Fish, as promised by Peter and Ken, here comes your spanking. You've bought an excellent receiver, but neither it nor the Pioneer nor any other properly designed receiver are either "bright" or "warm". Depending on what the difference in the listening conditions may have been the sound could have been different in the two situations, but it had nothing to do with the basic qualities of the two receivers; both are transparent with a ruler-flat frequency response. Also, you'd better not tell an "audiophile" about what you heard; many audiophiles suffer from the delusion that Yamahas are "bright" and Pioneer Elites are "warm". You would likely be derided and be told that you've got things bass ackwards.
