HDTV:

SONY STR-DB795

If you’re in the market for a budget home cinema receiver, this is a belting first-time buy. It offers a level of performance typical of products twice its price, delivering lightning-fast steering allied to all-enveloping surround sound. There’s also plenty of power on tap, and it never loses grip however hard you crank the volume. The balance here thankfully lacks the hard edge some manufacturers equate with home cinema excitement – this Sony’s sweet, open and involving.

Ideal for: A first-time buyer building a proper separates home cinema system from scratch.

MARANTZ SR4500

The Marantz is as capable with music soundtracks as with films, and comes with the full panoply of extended surround modes. In action it never shows any signs of stress or strain right up to the “pin you to the wall” levels, and manages to combine smooth warmth with the clarity needed to bring out all the detail of ambience and dialogue. Spin a CD or SA-CD and the Marantz has a clarity and natural sense of weight and power that eludes many other AV products.

Ideal for: Anyone who takes their surround sound music as seriously as their DVD movies.

DENON AVR-2105

Every year seems to bring receivers offering more for less money, and with the arrival of the AVR-2105 Denon has built on the value offered by its budget AVR-1705. This model has all you could need to handle all the current “extended surround” formats, backed up with high quality internal processing and plenty of power to ensure those big action movies are suitably gutsy and room-shaking. This as another Denon product offering excellent value for money.

Ideal for: Extended surround sound and bags of power for extremely sensible money.

SONY STR-DB900

The slimline receiver uses hi-tech digital technology derived from Sony’s flagship TA-DA9000ES amp, which uses up less space, develops less heat and delivers more power to the speakers. The result is surprising power and scale, backed up by amazing speed and precision. The real beauty of the Sony is the clarity with which it delivers DVD soundtracks: the onboard processing works exceptionally well, creating a lean, tight, muscular sound – it’s a winner.

Ideal for: Anyone who only has space for a slimline receiver, but still wants plenty of power.

HARMAN KARDON AVR430

We love the Harman’s understated looks and subtle blue display, but there’s far more to this receiver than just a sexy suit. It swaps the big, bold and aggressive sound of many American amps for a refined yet powerful presentation that serves movie action very well, makes actors’ voices clear and involving, and gives a fine feeling of ambience and atmosphere. What’s more it does a good job with music too, whether in straight stereo or pseudo-surround in Logic 7.

Ideal for: Fans of the Harman Kardon sound who can’t quite run to the pricier AVR630.

ARCAM DIVA AVR250

At first glance the Arcam looks just like an AVR300 with a bit less power and a few less sockets, but what you actually get – along with the ₤300 you can keep in your pocket – is a very fine receiver that’s as at home crashing out big action movies as it with music, be it multichannel or stereo. With 7x75W on tap it’s never short of power, and there’s a comprehensive range of processing options. This is a fine all-round buy, and an even greater bargain than big brother.

Ideal for: Anyone wanting a fine-sounding receiver for both movies and music.

DENON AVR-3805

Here we have a unit designed to deliver the thrills as well as the subtleties in surround effects. The styling is intelligent, with minimal controls on the fascia, it delivers a healthy 120W per channel into real world speaker loads, and it has both automatic set-up and the latest surround processing modes. And, as if all that wasn’t enough, it comes with the coolest remote handset known to man – it’s a slick, electroluminescent device.

Ideal for: If you simply must have the hippest remote on the planet, this receiver has it.

MARANTZ SR8500

You could be forgiven for thinking the SR8500 is just the same as the other receivers in the Marantz range, but with a few extra tweaks. While the style is very similar, and the family resemblance strong, the combination of DVI switching, a homegrown room acoustic calibration and set-up procedure, and very Marantz tuning to ensure musical ability means this stylish piece of competitively-priced kit is not your average Marantz receiver.

Ideal for: Anyone wanting a fine-sounding AV receiver able to play music superbly, too.

ROTEL RSX 1056

The Rotel is one of the more expensive receivers in the class, and with a power amp added to bring it up to 7.1 operation, it will cost ₤1550 – but the extra money is well spent. The Rotel communicates surround soundtracks superbly, catching you unawares with exciting effects. When you hook up a high quality multichannel audio or CD source, the receiver provides an impressively crisp, clean sound. As we said when we tested it, this Rotel is a little bit special.

Ideal for: Those who are more concerned about sound quality than the number of channels.

HARMAN KARDON AVR 8500

As a weight totaling 25kg hints (that’s right, 5kg for each one of its five channels), the AVR 8500 has generously specified high-current amplification stages. This gives enormous reserves to cope with virtually any load, and the ability to produce prodigious levels of oomph. For extended-surround use you’ll need to utilize the preouts to supply another amp (the PA4000 is ₤700) – then you can run the system in full seven-speaker THX Surround EX mode.

Ideal for: Action movie fans who love those car chase and gunfight scenes to be really loud.

SONY TA-DA9000ES

The 9000ES is Sony’s largest and most ambitious application of its S-Master digital amplifier technology. Digital signals are handled directly by digital processing and amplification, and stay digital right through to the output devices. Analogue inputs are handled by analogue to DSD conversion and then passed through the amp. This sound is incredibly smooth and clear; dialogue is crisp and clean, and there’s plenty of welly for the thundering battle scenes.

Ideal for: Those seeking state-of-he-art digital amplification for DVD and SACD.

YAMAHA DSP-Z9

Occasionally, a product comes along that redefines its genre. Yamaha’s DSP-Z9 AV receiver is one of them. It’s packed with top-grade sound processing and decoding technology, and can drive up to nine speakers. What makes the Yamaha a groundbreaker, however, is its onboard video processing circuitry, in the form of a Faroudja DCDi. This enables it to enhance pictures from TV, games consoles and VCRs.

Ideal for: Anyone wanting to take extended surround sound to the max with nine speakers.

DENON AVC-A1XV

The Behemoth, as Denon likes to call its flagship multichannel amp, is just that: a mighty 44kg hulk, standing 28cm high and 50cm deep. Inside, it has ten channels of power, each rated at a truly monstrous 170W. If that wasn’t enough, it’s also one of the first amps to include HDMI, DVI-D video switching and room correction software. So it’s a technical marvel, but how does the A1XV sound? In a word – incredible, generating astonishing sounds with crushing ease.

Ideal for: Power fiends who want the biggest, most flexible one-box amplifier money can buy.