Title says it all, really. My amp is on its last legs. I'd like to replace it and an AV receiver would allow me to have all my hdmi things plugged in at once, currently I have to swap the consoles over all the time.
I don't always want to use the amp for TV, I'm happy enough with TV speakers for boring TV stuff. I've already worked out that the amp I'm looking at does pass through on standby so that's fine. But I really can't be arsed with surround sound and subwoofers and cables and all that Shite.
If I only hook up two speakers is it normal for av receivers to downmix to 2.0? Or do I have to relay on the devices output 2.0 with varying degrees of success?
I've got an ONKYO AV Receiver and it has the option to pick what speaker setup you have. I've got mine as 5.0 because I have no subwoofer. All my devices output 5.1 over HDMI and I let the receiver decide what to do.
Just turned off the surround speakers + centre speaker and it downmixes to 2.0.
What Ant said - I use my receiver for 5.1 and for stereo. It's an old amp now, and has a button on the front to force whatever you're putting through it into stereo. Might be best to download the manual from the manufacturer's site if they do one and check from there...
I have the Onkyo HT-R393, it has a different menu set-up to Ant's, but does exactly the same thing in letting you choose which speakers are attached to it. Until recently I only had front left and right connected, due to moving and being too lazy to run speaker cable where I needed it, and had the amp set to 2.1 without having to change any of the source audio.
Onkyo seem pretty popular and I remember when I was looking fairly priced. No issues with mine. Got a reasonable deal on it a few years ago. Never actually bought a decent speaker setup though.
I joined when I got my amp. Meant I got whatever percent they were offering at the time, plus another £10 and it was on sale. I don't think the guys behind the counter (I actually went into a real shop!!) appreciated all the reductions I got.