Sony STR-DH800 7.1-Channel Audio Video Receiver
- 7.1-channel A/V receiver
- 7 HD inputs (4 active HDMI and 3 component inputs)
- Enhanced color range (Deep Color and x.v.Color technology)
- Blu-ray audio decoding (Dolby TrueHD/ DTS Master Audio/Linear PCM)
- Wireless multi-room audio (S-Air ready)
Product Description
The STR-DH800 7.1 Channel A/V Receiver delivers the Full HD 1080 experience to a home theater system. This newly designed 1080p A/V Receiver features 7 HD inputs including 4 HDMI inputs with “Active Intelligence” that allow the desire for more HD content to grow. In addition, the STR-DH800 is compatible with 24p True Cinema technology video signals and decodes uncompressed audio formats (Dolby TrueHD/dts Master Audio/LPCM via HDMI) making it compatible with Blu-ray DiscPlayers , the PlayStation 3 Technology and other HD sources. Simply plug in the optional S-Air transmitter and turn on the AirStation client (sold separately) and listen to your favorite music in another room or in multiple rooms…. More >>
Sony STR-DH800 7.1-Channel Audio Video Receiver
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5 comments
Giacomo on December 17, 2009 at 7:26 pm
Good: Great sound, lots of HDMI plugs, well-made
Bad: Manual is worthless (read below).
Does anyone know how to get this receiver to show up on my TV? It’s suppose to have an on screen menu but the manual only mentions it and doesn’t tell you how to get it. I hooked up one HDMI to the “Out” on the receiver and the other end into my Sharp HDMI 7 plug. Can anyone help me here?
Thanks!
Jim
D_reason on December 17, 2009 at 9:45 pm
I purchased this STR-DH800 amplifier and the 5 disc SONY NC800 DVD/CD player and am VERY DISAPPOINTED. The $300 amplifier does not have on screen menus and is very complex; the $120 DVD/CD player can ONLY be adjusted through the TV and does have 1080P upscaling. No 1080p upconversion on the amp so you cannot connect older components to the amp and expect the HDMI out cable to handle them. Why have composite video in on the amp if you cannot output??
When I try to play CD’s on the new player (connected by HDMI to the amp) it keeps losing sound every 10 seconds! Sony tells me that this is because the amp has
“ACTIVE INTELLIGENCE” (a real oxymoron…really meaning NO THOUGHT WHATSOEVER WENT INTO THE DESIGN) and the TV must stay on to play only MUSIC CD’s since the player is connected in by HDMI and the out is to the TV! WOW??
I had SONY audio and video products before…but never again after this experience.
minister for hire on December 17, 2009 at 9:48 pm
An OK unit but….
Will NOT allow both surround sound & TV speakers to work at the same time.
We use the TV sound output for a hearing impaired person who has a headset hooked up to the TV so we all can enjoy as a family music/movies with out blasting every one in the room. Impossible with this unit, and it has the typical problem of most amps, loud music & effects but very low volume voices even on Blue Ray. BTW I am using only HDMI hook ups.
Also the speaker connections are a pain and do not always have the best connections. The bass output connection is RF style only, while the rest of the speaker outputs are twist down plain wire.
Jeremy B on December 17, 2009 at 10:04 pm
I am a long time Sony fan! I purchased my first Sony receiver approx 15 years ago (can’t remember the model off the top of my head, but it was their top of the line one at the time – it was before 5.1/7.1 was introduced and had the old 3 speaker surround sound setup). Approx a 18 months ago I purchased the Sony STR-DG910 because I wanted 7.1 at my new house. The DG910 died last week (after only 18 months…) and I needed a replacement ASAP.
I wanted to go with Sony again because I really like their products and I am a long time fan. So I did my research and considered this model (the DH-800) and the STRDG-1200. The 1200 appears to be one of Sony’s premier line receivers and you definitely have to pay the extra dough to get one. It is currently on sale for $600 (verses it’s normal retail price of $900), but after doing a feature comparison of the two, I went with the cheaper 800 and am more than happy that I did!!
Sony makes it easy to compare their receivers.Go to sony[dot]com and browse down Electronics, TV & Home Entertainment, Home Audio Components, followed by Shop and Browse. You can then put a check in the boxes of the receivers you want to compare and it will display a side-by-side comparison.
The DH800 is one of Sony’s newest receivers and so far I think it is amazing!! As I said above I replaced my DG910 with it and it fixed a few things that bugged me about the 910, including: The amp seems to be much better – I get much higher volumes at a lower level and it seems to be a cleaner sound. It decodes Linear PCM from my PS3 and Samsung blu-ray player better. When I make adjustments to my surround sound speakers (volume and tone) and it actually stores them properly. It also have 4 HDMI inputs (v1.3), which was key for me to have with a new receiver (the DG910 had only 3 HDMI v1.2).
The ONLY thing about it so far I am disappointed about is the fact that it only has speaker outs for one set of front speakers. My two prior Sony receivers allowed an A and B speaker set, so I have two sets of fronts (which is great when listening to music). The receiver allows a B set, but that only works with you are using 5.1, not 7.1. The 7.1 uses the “additional” speaker options. I guess most people just use one set of fronts, so this may not be a big deal to you.
One other thing… The manual is a joke though, which Sony has always had a probably with. They should invest a little money in hiring an outsourced company to write their manuals so they make sense and allow their customer to have a pain-free setup. I’m thankful that I am good with audio/video equipment and was able to figure everything out without having to open the manual.
Overall I think this is a great receiver with a ton of fabulous features and for the price (approx 290 dollars here at amazon) you can’t go wrong! It doesn’t matter if you’re putting together an entry level home theatre or have a nice setup and want to replace your current system, you’ll be happy with the sound/video and the loud volumes you can get.
Andrew Willing on December 17, 2009 at 11:21 pm
The receiver is about what you’d expect for the listed specifications. I run at 5.1 instead of 7.1, so I can’t provide comment on that. The auto-calibrate feature for the speakers is easy to do and greatly improves the quality of the experience. I’m not an audiophile, however, so I can’t comment on “lows” or “highs” or whatever; movies sound like you’d expect, except that maybe the bass is more noticeable than with my previous Sony receiver. I generally dislike that the receiver (and I believe it’s true for most or all) doesn’t pass through HDMI without being turned on. That leads to a few mild annoyances, but only mild. I also dislike that the system doesn’t yet appear to have the ability to automagically turn 2.1 or 2.0 into 5.1. I can enable it with a press of a button, but if there’s a setting, I haven’t been able to find it through the on-receiver-screen-only interface.
Speaking of said interface, hands-down the best reason I like this speaker system is the on-screen display that will show me which speaker configuration is active. I have a smallish family room, and it’s not always easy to determine by sound if a speaker is active or not–and if it is active, if it is being transformed from 2.1 to 5.1, or if it’s a true 5.1 signal. This little on-screen display is huge. I also run a media server with a PS3 front-end, and this allows me to check whether my settings for audio have been maintained or downsampled through the process. Rather useful.