Customer Reviews

Black 780-Watt 5.1 Channel AV Surround Home Theater

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I purchased the HT-SP904 as part of a recent home theater upgrade. Overall the sound is excellent and the upscaling DVD player is a nice addition, but I really wish the HDMI was not limited to passthrough. Basically, any HDMI device plugged in to the receiver will need an alternate audio connection for full surround output. This is very strange considering the HDMI out passes the sound to the TV without issue. Why they couldn't they pass the sound to the receiver and surround speakers is beyond me. Despite this issue, the system is fairly easy to set up and work with. I'd recommend it for anyone looking for a mid-range system as a new addition to their AV setup.

I am probably violating Amazon policy here because I actually bought mine on sale at Circuit City a couple of weeks ago. Sorry Amazon. So far I am very happy with the receiver, the dvd player, and the speaker system. It is a very classy looking system and it all connects up well together. I am running it on a Charter cable box (Motorola) and a Samsung 46" LCD tv (which I did buy from Amazon). My only complaint so far is that the HDMI pass-through only works on the video side of things. In the fine print Onkyo does say that you have to have a separate digital coax or optical audio cable to connect to the receiver to get the surround sound out. Completely amazing to me that Onkyo engineers have not figured out how to pull the audio signal out of the HDMI cable and use it. What a pain and extra cables. Also, when I tried to use the HDMI pass through connections on the receiver, my cable box would freeze up anytime that I shut off the receiver. Almost like when the receiver is shut off, there is no bit-dumping to handle the data that probably keeps flowing from the cable box. Poor design on either Onkyo's or Motorola's (cable box/dvr) behalf. I have not determined who is at fault. Since I have 4 HDMI inputs on the tv I just connected the cable box and the dvd directly to the tv via HDMI, and used digital coax cables for the audio. The sound is excellent though and the subwoofer certainly handles the job. My girlfriend has yet to try out the ipod docking station. I am disappointed though that Onkyo did not include an AUX port to connect a simple MP3 player. Another feature left out that makes no sense.

I bought this system about a year ago. It still works great with no problems. The sound clarity is awesome. The features are great, you can individually adjust the frequency of each speaker. It goes very loud with minimal distortion. The sub woofer sounds good but it could be better. I like major rumble when I watch movies sometimes during a movie I have to get up to turn the sub woofer down during an action scene because of the distortion and the fact it is walking across my hardwood floor. Overall I am very satisfied with the unit compared to the Sony I had before that cost about the same. The dvd play is great and plays anything you put in it. One weird thing is that when you push the power button on the dvd player it takes about 10 seconds to come on. My only recommendation for this system would be to upgrade the sub woofer if you want extreme out of the ordinary bass.

I had this system for about 6 months and it sounds great! The 5.1 sound fills the room and the bass pounds. Especially when hooked to a Blue Ray/PS3. The only disappoint I had or didn't realize; when using the HDMI IN 1/2 into the receiver was only being used as a pass-through to the HDMI out. Meaning if you wanted the digital audio from HDMI input to play in the home theater, you also need to hook up the digital audio cable as well (optical or coaxial). See page 28 of the manual which can be downloaded from Onkyo's website to get more info. I guess most home theaters in a box are like this.

I purchased my Onkyo HT-SP904 directly through Onkyo a few weeks before christmas . It was a refueb Unit that came with the same warranty as the new item but much much lower. I paid $349 total shipped to my door. The system installed easily and sounds awesome . I would recommend the system to anyone considering it !