yamaha a2 vs 3802

D

Duncan Harvey

Guest
Can anyone help

I've had a yamaha a2 for nearly 3 years and am very happy with the 5.1 performance. That said, the Denon 3802 looks a mouth watering prospect at just over £600 and I'm giving serious thought to upgrading.

I'm interested in Pro Logic 2 and 6.1 DTS and DD EX, all of which the a2 can't do.

But of course its a lot of money to pay simply for the latest gadgetry.

Can anyone give me an opinion as to whether this upgrade is worth it - ie how does the Denon sound in plain vanilla DD 5.1, DTS and stereo

Cheers

Duncan
 
Hi Duncan

I`ve had a 3802 for about 3 weeks before which i had a Yamaha DSPA1 i can honestly say its a fantastic amp, I`m sure most people will say i must be mad to go from an A1 to the Denon but like yourself i wanted Prologic 2 and DTS/Dolby 6 channel.

I think it sounds excellent in both modes also it even improved on the Yamaha on 2 channel music aswell, I`m really pleased with it.

Cheers Carlos
 
Hi Carlos - hope Belinda is belting out in dts on the 3802!

I'm a little disappointed that the 3802 only has three optical inputs.

I currently use the following via optical output - CD, PS2, LD and MD. I use the DVD via coax.

Can you "assign" these optical inputs to any source you like? On my A2 they are fixed so for example to play back my PS2 sound I'm using the DVD optical input and my DVD is via the CD coax.

Not a problem as I use my marantz RC2000 remote to do all the source selection, but it would be nice to have the sources more "ordered".

Where did you get your amp from and how much did it set you back?

cheers

Duncan
 
I haven`t even played Belinda yet ;)

Yes you can assign the digital inputs to any source, i know what you mean about not having enough digital inputs luckily i have reduced my system down so only need three inputs in total.

I have seen a device to switch optical inputs 3 into 1 i think it was Lektropack who do it !!

I got the amp from Superfi in wolverhampton for £699, I know i could of got it cheaper online but would rather deal with someone personally when it comes to expensive electronics also it came with a 2 year warranty.

Cheers Carlos

[ 10-10-2001: Message edited by: CARLOS ]
 
re optical inputs, I've got a "two into one" splitter type device from Letropacks which I currently use for my ps2 and LD - it does the job nicely.

If push comes to shove I can use the phono input for my MD as I'm sure the internal DAC is pretty good.

Am tempted re the place in Wolverhampton - know what you mean about buying expensive items from a real person!

thanks for your help
 
you said you used the 3802 for your ld duncan, i thought it didn't have ac3 rf out
 
Well at the moment I use my A2 for the LDs but only via optical as I dont have any NTSC discs with AC3 - picked up a load of interesting PAL titles dirt cheap about 2 years ago, so no RF = no worries
 
Duncan,

The coaxial cable will make more difference with PCM, CDs... so, unless you also play CDs on your DVD it might be worth using the coax for the CD player, it must be digital, 75 ohms coax...
 
My CD player is a Sony 400 disc multiplayer, and I use the optical output for it. Not sure to be honest if there is a coax out.

One question though - is there really any difference between using a "proper" coax lead and a bog standard interconnect. At present for my DVD I use a bog standard and certainly DD/DTS sounds superb.

Cant really comment on PCM as I rarely use the DVD player for CDs.

BTW - Carlos - ordered it from Hi Fi Junkies - just spoken to them and they hope to have some stock by the end of the month.
 

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