Experiences with Onkyo ?

Q Acoustics M20 HD wireless music system
Regret selling my Onkyo PTC 707 in 2004 though it was a midi system - with Dolby Prologic, a 3 way front (6" Woofer, 2.5" mid and 2" tweeter), rear and centre speakers with 3" spkr.. Replaced it with a Bose 321 - costliest mistake in my audio investments.
 
rwnano said:
Anyone who has bought older Receivers and can elaborate on their experiences with the Onkyo Brand?

There's a HT 590 from 2010 available.
Thank you!
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Onkyo Receivers are Equally good comparing with denon /Marantz. I don't know why suddenly Onkyo became unpopular in the Audio market.
I am still using my 13 year's old ONKYO AVR for TV viewing.
Their old models have sound modes PLII movie ,PLII music which sounds great for TV viewing. It was even better than my new Denon AVR for TV Sound.
Also i felt stereo music also better sounded in Onkyo than Denon - Sounded more bright in Onkyo.
DTS/DD works good as my new Denon AVR.

Only thing is you will not have Audyssy with old ONKYO AVRs , you can very well do manual configurations.
 
I had HTS580 htib and was very powerful sounding even with 8in passive subwoofer. I chose above Denon that time due to good SW effect. It worked well till some noise started from surrounds. Onkyo service person came home and opened AVR,cleaned preamp,but couldn't find fault.l took it to authotised cervice center, but they said all readings perfect. Must be bad decoder chip.
 
I had an Onkyo AVR for many years with Audessy supplied. It worked fine but nothing spectacular....I did not enjoy it with music and went in for separates for music duties. I now have a Denon for AVR duties - frankly since I only use it for movies I cannot make out the difference between this and the old Onkyo. The entire video section of the Onkyo just died one day and so without spending a lot of money it was just an audio amp which it was not great for...so I gifted it to a friend who was stepping out on this slippery slope of journey of audio :)
Overall I cannot hear the difference between AVRs (other than power) as each movie soundtrack is so unique and so have decided to buy functional AVRs and use the Home theatre bypass in my audio separates if I want the extra punch. This setup seems to work and is economical.
 
I have heard few Onkyo AVR .It is good in giving raw power that hits you on the face.
Watching movies were good with Onkyo.
From my understanding,The brand downfall started because of poor customer service,parts unavailability and dropping Audyssey room calibration from their lineup and introducing their own room calibration.
 
Sugar said:
I had an Onkyo AVR for many years with Audessy supplied. It worked fine but nothing spectacular....I did not enjoy it with music and went in for separates for music duties. I now have a Denon for AVR duties - frankly since I only use it for movies I cannot make out the difference between this and the old Onkyo. The entire video section of the Onkyo just died one day and so without spending a lot of money it was just an audio amp which it was not great for...so I gifted it to a friend who was stepping out on this slippery slope of journey of audio :)
Overall I cannot hear the difference between AVRs (other than power) as each movie soundtrack is so unique and so have decided to buy functional AVRs and use the Home theatre bypass in my audio separates if I want the extra punch. This setup seems to work and is economical.
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Please elaborate on this..how are you doing music now?
 
I had an Onkyo HTIB for 10 years. Pretty good for movies and TV viewing. I replaced with Yamaha AVR an year ago. But the dialogues in movies was superior in Onkyo. It was able to give good sound effect even with passive Subwoofer. I hda the constant problem that occasionally the volume would go down to 0. THis will continue for few days and then it would become normal. I services in authorised center 5 years ago but 1 year later it triggered again. It wont turn to the most recent active source sometimes.
 
rwnano said:
Please elaborate on this..how are you doing music now?
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Hi - I am using separates now for audio: Mac mini (streaming & CDs) -->DAC-->Pre amp-->Power Amp-->speakers. I use the AVR only for movies with the front channels playing through the music preamp/power amp.
 
rwnano said:
Please elaborate on this..how are you doing music now?
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Hehe, lookup Focal Supra No.3.

Apologies @Sugar though. I did not intend to mention the Supras from a price point alone. Not a week goes by without my looking up youtube on the Kantas and the Supras.

On topic, my BIL has an older Onkyo receiver and I remember it sounding pretty good at his place.
 
ssf said:
Hehe, lookup Focal Supra No.3.

Apologies @Sugar though. I did not intend to mention the Supras from a price point alone. Not a week goes by without my looking up youtube on the Kantas and the Supras.

On topic, my BIL has an older Onkyo receiver and I remember it sounding pretty good at his place.
Click to expand...
Yes - feel blessed to have the Sopra - though it takes a long time to burn in / open up...so initially there is post purchase dissonance but 300 hours later its bliss!
 
rwnano said:
Anyone who has bought older Receivers and can elaborate on their experiences with the Onkyo Brand?
Click to expand...
You sure you want to buy something thats almost 13 years old? Unless you are getting it for free.
Nothing wrong with the brand. They make excellent AV products. What is not so great is the company has gone into liquidation a couple of times so makes you nervous when buying new. Even today, under the new owners, their future is uncertain.
 
OLD AVR's are an excellent choice as per me - some of them have BETTER power supplies and thus sound than modern AVRs. And todays AVRs going for what they are going for, why not get something older?
 
Depends on the model. The one you are after was a budget box sold as a packaged unit with compact speakers. Built to a price.
If you want quality from this era, you are looking at the TX-SR608 (I had this unit. Now sold) or the TX-NR5008. These Onkyo's had better power supplies, components and can easily rival a mid tier modern day receiver. I still have something similar so can vouch for that.
 
My first purchase was Onkyo 3300 HTIB a decade back. I have now moved to stereo system but still use the Onkyo in guest room. Good for movies and nothing much to say about music. However, I should say that it is built like a tank as it withstood lightning, massive power surge. Even it was continuously used for 12 to 16 hrs at a stretch. It has not yet been opened for service, only changed two remotes as of now. I also have a Denon D-M41 which I had to service two times for power problem. Certainly the built quality of newer generation amps are not up to the mark.
 
I used Onkyo HT 580 (part of HTIB 5300) from 2010 to 2022 and it worked like brand new till the time I sold it.

A friend is using Onkyo HT 590 (part of HTIB 5400) since 2011. It is working absolutely great (he wants to go compact now because of space).

Onkyo AVRs are of that era are rock solid.
 
I have Onkyo HTIB, HTS 580, with HTR 303 receiver, which is 17 years old now. It was used for more than 8 hours everyday with TV for more than 10 years. Now that no one watches TV at home, that's not being used much, except when I watch Amazon Prime occasionally. But it's working as new. Passive sub is good enough for my small living room of 11x12.
 
Aren't the older hdmi based onkyo recievers supposed to be ticking time bombs because of hdmi board overheating? At least that's what happened to most people i know
 
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