ONKYO HT-S770 6.1-Channel Home Theater System Silver

Rating:
Summary: I did not expect this!!.
Review: After a long research, I bought this system with a great expectation. My previous home theater (Panasonic SC-HT05) was only 600 Watts.
This system has enough power to fill a BIG room. It did very well with movies; the six speakers works great and give you a real theater feeling. When I tried some music CDs the sound was muddy and there was no punching effect. I expected more from this big speaker but was very disappointed. I tried different bass/treble settings, tried to adjust the speaker/subwoofer sounds and nothing helped.
If you are like me buying this system for music and movies, be aware of this. Returning this system will cost you lots of money!!.

Rating:
Summary: The Best Value In This Price Range
Review: It has been a long and arduous journey for me to find a home theater system that meets two simple expectations. When I finally found this system it not only met those simple expectations, it blew them away.

This is the third system that I have purchased, the others (a Sony and a Kenwood) weren't passing muster. My first expectation is that the sound system should work, and the Kenwood failed here when its Subwoofer stopped working in a literal cloud of smoke. My second expectation is that it should sound good, and this is where the Sony failed.

This Onkyo system sounds so much better than those other models in the $300 to $350 price range that I would gladly pay twice that after having to set-up and return two systems. The package was delivered by freight (for Free by Crutchfield, whom I also recommend) and it is a large, heavy box. The receiver has some real heft to it, and appears to be very well made. The speakers are much larger than the standard fare with home theater systems right now, and you will be glad they are once you hear them. There are six speakers in total, including three surround. The subwoofer has a powerful ten inch driver that will really add reinforcement to action movies and good soundtracks. There are 1000 watts in total going to all seven speakers.

This is a setup that is better suited for a larger room, mine is about 15' by 30'. It would probably overpower a room that wasn't big enough. The system itself is a little complicated to figure out but has many features. There is a built in crossover for the subwoofer that can be set from 80-150Hz, and the volume can be adjusted for each speaker. Make sure you have an optical cable from to connect the DVD player to it to fully take advantage of 6.1 surround.

One of the most important aspects of a system is having a well designed remote control. The remote control for this unit is a little large, but the buttons are spread out and illuminated for ease of use, although I haven't yet figured out what they all do.

This system also has the ability to play a stereo signal through all of its speakers, something the Sony and Kenwood systems couldn't do. The Onkyo will also take a 5.1 signal and convert it to a 6.1 signal by blending the left/right rear signals together into a rear center signal.

There is also a "Late Night" feature that will make quiet noises louder and the loud noises softer so that you can listen to a movie quietly and still hear everything, among other features that I haven't yet gotten around to discovering.

Be warned, this system isn't the easiest to set up or to operate, but the results can't be denied. It works. It sounds good. Buy it.

Rating:
Summary: best in its price range...
Review: Onkyo has long been making easily the best home theatre in a box systems below five hundred dollars...easily blows away the Sonys, Panasonics, and ESPECIALLY the hideously overpriced Bose systems.

Just remember a couple of things:

1. You get what you pay for. This system is great for movies, but not great for music, which is much more demanding of better speakers. Well what do you expect for this price?

2. The speakers are NOT satellites. They'll produce far better sound than those ridiculous little Bose satellites or the tiny tall skinny Panasonic towers, but that's because they are in REAL speaker sizes. Not as huge as really good audiophile grade speakers, but not tiny little cubes either. Hey, it's simple physics.

3. Onkyo is famous for its ease of use and solid build quality, which makes this an ideal entry-level mass-market setup in terms of quality-to-value raio.

Personally I think you could do better buying a separate receiver and a separate speaker system, for a couple hundred dollars more. Or you could actually stay within the same price range if you buy a refurbished receiver, for instance go to ecost dot com and look at their Onkyo 502 for under two hundred dollars then buy the Yamaha NS-P436 Digital HomeTheater Speaker Package from plasma bay dot com for two hundred fifty dollars.