Marantz SR 8012, 7012, 6012, 5012 & AV 7704 Owners thread

Do you have any suggestions on the external amp to get for this? I assume it doesn't have to be too high spec for surrounds.


I'd take note of the following thread:

The same suggestions made there would be applicable to your amp. The two main contenders would be the XTZ Edge A2-300 or Emotiva's A300 2ch power amp.
 
I bought my SR8012 a year ago to replace my old Pioneer SC-LX85 but have only just gotten round to installing it...long story!

Interesting, I'm looking to replace my 8 year old SC-LX85 with an SR7013.

However, like others have mentioned, I'm planning to combine the AV receiver with an integrated stereo amp.
I've a musical fidelity M6 500i to drive the fronts allowing the Marantz to handle the rest of a 5.1.4 set up.
I had planned on a Yamaha 3070 or 3080 but the Marantz seems better specced and slightly better value.
I listen to a fair amount of surround sound music, has anyone had experience of comparing the higher end Marantz and Yamaha AVRs?
 
Thinking of upgrading to 11 channel amp,I turn all my gear on using smart plug and Alexa,anyone tell me if the 8012 will power on from being totally switched off without having to turn on with power button?
Using Yamaha 3050 at present which does.
 
can anyone with marantz 8012 see if it powers on from just switching on the socket. thanks
 
You would need to get a Bluetooth device. I use wired from my Denon for headphones and both Marantz and Denon have good headphone ability. I use a 3m extension cable giving me a grand total of 6m with my Oppo PM1s. I use QED as they have a really robust set of connectors on them.


Thanks for the reply Gibbsy...I might have asked my question too soon. Justplugged in the HD600’s and sat back on the sofa and they reach! <blush>
Still would like to go wireless with the Bose 700 though so are you able to recommend a quality Bluetooth transmitter please?

I’ve seen the Sennheiser BT T100 and wondered if that would work? I realise the T100 supports aptX/HD and the Bose 700 do not (why not?) but I’m probably coming down in the side of convenience rather than ultimate sound quality these days.

I’ve also seen the Bose Soundlink but it looks like it’s main job is to receive BT streams rather than transmit them.

It’s about time manufacturers fitted BT transmitters in addition to receivers so we could stream both ways.

Mind you I’m not holding my breath as they still see fit to fit AM/FM radios instead of DAB when the cost of a DAB module is probably only pennies on a new build...

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
 
Also another question while I’m here...is it possible to get the OSD to display when playing 4K UHD discs?

I get the volume display and details when I press the Info button on my LG OLED when playing back from Sky and BD/3D etc. but when watching Aquaman 4K yesterday no sign of volume/info on the LG.

Is it possible I have to have up-convert or something similar turned on as knowing me I have most options turned off!

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
 
Both Denon and Marantz as well as Yamaha now include integral Blietooth transmitters onboard their new receivers. Yamaha have been including such transmitters on their receivers for several years now.

DAB is rubbish and will not give you superior audio. You may as well forget DAB and use a receiver's/AV amplifier's Network radio. This will give you as good if not better (higher bitrate) audio than you'd get via DAB.
 
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@GlynH I'm a pure analogue old fart when it comes to headphones. I don't have a scooby do about Bluetooth or wireless 'phones. I'm current sitting in a car showroom waiting for my car to it's service and getting funny looks with bleeding great wired Shures on my head from my PC.:)
 
Also another question while I’m here...is it possible to get the OSD to display when playing 4K UHD discs?

I get the volume display and details when I press the Info button on my LG OLED when playing back from Sky and BD/3D etc. but when watching Aquaman 4K yesterday no sign of volume/info on the LG.

Is it possible I have to have up-convert or something similar turned on as knowing me I have most options turned off!

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-


It depends upon the source and how the video is encoded.

snapshot001.jpg




Upscalling only applies to video of a lesser resolution. You'd be advised to turn it off anyway.
 
@GlynH I'm a pure analogue old fart when it comes to headphones. I don't have a scooby do about Bluetooth or wireless 'phones. I'm current sitting in a car showroom waiting for my car to it's service and getting funny looks with bleeding great wired Shures on my head from my PC.:)

funny-headphones.jpg



:thumbsup:
 
my humble experience with my Marantz 1609, low line :
-7+1 hdmi, 3 audio "line" level in +"phono" (turntable) the 1609 is the first to feature a "phono" plug.
Results are above what you get after usb conversion. I bought some new LP releases, wow!
Most impressive : old and new LP's, on an "ordinary" turntable : you feel like being in the studio...
Least impressive : "ordinary" audio from tv channels .."fudgy", but Marantz ain't in it.
Notes :
- I'm on PCM out from tv - much clearer voice.
- I'm on "dolby digital" mode from the "option" panel : it will set PCM stereo at its best, on every couple of speakers.
- if you want the like of the experience for free : just link the headphones plug to a second amplifier, you'll get a good experience of what I'm getting now on my system, with a notable improvement in volume, with no extra cost.
I wouldn't change it for a world, all the more so as it also picks anything from my computer (hdmi out, streaming ..) and upscales it finely (audio or/and video, streaming or files, K7 player included) ... I wish myself and others many happy returns of the Xmas gift!
Lots of other features I'm not attracted to, but they do exist (wi-fi, Atmos... )
By the way,, my version of atmos is two loudspeaker set above, on a shelf for the center channel, double and crossed, aimed at the ceiling for reverb : source of speech is barely detectable, except by cats!!)
 
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PCM and Dolby Digital are formats accessed from a source and not modes applied by an AV receiver. Dolby Digital would be decoded as PCM anyway. If outputting PCM from a TV, the TV would be down mixing multichannel audio encoding into just 2 channels of PCM data. The data itself is of no better quality than you'd have gotten had you bitstreamed the data in its original format.
 
Well, the proof lies in the listening .. there are so many people around that complain about not understanding speech as it comes out of a tv set, ..and resort to headphones.
I just thought to myself that there must be sth to look for there : the difference between the headphones plug and the sound system : headphones are just unadulterated stereo.
So, with a view to emulate the headphones sound, I just used the PCM out of my tv sat receiver, and it did the trick, making my headphones redundant as far as understanding talk is concerned.
Aside of disks (DVD, BR are perfect), I 'd much rather have my amp decode the pcm sound than let the tv set do it. The sound is definitely different, speech much more "intelligible", or "straightforward", as a friend put it.
How come they push to people buying sound bars? .. hearing aids? even substitles, if exist?
I'm afraid chain smoking is bad, so is chain sound processing, I only mean to share a free option that took me a long,unhappy time to put paid to.
 
No, the proof is in the fact that decoding a format onboard the source is no better than decoding it on the AV receiver. Your AV receiver would decode the formatted audio prior to the DAC and such decoding results in PCM data. Why on earth would a source decode the audio better than the AV receiver if both are using the exact same codecs to do that decoding?

Many people making claims of better audio due to letting a source do the decoding and outputting PCM simply do not understand what is actually happening. The exact same digital data is being conveyed. The only difference is how it is packaged during that conveyance. The PCM data is packaged within the formatted audio.

You do not decode PCM, it is data and is ordinarilly package in order to save memory and reduce bandwidth. THe PCM you are streaming from your TV is simply the result of the format the PCM data was encoded as being decoded. Your TV is very unlikely to be better at this than your AV receiver. There are instances were the PCM data aren't packaged or compressed, but due to the additional bandwidth associated with PCM data, there's sources are either limited or of a lesser quality than the compressed lossless alternatives.

There's also the fact that is wanting to accessing Atmos metadata then you'd have to bitstream the formatted audio the metadata is packaged with in order for a receiver to get it. There are exceptions to this with the Apple TV and the XBox that utilise Dolby MAT to strwam the metadata with multichannel PCM, but this isn't an option with most other sources including TVs.

Whether streaming formatted audio directly to an AV receiver or decoding it and then outputting PCM, neither would result in better dialogue or indeed improved centre channel performance. If in fact outputting PCM from either a TV or a SKY STB, the centre channel would be mixed down into the left and right channels because the TV and the STB haven't the ability to convey more than just 2 channels of PCM audio out to the AVR.
 
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@GlynH I'm a pure analogue old fart when it comes to headphones. I don't have a scooby do about Bluetooth or wireless 'phones. I'm current sitting in a car showroom waiting for my car to it's service and getting funny looks with bleeding great wired Shures on my head from my PC.:)

Ha yeah...I resemble that remark!

Still gutted that Apple dropped the headphone socket some time ago. Rendered my Shure SE846 with custom ear moulds obsolete overnight with my iPhones anyway. I hate using adaptors of any kind which probably harks back to my sound engineering days or more likely my OCD! :)

Thing is over the years I’ve sacrificed sound quality for convenience far too many times for comfort which is why I ended up with Bose QC35 and now the 700’s.

I see dante01 posted a picture of you in the car showroom? :)

-=Glyn=-
 
It depends upon the source and how the video is encoded.

View attachment 1241371



Upscalling only applies to video of a lesser resolution. You'd be advised to turn it off anyway.

Yeah as I said I have everything to do with processing turned off anyway.

Seems like it could be down to ‘some kind of HDR signals’ then which is not very helpful.

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
 
Both Denon and Marantz as well as Yamaha now include integral Blietooth transmitters onboard their new receivers. Yamaha have been including such transmitters on their receivers for several years now.

DAB is rubbish and will not give you superior audio. You may as well forget DAB and use a receiver's/AV amplifier's Network radio. This will give you as good if not better (higher bitrate) audio than you'd get via DAB.

Ah one generation too late for BT transmitter in my SR8012 then? Pity...it would have been a great solution for me.

Wasn’t particularly looking for superior audio. Just wondering whether to press my existing DAB antenna into service again! My point was more related to the many years that DAB radio has been around and yet manufacturers of even top-end receivers continued to fit FM modules instead of DAB during that period. Used to make me angry but in these last few years of streaming doesn’t bother me any more.

-=Glyn=-
 
Another SR8012 related question; as it doesn’t have tape loops any more (remember those?) how best to feed a stereo analogue signal into my Sonos Connect so whatever is playing on the Marantz in the living room can be squirted to any room in the house? For as long as Sonos allow me to do that on my recently demoted legacy device of course! :(

I’m guessing I could use either the Zone 2 or Zone 3 phono outputs?

Or would I be better advised to use the front left/right stereo pair dedicated for external amplification? Assuming this wouldn’t cut off the regular left/right stereo amplification I have connected to my main stereo pair of course?

I am also guessing these are all fixed output and a good match for the stereo analogue inputs on the Connect?

If I used Zone 2 for the Sonos Connect input then maybe I could use Zone 3 to drive a Bluetooth transmitter of some sort for the Bose 700’s?

Hmmm...thoughts?

-=Glyn=-

PS. Just a thought...if they are not fixed output as I assumed above then Zone 2/3 analogue output volumes might be driven by the volume knob on the SR8012 itself? If this is the case then is there any way to set these for a fixed output and adjust the volume on the destination itself instead of depending on juggling two volume controls? Just thinking out loud...
 
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PS. Just a thought...if they are not fixed output as I assumed above then Zone 2/3 analogue output volumes might be driven by the volume knob on the SR8012 itself? If this is the case then is there any way to set these for a fixed output and adjust the volume on the destination itself instead of depending on juggling two volume controls? Just thinking out loud...
They have to be routed to an amp so the assumption is that they are a fixed output. They will perform the same as the old tape loop out and will be safe with a headphone amp and such.
 
Just to answer my own question above and maybe help anyone else searching down this same road in future let me outline what worked for me.

I decided to use the Zone 2 analogue L/R phono outputs into the corresponding inputs on the (Legacy) Sonos Connect in the Living Room.

I had setup the Line-In some years ago and it still reflected the Pioneer SC-LX85 as the name of that particular line in so I renamed it.

I selected Line-In with the Sonos app for the Kitchen (Legacy) Play 5 as the input and selected the Marantz Living Room as the source.

I then used the HEOS app to select a track from Amazon HD and the app started to show the track playing. Went into the kitchen...no sound. Turned the Sonos volume to max...still no sound.

OK...back to the Marantz and figured out I need to have Zone 2 turned on! That might help.

Now I have sound in the kitchen. But...and there’s always a but...not only did I have volume control from the Sonos device & app but also in the HEOS app and the Marantz volume control from the front panel, remote control & Marantz app!

Much too much and after going into Settings/General/Zone 2 I was able to change from Variable and choose a fixed output setting (I settled on 75 to balance the Sonos volume with other sources) and figured I had it sorted.

After some more experimenting I found that as long as I left Zone 2 switched on then even with the Marantz SR8012 itself powered down in its usual standby mode I could still choose music through the HEOS app and play it through any of the 7 Sonos Zones around the house.

The only visible clue that Zone 2 was active is a small cluster of LEDS in the porthole that from a distance looked like it might spell Zone 2 but with closer inspection with a magnifying glass is really just a cluster of LEDS.

And of course I can choose any source for Zone 2 independent of the selected source playing in the Main Zone.

You know the more I dive into this Marantz the more I like it. Doesn’t sound too shabby either...:)

Think my next move will be to purchase a decent Bluetooth transmitter, connect that to Zone 3 and drive a pair of Bose 700 headphones.

My biggest concern is getting a decent BT transmitter. I’m looking at the Sennheiser BT-T100 currently as I don’t fancy one of the strangely-named Chinese devices but I see any mention of AAC?

Only wish Bose had equipped the 700 with aptX or aptX HD but then again I can’t have everything I suppose...

—=Glyn=-
 
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Both Denon and Marantz as well as Yamaha now include integral Blietooth transmitters onboard their new receivers. Yamaha have been including such transmitters on their receivers for several years now.

Dante...curious to know which Marantz amplifiers/processors/receivers in particular might have integral BT transmitters onboard?

Guessing only the very latest model(s) such as SR7013 maybe?

Maybe the SR8012/8055 replacements might have this feature in future?

Not that I need an excuse to buy another amplifier when the time comes of course...:)

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
 
Dante...curious to know which Marantz amplifiers/processors/receivers in particular might have integral BT transmitters onboard?

Guessing only the very latest model(s) such as SR7013 maybe?

Maybe the SR8012/8055 replacements might have this feature in future?

Not that I need an excuse to buy another amplifier when the time comes of course...:)

Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-


I'm sorry to say that I was mistaken when I assumed that the latest Marantz models included the same Bluetooth transmission abilities awarded to the most recent DEnon models. It would appear that this feature hasn't been awarded to the Marantz models depits the Marantz models being very similar to their comparative Denon models.

Whether or not this year's Marantz models get this ability is as yet unlnown?
 
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Looking at the manual for my SR7013 it seems that it can pair with a BT device to receive music for playback but no mention of transmitting to BT devices.
 
Hello! So I've just installed my SR8012 in place of a Sony STR-DN1080, and a couple of days later
swapped out my 4xsurround Canton CD10ii's for 4xArcam Muso's.
I noted that the Muso's are 4ohm speakers so I set up the amp as required on page 43 of the manual.
I used the Audyssey Editor App to calibrate the amp to my room and speakers, and set a cut-off of 200Hz for the profiling, as per the Schroeder frequency.
All speakers are set to 80Hz crossover, the LPF for LFE for the subs is 80Hz, and the subs themselves are set to 80Hz (on the subs) i.e. cascading crossovers.
Prior to adding the Muso's I could listen to the thunder in the Dolby Amaze Atmos Demo at any volume I wished and all was good.
The Canton crossovers were at 120Hz, as detected by the Audyssey app.
After swapping in the Muso's, at 85db the amplifier cuts out at the thunder scene.
Is this just too much for the amp? I was hoping it could cope..
I'll try playing with the crossovers to reduce the load on the amp, but I'm just trying to work out if I could possibly have a faulty amp, or it's just that my expectations are too high :-S
Any thoughts appreciated!
Cheers!

I just upped the crossover for the Muso's to 200Hz and it played fine.. hmm.. too much being asked of the amp?
(I've checked all of the connections etc just in case there was a stray wire somewhere).
 
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Hello! So I've just installed my SR8012 in place of a Sony STR-DN1080, and a couple of days later
swapped out my 4xsurround Canton CD10ii's for 4xArcam Muso's.
I noted that the Muso's are 4ohm speakers so I set up the amp as required on page 43 of the manual.
I used the Audyssey Editor App to calibrate the amp to my room and speakers, and set a cut-off of 200Hz for the profiling, as per the Schroeder frequency.
All speakers are set to 80Hz crossover, the LPF for LFE for the subs is 80Hz, and the subs themselves are set to 80Hz (on the subs) i.e. cascading crossovers.
Prior to adding the Muso's I could listen to the thunder in the Dolby Amaze Atmos Demo at any volume I wished and all was good.
The Canton crossovers were at 120Hz, as detected by the Audyssey app.
After swapping in the Muso's, at 85db the amplifier cuts out at the thunder scene.
Is this just too much for the amp? I was hoping it could cope..
I'll try playing with the crossovers to reduce the load on the amp, but I'm just trying to work out if I could possibly have a faulty amp, or it's just that my expectations are too high :-S
Any thoughts appreciated!
Cheers!

I just upped the crossover for the Muso's to 200Hz and it played fine.. hmm.. too much being asked of the amp?
(I've checked all of the connections etc just in case there was a stray wire somewhere).

You should leave the Impedance Setting at the 8 ohm Default. Setting it to 4 ohm reduces the amount of power available.

Also make sure the ECO Mode is Off or on Auto.
 
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