The Apex Club

Sorry greedy, only reason I asked was your question on the low frequency issue of the Pioneer was interesting! Oh yes, the Marantz AV8801 processor looks promising. I have fond memories of Marantz wonderful musicality.

Way too little info about it online as of yet though apart from XT32 of course.  

XT32 will outperform the XT Pro kit. Ricky you are right to wait for a receiver with XT32 and then consider XT32 Pro kit. 

Guys, been enjoying my APEX setup now for just over a year and a half, and I'm still extremely impressed by it. I made my purchase after reading/researching for a decent AV setup to blow my cash on. I came across this thread in Feb '11, and after the great advise from the original founders and member's (you know who you are) I took decision on the APEX/Yamaha system. It is the only AV kit I have ever owed, and the best I've heard in its class. So 1.5 years on I am still a keen follower of the forum, and catch up with it every now and then. I'm now looking more great advice from you guys. Since taking the plunge into 5.1 I'm no longer interested in stereo, but I still want fantastic CD playback. I'm looking for advise on wether or not it is worth my while upgrading my bluray to oppo, in doing so getting good bluray and good CD playback, or spending the same amount of money on an award winning CD player. My goal is fantastic CD playback in multi channel. Your advice is greatly appreciated Cheers, cowboy

Hi Holywoodcowboy - great choice of receiver and speakers you have there

I also much prefer CD/Music in 5.1 surround now too. My comments below don't directly address your request but hope adds some context to consider.

As you can see from my signature I have an Oppo which even as the 'older' 83 model plays CD's very well - the reveiws now rave about the current 95 DAC enabled model for it's sound quality.

I considered whether to upgrade my Oppo 83 to the 95, but having looked at the Wolfson DAC's already onboard the Yamaha RX V3067 wondered whether there was much benefit to that upgrade, so felt I would use the receivers DAC's for multichannel sound as that was what they were set up to deliver. I think the sound delivered is excellent by the way - so thoroughly recommend the Oppo/Yamaha/Apex combo. Given I'm only using the Oppo's CD as 'transport' I don't know if that's better than what you have already.

Never been in a position to test how much the new Oppo 95 (or such like) or a high spec dedicated CD player for that matter would have improved the sound quality through the Yamaha/Apex.

I decided on spending my money on the Vortexbox Appliance 2 TB instead which is another direction to go (great sound quality) and another story....

Hope the context is of help.

I was in a similar position about a week ago. I took home the CA 751 and from the first track (which was from a nickleback album) i was seriously taken back. Never before had i heard so much detail, attack & seperation in that album. Every chance i get i'm putting cd's in to the 751bd to have a listen. 

Cheers for the info guys. The oppo and CA 751 seem like great solutions to an all in one player. I take it then that I let the multi channel dacs on the Yamaha handle the sound from either of these machines over HDMI? Can't wait to here the APEX sing with decent CD play back. Have had friends in to watch movies, and they have been truely blown away by the APEX/Yamaha set up. Had a look at the Vorta kit, looks very interesting indeed! Maybe something for a future purchase Cheers, cowboy

Thats one way. Personally, i use the dedicated 2 channel analogue outs and set everything to pure direct, sounds very nice indeed. 

I purchased the apex based on reviews and comments from this thread and to be honest i wasn't all that impressed for the first couple of seek, almost sent it back to the supplier. It wasn't until recently that started to really hear the apex. Maybe it just needed a lenghty warming up :-D 

Love my setup now for both music and movies. 

hi all,

Another Apex member signing in 2 weeks ago I got my new reciever and speakers installed and set up. The total went over budget but I haven't regret it for a moment. It's such a great set! The clearness, detail and punch.. I love it! Such a well balanced soundscape, even with the 'lower class' reciever (saving for an upgrade there in a couple of years).

Pictures will follow when the wiring is properly done. 

Guys, when listening to CD's in 5.1 what decoding mode do you use - there's so many and they all sound different! I decided to buy a second-hand Cyrus CD7Q (upgraded Q DACS) to play my CD's but still find 2channel stereo sounds better than any of the 5.1 modes - am I missing something? What's the difference between 7channel stereo and the neo 6 surround modes?

I'm using 'Multichannel Stereo' on my Denon. Regular 2-channel simply sounds dull in my case. I want the music to fill the entire room. I have tweaked the mode so the centerchannel is silent. Basically stereo in the front and stereo in the back. It does the trick quite well without sounding gimmicky or overblown. I'm sure your Yamaha must have the ability to tweak it's 7channel stereo mode to your liking aswell. The whole idea with a mode like this is to find balance. But if plain old 2-channel sounds good for you then why bother? It is the more accurate route to go, after all, and what most people seem to prefer.

The difference between DTS Neo 6 Music and a 'Multichannel Stereo' mode is that the latter simply sends the same stereo signal more-or-less untouched to all connected speakers (duplicating the signal), while the former is a sort of psuedo-surround mode that extracts cues and ambience in the recorded music and places them in the appropriate speakers to create an effect. If it sounds natural or not only you can decide. I think the end result varies alot between material. 

In my opinion , for good stereo listening floorstanders are needed ( or  higher end standmounters).Apex are to small to produce good stereo from only 2 speakers.Most receivers cross Apex to 80hz, so must play subwoofer for good bass weight.Two Apex speaker alone are to weak sounding for me.So i always use MULTICHANNEL STEREO mode with my Denon, when all channels are playing with subwoofer- there is another league....TRy it AC/DC "Higway to hell"

Ricky> i'm very happy with my avr-4311 - this is a beast.I think i'll get Audyssey Pro for Christmas

I have never listened in stereo. For the last 20 years I only use surround. My favourite was Logic7 through my Lexicon DC2. I have found that if you calibrate a system properly it really does work. I now use PL2 music with my Anthem which I know isn't for everyone. This is why I run sub sat as music works better in surround this way IMO. I have listened to stupidly priced stereo set ups costing £50k+ but doesn't satisfy me. I listened to a pair of KEF Blades with Bryston amplification yesterday and it did sound amazing but it needed surround channels IMO. Different horses for courses. 

I feel that the Apex make an excellent pair of stereo speakers but you do have to run the sub as well. 

These are just my views and I know im in the minority re surround music but I love it and don't care ha ha!!!!

ditto to ric71's comments on surround music sub/sat style

Glad you are enjoying your Denon, greedy!

It's funny, but yesterday before I read your post I spent all day reading up on Audyssey Pro and it looks very promising. According to user feedback it seems to extract that extra amount of performance from the EQ-system. It's more of a hassle maybe since you have to include a PC in the calibration process but because of that there is more processing power on tap. Also, Audyssey Pro is more flexible than the standard system if you want to tweak things.

Also, I assumed that with 32 measuring points at your disposal the system would best work for those with a very large room, but I read several users who have small rooms (much like my own) and "only" executed 12-14 measurements with Pro and got fantastic improvements.

Can't wait to hear your findings after Christmas! 

I'd love to know if the performance of Apex elevate!

Thanks for that RickyDeg, I'll try multi-channel again and turn off the centre channel and see how it sounds. I think it was the centre channel that was obscuring the stereo imaging which is what I didn't like about the multi-channel mode so by doing what you've done it should sort out the imaging problem!