About a month ago, Yamaha announced a few new receivers to rejuvenate your aging sound system. In this economy, it's hard to always stay current with the latest technology. However, Yamaha seemed to be making things a little less painful, with five options ranging from $250 to $650.
Even better, the units are now shipping and at even sweeter street pricing. Amazon.com has photos, specs and ordering info about all five of the new receivers in the 65 Series. All include HDMI inputs for compatibility with the latest high definition gear and all but the entry-level model (the V365) support decoding of the latest surround sound codecs from Dolby and DTS, including DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD.
At the top of the heap is the 7.1-channel RX-V765, which retails for $649.95. Cranking out 95 watts to up to seven channels, other features include support for Bluetooth, satellite radio, and hookups aplenty via four HDMI inputs and one output.
The RX-V665 ($549.95) is a successor to the best-selling RX-V663. It's very similar to the V765, but knocks the power down to 90 watts per channel. This is the one that the company seems to be pushing, adding in Deep Color (30/36 bit) technology, 120Hz/24Hz refresh rates and Auto Lip-Sync compensation, which knocks out those annoying instances when the image and audio don't match up. For those not interested in the bells and whistles, the RX-V565 ($479.95) also offers 90 watts to each of seven channels.
If you haven't kicked in the two extra speakers yet, there are options for 5.1 systems as well. The RX-V465 ($379.95) cranks out 105 watts to each of those five channels, and with full HDMI audio decoding on board (including Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio). The entry-level RX-V365 ($249.95) is the least expensive option, but no slouch with 100 watts per channel. The other main difference is that the V365 offers the least HDMI options, with two inputs and one output and no HDMI audio decoding (video passthrough only).
The top four units have four preset "scene" buttons to deliver the best A/V experience for your specific content. The top three also promise video upscaling, up to 1080p. On the audio side, each one is compatible with the iPod, via one of Yamaha's optional docks.
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