Gahhh! My receiver has died! Please help me replace my Harman Kardon AVR-120!

December 5, 2006 4:47 PM

Do you know a good replacement receiver for a Harman Kardon AVR-120?

Gahhh! My receiver has died! Please help me replace my Harman Kardon AVR-120!

Aw dammit, my HK AVR-120 no longer feeds sound to the left front channel. Even after a full reset. Even with a different speaker. I've continuity checked everything. I opened it up and saw nothing obvious. If it were a visibly smoked chip or a popped cap, I could have fixed it. But whatever it was has left my left speaker silent, and it's (as far as the AVR is concerned) deadly.

Getting my wife to let me buy a new receiver will be an uphill battle already, but we'll need to replace this one. It will need to be at least as fully-featured as the AVR-120, and at least as well powered. I'm hoping (against hope) that in the five years that I've had this one, prices have come down a bit.

This one has (or rather had):

6 RCA vid inputs
6 Svid inputs
8 RCA Audio feeds
3 Digital Coax Audio feeds
3 Digital Optical Audio feeds
1 All of the above Out Feed

AM/FM Radio
Surround 5.1. Lots of Dolby crap. Tons of surround modes. The option to program which feed should go to which input is a must. For instance, I need to be able to program that Video 1 gets its sound from the Optical 3 feed.

I've really liked this receiver, so if there's a newer HK on the market that's a little more advanced than this one, but dirt cheap (last year's model, refurb, etc...), then that would be great. Please don't refer me to some fancy looking POS that won't sound great. Non-HK is OK! But no RCA, RadioShack, Thomson, Philco,...You get the idea. Do tell me if you own a particular model and love it, and why.

Wonky remotes are not a consideration, as I control everything with my Harmony remote.

Also, please do not try to help me troubleshoot this one. I'm sure, so let's move on.

Help us ObiMeFi, you're our only hope.

posted by SlyBevel to Shopping (20 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh, I forgot. Here's the Amazon link to the old one, for further specs if necessary.
posted by SlyBevel at 4:50 PM on December 5, 2006

Floor models are your friend. Go to your local home theater shop that's not a big box and see if any floor models from HK or Denon are on sale. You will get a great deal and, if you play your cards right, a full manufacturer's warranty. If there's no remote (as is often the case), you can get an even better deal.

FWIW, I love my Denon AVR 2804, but I've been drooling over the new 2807.
posted by infinitewindow at 5:13 PM on December 5, 2006

Also see NAD and Onkyo.
posted by four panels at 5:24 PM on December 5, 2006

I know you don't want to troubleshoot, but there is a service manual on eBay for $5. Are you handy with a solder iron and multimeter? I would try checking the output transistors, but it could be so many things. The service manual should be a big help. You are lucky to have one available. I am trying to repair an old PA amp to make a guitar amp out of it and I don't even have a schematic. That is a PIA. The service manual should tell you what to check for the most common ills.

If you want to replace it I suggest buying through Audiogon, especially used. Receivers typically last a long time. Here is a new NAD T-763 for $879, not too shabby. Here is a Rotel 1057, used, for $1300. It's a reputable place to shop, but look for sellers with at least a half dozen or more major transactions and who have been members for a year or more.
posted by caddis at 5:32 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Ok, here are the ones I'm looking at. I'm comparison shopping at Amazon. Odds are if I settle on one of them, I'll look around for a better price.

Choices:

Pioneer VSX-1016TXV-K $400

Harman Kardon AVR 245 $395

Yamaha HTR-5950SL $300

Onkyo TX-SR604S $380
posted by SlyBevel at 5:35 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: I'm not going to repair the HK. Not for now, anyway. As stated in the question, please do not help me further troubleshoot the HK.

And...I'm just about dead certain that the wife will let me spend no more than $400, if that. So I'm trying to find the best receiver within that range, as you can see above.
posted by SlyBevel at 5:37 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Sorry, Cadis, I didn't mean to be snarky. I'm just focused right now.
posted by SlyBevel at 6:02 PM on December 5, 2006

That Harmon Kardon unit looks nice, but you still get a better deal on used equipment, as long as you can find the features you want. I don't think though that you would be unhappy with the HK.
posted by caddis at 6:15 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Caddis, can you see any specific problems with the Pioneer above?

I'm looking at it closely because it does video upconversion, and the HK doesn't appear to.
posted by SlyBevel at 6:43 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Caddis, I poked around at Audiogon, but they only had 10 or so receivers for sale.

My requirements and price range are a little on the specific side, so I want to shop for specific models. At the same time, I'm ok with buying used.

Is there some other used market that I'm missing here? Other than Ebay?

Also, I'm now looking at this Onkyo TX-SR674. Thoughts?
posted by SlyBevel at 7:12 PM on December 5, 2006

Best answer: It's often not that expensive to fix these; if you have a local electronics repair shop, you can probably get a quote, though some shops will charge for the diagnostic time. Receivers will normally last a long time, so unlike a lot of consumer gear, repair is usually an option.

That said, if you're dead set on replacing it, Onkyo is a very good brand. (All the recommendations so far have been good, actually.) If you like the features of the 674, I think you'll be very happy with it. I see that it has Audyssey room correction, which is supposed to be very impressive. And it has listed power ratings down to 3 ohm speakers, so it should drive pretty much anything.

Looks outstanding to me. If you're sure you want a new one, that's a great choice.
posted by Malor at 7:26 PM on December 5, 2006

Best answer: I have some familiarity with HK, but not so much these other units, and as for video I am not the person to ask. The upconversion looks intriguing but I would audition the unit in question to see how much benefit that really provides. It can't add more resolution, just play the resolution you have as well as can be.
posted by caddis at 7:27 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Thanks, everyone, for the answers so far.

I'm heavily leaning toward this Pioneer, and I've just about got the wife convinced.

Any reason I shouldn't proceed with a purchase?
posted by SlyBevel at 7:45 PM on December 5, 2006

Best answer: It's my general understanding that the regular Pioneer analog receivers aren't that good. You want either Pioneer Elite (which are expensive but excellent) or their little XR-series digital ones. I'm not sure they have any 7.1 in the XR series, though. The XRs are supposedly outstanding, punching far outside their price class for power output and sound quality, despite being tiny and a bit flimsy.

The original Onkyo you were looking at is a little out of your price range, but it's likely to be quite a bit better than the Pioneer. Audyssey alone is probably worth the price difference.

What is it? It's a method of using a microphone and a series of test tones to measure the sound characteristics of your room. Room correction has been done for a few years now, but Audyssey has two major advantages: it apparently uses 'time domain' filtering, which improves sound quality (I don't understand why, but math heads over on avsforum seemed to agree that it was better), and also measures several different listening positions in the room and improves all of them. They had originally planned to try to average the measurements to make a 'least bad' approach, but they discovered that their algorithms simply worked better for all positions as you added more position data in. So, purely by accident, measuring six positions in the room is better for all six than measuring only one, as other systems do.

Basically, the extra $150 is likely to make a substantial difference in the quality of the sound you actually get. Room treatment is always better, but sound processing is a lot better than nothing.
posted by Malor at 8:03 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Damn, Malor, I can see that you're right. The Onkyo is the better choice.

But she's hung up on the price. Gonna have to deliberate for a while.
posted by SlyBevel at 8:24 PM on December 5, 2006

Best answer: I've had good luck with refurbs from the Onkyo USA Store. Decent prices and warranty, and the goods are pre-disastered.
posted by Opposite George at 10:29 PM on December 5, 2006

Response by poster: Thanks for the tip, OG.

The Onkyo store didn't have the 674, so I was out of luck.

I did buy the Onkyo 674 just now, based on lots of good reviews and a comprehensive feature list. And the unit seems to be pretty well future proofed for me for a couple of years at least. I hope.

Thanks to everyone for the help.
posted by SlyBevel at 10:41 PM on December 5, 2006

You should really enjoy that unit. I'm a little jealous; that's in the same league as the Onkyo 901 I have, perhaps better because of the room correction, and it cost a lot less. Damn the march of technology. :)

I'll try to check back a few times... do let us know what you think!
posted by Malor at 1:20 AM on December 6, 2006

(still checking :) )
posted by Malor at 7:16 AM on December 14, 2006

Response by poster: Very well, Malor, my review is here.
posted by SlyBevel at 9:14 PM on December 19, 2006