Review 1 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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your doing it the wrong way
02/21/2009
By Anonymous
from h-town
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What's great about it: sound
What's not so great: wasnt free
"if you have a newer lcd tv or plasma, look at the connections on the back if you see a orange digital coaxial, all you have to do is hook that one cable from the tv to the receiver, thats all. and the speakers to the receiver."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 2 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Pretty good unit
02/21/2009
By Ryan21
from Blissfield, MI
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What's great about it: has hdmi and 2 optical digital inputs
What's not so great: can't use the optical inputs for ne thing other than the hdmi it is connected too
"I bought this unit because of the hdmi and two digital optical inputs. It is a very solid unit but i discovered that in order for the digital optical inputs to do you any good you have to use the hdmi that corrasponds with it. And you can only use the sound inputs that go with what inputs your using. For example when using component cables you have to use digital coaxial. you can use digital optical for your component inputs which i thought was annoying. It also doesn't atomaticaly recognize what surround sound the dvd is using which my old old kenwood did no problem. Its ok for the price."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
No
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Review 3 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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very noisy circuitry, this sony is a phony
02/19/2009
By electrodoctor
from boston
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What's great about it: remote control
What's not so great: anoying buzz in all speakers when its turned on, no phono input
"I got this receiver and though it has a nice remote, its amplifier circuitry is really poor. no matter what impedance rating of the speakers hooked up to it you will hear a quiet but anoying high pitched hum comming from all speakers when nothing is playing. I swapped it for another one and had the same problem. I think sony really put CHEAP INTERNAL COMPONENTS in this one. i'd AVOID THIS UNIT if you find buzzing sounds anoying, im going to spend a little more on a denon or harman kardon."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
No
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Review 4 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Good product, other reviews may be misleading
02/15/2009
By Jordan3093
from Green Bay, WI
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What's great about it: Price, easy to set up and use
What's not so great: not much
"This is a solid receiver, with good sound quality and is a great deal for the price. My wife bought this for me for valentines day and she told me that she checked the reviews after she bought it and wasn't so sure about the quality. I also read the reviews, many very negative about the HDMI passthrough. You don't need to use the passthrough if you don't want to and I chose not to, this system works great with a CD player, TV sound in and an extra video port I use to connect my my mac sound to. Another review said that you need an advanced degree in electronics to install this thing, not quite. I assure you I have no advanced degree in electronics, but I have installed several of my own stereos myself. This one was no different, 30 minutes without cracking the manual open, no problems."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 5 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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HDMI Passthrough useless
02/08/2009
By dee81
from Holland, MI
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What's great about it: Brand recognition
What's not so great: HDMI Passthrough useless w/ PS3
"I should have done my homework; I did not realize this was an HDMI passthrough only receiver. I have a PS3 and cannot use HDMI and digital optical at the same time for sound. I am confused why anyone would use HDMI passthrough, if I want sound to my TV I will plug the HDMI into my TV. It seems pointless to spend the extra $50-$80 on an extra HDMI cable (one from the PS3 to the receiver, and one from the receiver to the TV) when I could just skip the receiver and go strait to the TV. And then I need to buy an optical cable too when an HDMI is already carrying an audio signal; sounds like a scam to make more money to me. I cannot review the sound quality because there is no sound. I will be returning this to BestBuy and buying a different receiver."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
No
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Review 6 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Excellent $150 Sony Receiver
02/03/2009
By vchanpe
from Vallejo, CA
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What's great about it: Home theater receiver sounded great for the price. Bravia Sync works.
What's not so great: Display is too small. Not enough inputs for a CD player, a cassette player, etc.
"Some reviewers stated that the HDMI pass thru is useless. It is indeed useless if you do not have a Sony Blu Ray DVD Player and a Sony Bravia TV. However, if you do all sony components that are "Bravia Sync" compatible, then the HDMI pass thru becomes extremely useful as a switching device. For example, if you want to play a Blu Ray Disc, you simply press "Play" on the Sony Blu-Ray remote and it automatically does the following in one operation: (1) Plays the Blu-Ray Disc, (2) turns on the Sony Bravia TV and automatically selects the correct HDMI input to the TV. (3) Switches the TV sound from the TV speakers to the Sony 520 Receiver, (4) turn on the Sony 520 Receiver for the home theater sound.
This avoids picking up three remote and pressing several buttons to make it all work together. Using a single remote vice three remotes has a lot of advantages. Sony calls this system "Bravia Sync". Panasonic calls their system "Viera Link". Once you understand this concept, you will also understand why you need a separate optical connection to connect the DVD player to the Sony 520 Receiver. A good home theater system should have compatible components that work together.
As far as rating the Sony 520 receiver.... the Dolby 5.1sounds pretty good for a $150 receiver. Set-up was fairly easy and it basically does everything necessary for a Dolby 5.1 home theatre system. My only complaint is there were no extra auxillary inputs for other sound sources other than a home theater setup. I kinda wished it had more inputs for my cassette player, CD player, etc. The display is also too small to read from a distance. And yes, I really like using only one remote to turn on the entire system to watch a Blu-Ray Movie with the minimum of fuss."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 7 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Good AV/Reciever for general Home User
02/02/2009
By Tony1989
from Charlotte, NC
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What's great about it: Good Value - Sony brand name - features
What's not so great: Setup and Explanation of HDMI abilities
"Picked this up just yesterday for $179 - price match of HH Gregg normal price.
I was replacing my Philips FR-968 with this unit.
Primarily it was to connect - Sony BluRay S350 via HDMI & HD DVR via HDMI
You MUST connect Digital Coax or Optical in order to get Audio - it is HDMI PassThru ( which it does state )
Once I had everything connected properly and spent 20 minutes going thru the guide and adjusting the various options in order to get the best sound, I setup my S350 to output DD & DTS 96/24 and thru in 3 different movies
BluRay - The Matrix Reloaded
BluRay - Wanted
DVD - Pearl Harbor - Set this to Dolby DTS option in menu
Based on my 3 hours of playing with different settings and speakers here is my opinion.
Plain old 5.1 Dolby Digital is good enough - I was underwhelmed and underamazed at anything but a minute difference in the sound enhancement and quality over my old setup with plain DD.
There was slightly less hiss - channels were seperated a little more distinctly but over that I got the same level of performance from my 7 year old Philips unit as I did with this new Sony.
I am using Sony surround speakers with Infinity front channel and a Sony 100W powered sub - so it was not my speakers that were limiting it.
If you are looking to move from say analog to digital and want to go from 3.1 to 5.1 then this is a fantastic buy for you.
I am under the impression unless you have a dedicated room with optimally placed speakers and go for the 7.1 setup, you are not going to get the immersive sound which I was expecting based on others reviews here.
Great deal if you get them to price match HH Gregg
I took it back to the store in the end and will wait until the 7.1 systems drop in price and the DTS / TrueHD are the defacto standard of audio."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 8 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Great unit for the price.
02/01/2009
By Monteee
from Minnesota
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What's great about it: Price, look, sound
What's not so great: HDMI "Pass-through", making adjustments via remote
"This unit looks good, sounds good, sets up fairly easily, and is a GREAT value. However, you MUST consider the HDMI "Pass-Through" feature, as it is completely irrelevant and therefore useless. We Sony customers should lobby Sony to discontinue the Pass-Through feature. Take your time learning how to adjust bass/treble and speakers via remote, as it can be a bit confusing. Read the instruction manual very carefully. All in all, it is a good receiver. Sony hardly ever fails to produce good, solid units."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 9 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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lots of bang for the buck
01/04/2009
By FunkyFish
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What's great about it: good price, easy set up
What's not so great: does not process DTS signals through HDMI
"I bought this reciever as a replacement for my out dated Sony STR K660P, which is still a fully functional and good reciever for being a package deal from walmart (speakers and sub came packaged with it, i use my 12" pioneer floor speakers for the front channels 15 years old and still going strong). I just bought this reciever a couple of weeks ago, it was easy to set up but im not using the hdmi ports due to the fact my TV screen kept flickering when I hooked the hdmi on my PS3 in through the reciever. Also it wont process DTS signals through the HDMI cable even though the PS3 will out put DTS through it.
However, even though it's only 80 more watts than my old reciever, I can turn this up to half the level my old one had to be at to produce the same quality of sound. Im still tinkering with it to get the screen flickering to stop. The other thing is that for some reason it has optical inputs for blueray and satellite, but only has analog inputs for DVD, which in my opinion is a rather outdated audio input.
If you can find a way around some of the minor draw backs like I have you'll get more out this device than what you paid for. That's one reason I commonly buy Sony products, you always get more bang for your buck."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 10 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Maybe it was a dud?
12/30/2008
By merritm
from Minneapolis, MN
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What's great about it: Nothing as far as I can tell
What's not so great: Difficult set-up, HDMI hookups didn't work for me
"Maybe I bought the only non-functional Sony receiver the day I bought it at Best Buy, but my experience with this receiver wasn't good. I was 110% sure that I had everything hooked up right (I was sending my DVD player and TV through the reciever via HDMI, and one HDMI hookup to the TV), but I could never get everything to work. At first I was getting picture and sound with HD channels and only the picture with non-HD channels. Then, I was only able to get sound from my TV and DVD player with no picture. I called the Sony folks and while their customer service reps were nice, they were not able to help me and determined that the receiver needed service. I was so sick of fiddling with everything that I decided to go back to my trusty old Yamaha receiver, and just connect the cable box and DVD directly to the TV without going through a receiver."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
No
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Review 11 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Another great Sony product
12/22/2008
By Dennis08
from Houston, TX
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What's great about it: Price and ease of set up.
What's not so great: Nothing at this time.
"I bought this unit to replace an outdated Sony Home Theater System. This receiver was super easy to set up. 3 HDMI input / outputs, you can't go wrong. The multiple other inputs / outputs also make this unit the best bang for your buck. The sound fields and sound levels that you can set are, in my opinion, are just as good and if not better than the much more expensive brands. I have owned Sony products for many years and this is another reason that I buy Sony and I buy them from Best Buy...."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 12 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Can not even tell this is a $200 receiver
11/24/2008
By godsmackbrad13
from ohio
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What's great about it: The sound and all the hd hookups
What's not so great: No sound through the hdmi cable
"This receiver is great sounding and works great.I watched "the incredible hulk" on blu-ray and the sound was amazing and shook the house.Anybody who says anything bad about this must not know how to hook up a system or has it hooked up to bad speakers.The only bad thing is the sound is not carried through the hdmi cable so u have to use a a digital optical cable which is not a big deal and i knew that when i bought it.But anyways,u can not go wrong with this receiver."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 13 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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great unit
11/23/2008
By rc2id
from colorado springs
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What's great about it: auto calibration, hdmi pass through, 5.1 channels instead of 7.1 for those of us who dont have big living rooms
"great unit for the money. I have used Sony since the early 90s. always impressed with the quality and this unit was no exception. Auto-calibration will get you in the ball park of good sound, but you will still need to go through and tweak a bit to your taste. I live in an apartment and didnt see the need for a 7.1 system, so finding a Sony unit in 5.1 was great. Anybody who doesn't like this unit has to high expectations for this price range."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 14 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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What's not to like
11/20/2008
By Eric21
from Garwood, NJ
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What's great about it: Exactly what I expected
What's not so great: ....
"Do your reading, know what you're gettiing. For all those who say that the product didn't deliver on what they thought, don't think about it, just understand what you'er getting. HDMI pass through, no audio, check. DMPort to use my integrated Ipod dock, check. The receiver set up and is being used exactly as advertised and really no reason to look further. Not running a movie theatre here so why pay more for bells and whistles which I'll never use. Excellent product for what it is."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 15 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Can't Beat The Price
10/04/2008
By Sniper1977
from Chesapeake Va
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What's great about it: Good Features Great Sound
What's not so great: HDMI
"I am very satisfied with this unit thus far. I purchased it in July 08 great value for the price."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 16 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Great Purchase
08/05/2008
By jpaskin
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What's great about it: Plenty of power and inputs
"good product.Affordable and very functional. Easy to use"
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 17 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Bad Surprise
07/29/2008
By MerlinTX
from Houston
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What's great about it: None
What's not so great: HDMI pass through
"I was shocked to discover the concept of HDMI pass through. What this means is that your receiver is a glorified patchcord for the signal. Any HDMI signal in is merely sent on to the television without processing the signal and broadcasting the signal through the speakers.
What is a receiver for if it does not receive the signal?
This is a complete waste of money."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
No
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1 of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Review 18 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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Reasonable for the price
07/22/2008
By Kjohn
from Iowa
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What's great about it: Sounds good
What's not so great: Output is limited to only one that doesn't work for all inputs
"The unit seems good for the price but the documentation is a bit confusing. The way the "VIDEO1" circuitry is set up is entirely counterintuitive...case-in-point: I discovered after experimenting and visiting with several Best Buy salesmen and Geek Squad agents that VIDEO1 input data is not reproducable through the VIDEO1 output. I called Sony and they informed me that the only material that can be output via VIDEO1 circuit is data that is fed into the unit via the SAT circuit. Now, that IS really screwed-up logic! I am impressed, however, with the quality of souund reproduction, particularly data that I feed into the unit through the Optical Digital circuits."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 19 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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A steal
07/21/2008
By ethanake
from Little Rock, AR
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What's great about it: sound compression - not noticeable
What's not so great: volume capability
"The compatibility of this receiver was great. The remote works to control any sony product as well as recognizing which component you would like to power on/off. On Black Friday of 2007, this item was sold for $99.99, which is an amazing purchase. I would definitely recommend this to a friend."
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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Review 20 for Sony 500W 5.1-Ch. A/V Home Theater Receiver
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GREAT Receiver!
07/04/2008
By SomeWhiteGuy
from Tulsa, OK
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What's great about it: Easy set-up, many settings to customize the sound, good price
What's not so great: none as of yet, and am not expecting any
"I had owned a Sony receiver for the past couple of years (model str-k740p). It has served me VERY well, and I have been very pleased with it, but it was just time to upgrade. So, being a college student on a budget, I chose this receiver, and HOLY COW! What a great choice. The sound is amazingly clear, and thats on my old speakers! There are little details in the sound that I did not hear very well with the old receiver, but, the old receiver was only 180w! The set-up was nothing, it was very easy. I had it set up to my liking in only 10 min. I highly recommend this for someone building a home theater on a budget!"
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Would you recommend this product to a friend?:
Yes
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