couldn't deliver and was shutting itself down to avoid clipping (i dunno if the h/k has any built in circuitry for this, i'm not familiar with the unit), i'd see your point... but you'd also be arguing AGAINST yourself... :) and it doesn't have anything to do with the circuit it would be on...

</imo>

an aside... mustang/wes, there's no such thing as too much power... :D or too much capacitance... or too much anything... :) generally speaking, a 300 watt monoblock delivering 50 watts will sound better than a 50 wpc avr delivering 50 watts... but your points are well taken, in that many people say "WOW!!!! look alll these wpc!!! this one has GOTTA be better than the other one"... :rolleyes:

as far as class ab vs. class d, this page does a pretty decent job of explaining it at a basic level...
 
A 5Lb transformer can only do around 250VA total... That's weak. I have some 650VA transformers that are near 20Lbs each.
 
dandragonrage said:
A 5Lb transformer can only do around 250VA total... That's weak. I have some 650VA transformers that are near 20Lbs each.
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Haha, well I think your only strengthening my cause then :D

You should see this mammoth I pulled out of a Yamaha P2200...here I found the pics. I know this is slightly off topic, but the lesson here is that this came from an amplifier rated at 240Wx2...You will not see anything like this in a reciever.

There were two of these in the amp

IMG_0384.jpg


Thats a full size 10" paper plate under there.

IMG_0391.jpg
 
ccotenj said:
????? explain, please...

<imo>

if it was trying to draw power that the circuit couldn't deliver and overloaded the circuit, i most certainly hope that your circuit breaker was tripping (s/b a breaker, 35 years old isn't THAT old, and i'd be greatly surprised if it's not at least a 15 amp circuit)... if not, i'd get an electrician in there PRONTO... that's kinda the concept behind circuit breakers/fuses....

now, if the unit was trying to deliver power to the speakers that it couldn't deliver and was shutting itself down to avoid clipping (i dunno if the h/k has any built in circuitry for this, i'm not familiar with the unit), i'd see your point... but you'd also be arguing AGAINST yourself... :) and it doesn't have anything to do with the circuit it would be on...

</imo>
Click to expand...

Well, this was an assumption on my part i guess, i'm not an electrician. ;]

Here's what happened: When i first hooked up the new HK, and it hit a bass-heavy passage, the receiver would turn off. Not just shut the amp down like it overheated or something, but actually turn itself completely off. At the time, i had all my HT gear plugged into the two outlets in that room. That was the HK, 2 x Energy e:XL-28P speakers (100W powered sub in each), DVD player, Dish PVR,TV, etc. As an example, at the start of The Fifth Element, as soon as the rumbling started, the HK would turn off. When i unplugged the subs and played the passage again, it was fine (but of course, no bass, heh). This was before i felt the rumbling, btw, so it wasn't vibration. I moved the plug for one of the subs to an adjacent room (which just happens to be on another circuit breaker), and the problem went away.

I assumed since the HK was the only thing that was different, that it was causing the problem. Maybe the problem's always been there, and the HK just has different circutry, causing it to shut off when my old Kenwood didn't? I dunno.
 
Man, might have to postpone the receiver purchase again... friend of mine is trying to sell a g5 powermac and he's willing to give me a pretty good price on it. Doh! =b
 
Ok, friend isn't going to be able to sell me the G5 for a while, so I went ahead and got the receiver and Rocket ELT system.

Woo ;)
 
Off topic, but energy in a capacitor is (CV^2)/2, so lowering the voltage to 5V allows you to raise the capacitance quite a bit. Check out aerogel capacitors (example link: http://www.hec.co.uk/supercapacitors.html) for even more amazing things. Though aerogel capacitors have a high internal resistance (unlike electrolytics) so they're not so good for PSUs...
 
Huh. Learn something new every day. Thanks for the information.

 
im thinking about getting the harmon AVR 230-Z. Does it have phono inputs so I can plug my record player in?

thanks,
Zack
 
Receiver came in today, but the speakers won't get here until Tuesday next week
 
fugu said:
Receiver came in today, but the speakers won't get here until Tuesday next week
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Which receiver did you end up going with? Give us some impressions of your new system when it's all setup. :)
 
avr 335 =) The thing looks pretty sweet... It's not doing much sitting under the tv right now though =b I'll make a new thread about it when the speakers come in.
 
westrock2000, that's one of the biggest capacitors ive ever seen............ Yikes.

I have a quick question. So, because "watts" is mostly marketing hype with some of these brands, what are some good stats to keep in mind when looking for a cheaper receiver (Besides subjective listening)?

It seems there are a few people around here that like to recommend HK receivers for cheap budget's. I also have a cheap budget, but if you could get a cheap denon (like thier 1705), then how would that compare.

The problem I have, is there aren't any places around me for really good subjective listening. The only local place I've seen is just way out of my price range, sadly.
 
ds- said:
Is the AVR 135 any good?
Click to expand...

Indeed it is. I have the AVR130, which is the older version of the AVR135, and I'm in love with it. Even a year after buying it, I'm still having fun playing and tweating with it. I've gotten used to the great sound of it, so today when i got bored and decided to see how my old sony and my brother's onkyo receiver sounded with my speakers, the AVR130 totally blew those two receivers out of the water, no doubt about it.

Harman Kardon products are of great quality.

Also, their customer support is just about the best you can get. If you have a problem with your unit, THEY'LL pay for the shipping back to them and they will EXCHANGE the unit, instead of replacing it, assuming they still carry the same model.

My remanufactured FL8385 makes the slightest little gridining noise when the CD-changer mechanism is spinning, and the customer support email me a shipping slip and offered to replace the unit or refund my money, my choice, if i would like to send it back.

The company conducts itself with great ethics.

It probably sounds like i work for them, but i assure you, i do not :)
 
bjornb17 said:
Indeed it is. I have the AVR130, which is the older version of the AVR135, and I'm in love with it. Even a year after buying it, I'm still having fun playing and tweating with it. I've gotten used to the great sound of it, so today when i got bored and decided to see how my old sony and my brother's onkyo receiver sounded with my speakers, the AVR130 totally blew those two receivers out of the water, no doubt about it.

Harman Kardon products are of great quality.

Also, their customer support is just about the best you can get. If you have a problem with your unit, THEY'LL pay for the shipping back to them and they will EXCHANGE the unit, instead of replacing it, assuming they still carry the same model.

My remanufactured FL8385 makes the slightest little gridining noise when the CD-changer mechanism is spinning, and the customer support email me a shipping slip and offered to replace the unit or refund my money, my choice, if i would like to send it back.

The company conducts itself with great ethics.

It probably sounds like i work for them, but i assure you, i do not :)
Click to expand...

Sounds awesome. I think I'll pick up the AVR 135.
I live in canada so it seems more expensive. Like for $650 CND at futureshop.

But I can get it for $330.43 CND from amazon.com. $453.80 after taxes and shipping and duties.
 
zackboll said:
im thinking about getting the harmon AVR 230-Z. Does it have phono inputs so I can plug my record player in?

thanks,
Zack
Click to expand...


No it does not, sorry :(

Heres a view of the back

You can hook the record player into one of the RCA inputs, but it will be extremely quite. So if your just looking to validate something it will work, but for listening not so much.

You can use a standalone preamp like this or heres some more. You can spend alot more too. Make sure they have RIAA EQ (ya the RIAA did something beneficial once, but they've been taxing our asses for it ever since)
 
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