AV Receiver Reviews

Great review, Mark, thanks!

Your review reflects my experience with the VSX-1021-K (so far--I've had it for about a month-and-a-half) in all respects save one: the availability of AirPlay out of the box. I was pleasantly surprised--shocked, really--that I had to do nothing but plug the ethernet cable into the 1021 to get AirPlay to work. Once I turned it on, it just showed up as an available device in iTunes and my iOS devices (an iPad and two iPhones). "It just worked", as the folks at Apple like to say. My household is exclusively Mac, and you were using a PC, I gather. Also, my wireless router is an AirPort Extreme. Perhaps that could be the difference?

Thanks again for the review!

Good review, though weighted on the side of gee-whiz features and a little light on accuracy of sound and quality of video reproduction, but I saw a confusing section which I'd like elaboration on. The reviewer stated that he listened to a classical multichannel SACD through the Pioneer.

Now, it's possible that Sony has changed their licensing requirements for SACD, but I clearly remember needing analog multichannel audio inputs on my AV receiver (which the Pioneer lacks) to play SACDs because SACD content wouldn't play over digital cabling. Sony demanded this analog-only cable spec to avoid content piracy with their proprietary format. If that's unchanged, I don't know how Mark could have listened to anything other than stereo reproduction from his SACD player.

It'd be great if there was an editorial response on this issue, and thanks!