Customer Reviews

Pioneer VSX-D812K A/V Receiver

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

 

 

I purchased this receiver used a couple months ago. So far it's done very well. In comparison to today's receivers this one doesn't have half of the 'bells and whistles,' but it does a great job with the basics.

I went with the Pioneer brand because the my 13 year old Pioneer Pro Logic receiver outlasted my 7 year old Kenwood DD/DTS receiver. The receiver sounds great with movies (in both DD and DTS) as well as music (in DD/DTS or just a stereo CD).

The best part about the receiver is the pre-outs for all 5.1 channels for separate amplifiers. I am currently running a powered sub and a separate 2-channel amp for the fronts and it sounds incredible.

The receiver is also expandable to 7.1 channels.

PROS:
Reliable!
5.1 channel pre-outs
Solid performance for movies and music (great DD/DTS processing!)

CONS:
No auto-setup feature (see VSX-d912 for that)
No learning remote

I currently have it set up in 5.1 mode (I have had it in 7.1 mode, but the other two speakers didn't sound as good and I took them out of the loop) running audio for my 3 computers, tv, and xbox360 and they all sound great. The sound quality is awesome at high and low volumes. It does a good job of decoding the position of the sound and sending it to the right speaker across both input methods (RCA and optical) I have tried. It has plenty of connections on the back - more than a lot of receivers in its price range. I have had it routing video for my 360 too and it seems to do a good job of that too.

Drawbacks:
No HDMI
only 2 optical-in ports
Sound quality is good enough that low bit-rate mp3s are going to sound watery
Doesn't bring me coffee in the morning.

I've owned this for >2 years now. Of late the receiver has started going into Amp Error mode and I believe this is because it is unable to deliver the high current the speakers demand for movie watching. One thing to note is I am using this in the 5.0 mode with no subwoofer and that may be one of the causes.
Otherwise, the sound is very clean, setup is very easy and intuitive, connectivity is abundant, features are easy to access, display is easy to read from a distance too, remote is well designed and it just works. I have not been able to find anyone with similar issues to mine for this particular model, but a net search shows other Pioneer models with a similar problem.

I'm going to skip the boring stuff like listing all of the inputs, long story short, 2 optical, 2 coaxial, 2 component, no HDMI. This shouldn't be your biggest concern anyway.

Real Brass tax: This has your standard blowout protection, so no concern there. The Sound quality is on par with anything once you set everything up. It is a 6.1 receiver that is expandable to 7.1 simulated surround. This isn't a big deal either since the first true 7.1 surround sound DVD was Step Up 3D, and there are currently only 30 movies that have true 7.1 signal. The real value is in the features below.

Super cool feature 1: this receiver has a full set of 6.1 pre-outs, so you can route your the speakers to amps, which of course will allow you to drive your speakers closer to their intended Wattage. This will also greatly increase the performance of the speakers that you choose to drive with the internal amplifier.

Super cool feature 2: I said 6.1 pre-outs, but the number 6 pre-out, can easily be reconfigured to act as another .1, so you can run 5.2 surround sound from this receiver (like I said, modern receivers are just starting to do some of this stuff, and you pay a lot of money for it). I use it to run a tactile transducer, and it's amazing.

Super cool feature 3: Most receivers are limited to setting a specific crossover frequency for your speakers to stop producing sounds, and your subwoofer to start (usually 80 hz). This means if your speaker is capable of 40hz it still won't produce the lower bass levels, anything less than 80 will exclusively go to the subwoofer. With this receiver, you take the sizes of your speakers (either small, or large) and input them, then this receiver will send low bass to all speakers capable of handling low frequencies. This means if you have a speaker with a Frequency Response of 40 hz, the speaker will get that signal, and produce the sound. this obviously requires precise tuning of the crossover, phase, and level of your subwoofer otherwise it won't sound very good)

I've had this for 7 years now since I was employed at Best Buy, and since then I've never seen anything like this receiver for under $1000. I would put this receiver up against anything made today with a price tag under $600 and a couple of things above, and I'm sure this would come out on top.

Best of luck!