NAD T758 V3 AVR Receiver Owner's Thread

[gilron]

Well I sold my T753 and now looking at the T758V3 but also looking at the Anthem MRX720. I am going to a simple 5.1 for home theater but in another part of rec room i will be setting up a second zone for music. I currently have a Node 2i in another part of the house so the BlueOS is already familiar. So i would like the system to play music all across the channels so i can enjoy throughout the full rec-room. only on Zone 2 for some light background music or of course having the main 5 channels being used for the theater. Anyone want to throw in their 2 cents?

 

[Sonnie Parker]

While I have always admired Anthem... owned their processor and amp in the past... I don't believe ARC can compete with Dirac Live. However, the ARC software for my Expression 13A speakers did a very good job on those back when I had them. This was the two main speakers only and limited to 500Hz, not the full system and not full range.

 

[bkeeler10]

Well I was looking at the MRX720 myself a year ago. I am still quite interested in trying that out at some point. However, the combination of price and Dirac Live won me over to the T758. I'm quite happy with it, although Anthem's ARC still intrigues me. It seems the prevailing wisdom is that Dirac is the best reasonably-priced room correction software currently on offer, but I have not heard a system with ARC so I will be reserving personal judgement.

I do think the primary things to consider when choosing an AVR are 1) Does it have the features I need (connectivity, output channels for example); and 2) Does it have the room EQ software I prefer or think I will prefer. I'm not going to go so far as to say AVRs are indistinguishable from a sound quality perspective (without EQ applied), but I do think the sound of any decently designed AVR will be dominated by the room EQ it uses and the proper application of that room EQ.

 

[Sonnie Parker]

I do think the sound of any decently designed AVR will be dominated by the room EQ it uses and the proper application of that room EQ.

I think you nit the nail on the head with that summation. I am left scratching my head at how any system can really sound as good as it could sound when it doesn't have a good auto-EQ/processing system. Don't get me wrong... I've heard countless systems that sounded good... a source, an amp and speakers... but I also wondered how much better they might have sounded with Dirac Live in the loop. So it sounds very good as it is ... but could it sound even better? Several speakers we've had in my room sounded really good... I could definitely live with them (had I never heard Dirac Live)... but when I switched DL on... and compared back and forth, it was clearly evident that I preferred the sound with DL engaged.

The T758 is the first AVR I have owned with DL built-in. I've always used the miniDSP DDRC-88A previously. While NAD is no doubt a very good company and they make excellent products... DL is now what I believe makes the T758 worth owning.

 

[Flak]