Got bored pretty quickly of using my "newly" acquired Cambridge audio am1 mk3 instead of the horrific Tv speakers and happened to see the Yamaha YHT 196 kit in a Richer Sounds leaflet. Looked online for reviews which seemed mostly favourable so took a trip in on Saturday for a look/listen.
Didn't have any that I could Demo in store for whatever reason, but offered it on sale or return and I had a listen to some Receivers at roundabout the same price as the Yamaha receiver and 5.1 setup. One of these was the Sony STRDH820 the other the £170ish Onkyo. Thought these both sounded pretty decent for the cash but if I was to buy one it would be the Sony, obviously it's hard to tell in shop what it'll sound like at home but at least both were tried in the same environment.
Decided to take the Yamaha package and see what it was like at home. Very pleased with it - sounds better than the receivers at the price of the whole Yamaha 5.1 package despite being a cut down version of one of their other models, that's with a pair of diamond 9.0's as the front two but hardly expensive all the same. Only has a passive sub but that's probably for the best as I'm in a flat, stuck it on some Granite with Polystyrene underneath for now to hopefully avoid annoying the neighbours.
I have since found out that my Sky box doesn't seem to play ball with DD over HDMI so need to get a couple of optical cables which isn't ideal but the xbox sounds great both in terms of Games and DVD's - I know it's not the same experience you'd get with a BR player but sounds much better all the same.
Overall it seems to be a cracking little setup for the money and one I would definately reccommend to anyone looking for a budget or first setup. I've no doubt that if I was to spend £7/800 I could put together a system that would blow the Yamaha away, but at say £400 I'm not sure that would be possible (buying new anyway)
Didn't have any that I could Demo in store for whatever reason, but offered it on sale or return and I had a listen to some Receivers at roundabout the same price as the Yamaha receiver and 5.1 setup. One of these was the Sony STRDH820 the other the £170ish Onkyo. Thought these both sounded pretty decent for the cash but if I was to buy one it would be the Sony, obviously it's hard to tell in shop what it'll sound like at home but at least both were tried in the same environment.
Decided to take the Yamaha package and see what it was like at home. Very pleased with it - sounds better than the receivers at the price of the whole Yamaha 5.1 package despite being a cut down version of one of their other models, that's with a pair of diamond 9.0's as the front two but hardly expensive all the same. Only has a passive sub but that's probably for the best as I'm in a flat, stuck it on some Granite with Polystyrene underneath for now to hopefully avoid annoying the neighbours.
I have since found out that my Sky box doesn't seem to play ball with DD over HDMI so need to get a couple of optical cables which isn't ideal but the xbox sounds great both in terms of Games and DVD's - I know it's not the same experience you'd get with a BR player but sounds much better all the same.
Overall it seems to be a cracking little setup for the money and one I would definately reccommend to anyone looking for a budget or first setup. I've no doubt that if I was to spend £7/800 I could put together a system that would blow the Yamaha away, but at say £400 I'm not sure that would be possible (buying new anyway)
