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Nowhere in the manual, or on Yamaha's web site, or in any of the professional or personal reviews is it stated the limitations of how these 7 Amplifiers may be used, or in what combinations. Turning on Zone 3 along with the Main Zone causes the two surround speakers in the Main Zone to turn off. Before contacting customer service the first time I actually thought the system capable of 7.1+2+2 simultaneously.The standard 800# customer service was no help with this, and referred me to a "level-2" customer service long-distance number where I spoke directly with an engineer. I normally do not respond to these types of forums simply because I don't usually have anything to add, although I have used them extensively in the past when doing research for purchases. When speaking to this person I was led to believe that he too was not aware of this limitation, and even he had to seek assistance from another engineer to answer my problem. But, keep in mind that I have no connections to the shared Surround Back/BiAmp connections. I am not familiar with the other manufactures' systems, but at least some of you may reconsider your purchase in light of the limitations I have discovered with Yamaha.
In my case, I have connected the Main Zone with a 5.1 speaker set, Zone 2 and Zone 3 each with stereo speakers. I know most of you will simply blow this off as being of little or no importance because the receiver has great sound and capabilities, but for those like me who wanted to use this receiver to spread music throughout multiple zones of the house, 3 in my case, this is a real disappointment, and, I believe, false and misleading advertising on the part of Yamaha. Well, that's 5 channels, so where is my 7-amplifier system. So, I believed that I should be able to have 5.1 surround sound playing in the Main Zone, and stereo sound in either Zone 2 or Zone 3 simultaneously. The explanation from customer service was that since SP2 connections share the Surround Left and Right amplifier the system shuts off the two surround speakers in order to play the two Zone 3 speakers.
With the recent purchase of the Yamaha RX-V3900 I felt compelled to inform those considering the purchase of this, or possibly any zone-capable Yamaha video receiver, of the false advertising and blatant misrepresentation of its capabilities.The 3900 is billed as having a "Built-in 7-channel power amplifier" available in combinations designated for the Main Zone, Zone 2 and Zone 3. The effect is basically a 3-channel system in the Main Zone, and 2-channels in Zone 3. In my case, turning on Zone 2 speakers along with the Main Zone does indeed yield 2-channel stereo in Zone 2 and 5.1 surround sound in the Main Zone. Having not seen any data to that effect my belief was that connecting speakers to Zone 2 and Zone 3 would allow either of these speaker sets to be turned on, along with the Main Zone, so long as no more than 7-channels were used at any one time. What actually occurs, however, is that the Zone 2 amplifiers, speaker set 1 connections (SP1), are shared with the Surround Back/BiAmp amplifier, and Zone 3 amplifiers, speaker set 2 connections (SP2), are shared with the Surround Left and Right amplifiers.
Otherwise, years down the road you will wish that you had done it.One thing that is not clear in the descriptions of this receiver is the XM and Sirius availability. It's only about $50, but they should make it clearer that you need to purchase this too.Overall this is a 5 star receiver. Other people have gone into all the great details on this receiver. When I finally decided to upgrade, I knew I wanted to go with a networked receiver that also had HD radio and XM/Sirius and at least 4 HDMI inputs for all my equipment. Think of it as an XM dock just like the iPod dock that you need to purchase. I also looked at the RXV-863 which is about half the price, but it didn't meet my needs. Once you're going to spend $1,200 on a receiver, you may as well spend the extra money and get this capability.
Then the Yamaha can play them. You actually need to buy a separate unit from XM or Sirius that plugs into the Yamaha.
To meet my needs, it meant spending $1,600. It comes with the capability to have XM and Sirius, but it is not built into the unit.
Overall I am very happy with it and have no problems. Even Store salesmen didn't understand it.
Because it's so expensive, I only gave it 4 stars. I figure this should stay current for many years to come.
I also considered the RXV-1900, but you lose the networked capability.
After speaking to Yamaha and also emailing them (painful in itself) they just say its not their problem and want to get off the phone. After speaking to Motorola tech support they say that their box queries the TV to see what the maximum resolution it can do is. If it does not get a response or gets something it doesn't understand it defaults down to 480p to make sure the person at least gets a picture. As others have mentioned this is a very good receiver and I could have given 5 stars except for one major problem. Buy this unit if you don't plan to connect all your video with hdmi or you will be disappointed. Very annoying. Every time my Samsung plasma TV and Yamaha rx-v3900 receiver are power cycled the Comcast Motorola set top box changes itself back down to 480p and I have to manually change it back to 1080i. When the TV is directly connected to the Motorola, also with HDMI the problem goes away.
I actually use the HDMI -> HDMI up-conversion, as for non-1080p sources I believe this improves the overall picture quality. Also, this is not an issue when using my Sony RPTV. However, since I upgraded from the Yamaha 1800 receiver to this unit, some folks might find my thoughts interesting.High points:- Overall sound is excellent, as well as very flexible.
This was briefly mentioned in another review. Annoying to say the least, however I'm hoping that a future Firmware update for the Yamaha might fix this. This only happens with my FIOS unit; my DVD and BluRay players do not have this problem.
I'll keep this review short, as the other reviewers have covered a lot of ground here. Every time I toggle between my two displays I have to change this setting.- Whenever I switch my FIOS DVR to my Panasonic 2000, the DVR output is down-rezed to 480p. (BTW: I tried every video option on the 3900 including using the THROUGH option for HDMI -> HDMI output; the problem remains)Overall, I'm still happy I bought the 3900, however I cannot give it a 100% recommendation until this HDMI handshaking issue is resolved)
A slight upgrade from the 1800- Video processing is top notch. A MAJOR upgrade from the 1800- Ergonomics are very good, and the on-screen GUI that works with the HDMI output is a BIG plus from the 1800, which did not support this.Low points:- For my two video displays (Sony HD RPTV and Panasonic 2000 video projector) you cannot use the simultaneous output of HDMI1 and HDMI2.
My 7-year-old was able to dial up his Backugan videos after 30 seconds working with the GUI and my iPod classic video plugged into the DOCK.The HD radio stations tune in quickly and sound great. The web interface is simple yet powerful. The HDMI GUI is robust and intuitive while the remote is laid out logically and leaves the heavy lifting to the GUI.
Well, considered me WAY wooed. The setup was easy with the manual a perfect blend of "why" and "how-to". I nursed my 10 year-old Yamaha AVR into her golden years waiting until the right features and network integration could woo me into spending the big bucks to move into the new century.
It had just the right of information to get things started and a clear path to enable more features when I'm ready. I have yet to put the unit through serious video switching, but I'll make an additional report should I find it lacking. A search for a decent HD radio started me on my upgrade path and before I knew it I was ready to put down $1,700 for the RX-V3900.
Satisfied with my pervious Yamaha gear and seeing it had solid reviews in every source I checked, I didn't spend a great deal of time doing a feature by feature comparison to alternatives.
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