Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Receiver Question

I've recently undertaken the task of upgrading my setup from a 15 year old Toshiba CRT, an old pawn shop Carver receiver, and a pair of Infinity SM-120s (stop laughing please) to something a bit more modern. On the speaker front I selected Axioms and went with the M80s, QS8s, and VP150 which are currently on order ... I can hardly wait to receive them!

I thought I was fairly well-settled on my receiver choice as well but now I'm not so certain. I'd intended to pick up a Yamaha RX-V3800 but after seeing Alan's comment in another thread to the effect that Yamahas sometimes have problems driving the M80s I may need to rethink this decision.

I settled on the RX-V3800 primarily because I love the sound of Yamaha's midline and better gear, to my ears this is about the best sounding non-audiophile gear around. Secondly, but also important, my new display and BD player are both HDMI 1.3 and I'd like a receiver that's 1.3 compliant as well. Lastly the Yamaha will play digital music directly from a USB drive, while not mandatory I do have a bunch of that sort of thing that I resort to when I'm feeling too lazy to troll through the stacks looking for a particular disc so the feature is definitely a draw for me.

I see three distinct options:
1. Buy the 3800 and hope for the best.
2. Buy the 3800 and use my 20 year old Yamaha M-65 to drive the Axiom M-80s.
3. Scrap the Yamaha purchase and buy something else.

Comments? Ideas? I'd really appreciate a bit of input.

John, welcome. Any receiver/amplifier can be driven into shutting down if it's driven loud enough and long enough, but this problem shouldn't be assumed. The new 3800 would be an excellent choice for you and would share the substantial 4 ohm power capability that its predecessor, the 2700, had. Other receivers in roughly the same price class that could be considered would include the Denon 3608 and Onkyo 875.

If you really like the Yamaha sound (debatable to if there really is a distinct brand sound), then I’d say buy the 3800 and give it a whirl. Your mind is already telling you that you like the sound, so you should not be disappointed. If you get to cranking it up after a wild night of tequila shooters and AC/DC at a 100 dbs, pick up an amp.

Interesting read at AVSforum about
Why you don't need HDMI 1.3