I'm about to buy the following setup
Which amplifer should i chose ?

i had my eyes on this one..
1x Denon AVCA11SR Surround-AMP dkr 20.499,-
but got adviced to go NAD

Which "road" should i go ?
one US dollars is around 7 DKR

I listen mostly to Hardcore Techno and HeavyMetal


--EDIT--
spacing issues fied

It is obvoius you live in Denmark. Denon, Nad and Dali are all sold exclusively through a chain called Hi-FI Klubben. The proprietor of this chain also owns Dali and Nad plus some chunk of Denon. The chain was started in the 80s (or 70s) as a club for audiophiles. They sold good products at a reasonable price until 1994. Then they acquired a competitive chain and merged. Since then profit margin has grown huge and with their own products it gets even larger.

I recommend visiting other shops and checking out their products before buying.

Sven, I would recommend the Denon, but don't go by me... check out the AVS Forum:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/

There are separate forums for Speakers and Receivers. I learned a lot from these guys. It may sound trivial, but one reason I like Denon is because it's such a popular brand among home theater buffs that you can always find a lot of technical info about their products in the forums. I think the NAD is supposed to be pretty good, too, though, so I doubt you have much to worry about either way. One thing I know for sure - don't chintz on the speakers in favor of the receiver. All other things being equal, I think a guy who spends $1000 on his speakers and $400 on his receiver is going to be a lot happier than a guy who spends $400 on his speakers and $1000 on his receiver.

Agreed.

The reason i use more money on the reciever is that its easier for my to get by some VERY good offers (the kind of offer without recipts) on speakers then on receivers.

anyway I'll try looking into the forum.

It seems there is no objective HIFI reviews site - like PCHardware sites.
that makes it darn difficult to know if you buy the right stuff.

and yes i live in Denmark.
but i will not buy from hifiklubben, i use price search engines to find the lowest price.

But advice on sorruond amp in the 3000U$ is welcome

A friend of mine just purchased an Onkyo TX-NR801E digital receiver. Great sound quality and many options to play digital audio from your PC, it even has an ethernet connection to access digital audio directly from your harddisk using Onkyo's Net-Tune software. Price is around Euro 1400,-

[edit:]
Just checked the German Audio magazine, some receivers mentioned in there rating list in and around the price range that you're aiming at. Some models are 2 years old however.
The number between () means the rating in points.

Denon AVC-A1 SE (102)
Harman/Kardon AVR 8500 (102)
Marantz SR-9200 (100)
Yamaha DSP-AZ1 (98)
Denon AVC-A11SR (95)
Yamaha DSP-AX1 (95)
Harman/Kardon AVR 7500 (88)
Harman/Kardon AVR 7000 (87)
Rotel RSX-1055 (85)
Onkyo TX-NR 900E (83)

I cannot give advice on other amps than my own.

Old Sony Flagship:
TA-E9000ES - Digital pre-amplifier with DD, dts, AAC, MPEG and Pro Logic
TA-N9000ES - Analog power amplifier

Sony stopped making this model last year. Their new flagship is some $7,000.

Approx retail price for my set (Denmark): $3,700. I got it used for much less - $1,100.

I am very satisfied with this set. It sounds good and the units looks cool.

Compared to integrated surround amplifiers I see one advantage with my set: The seperation of pre and power amplifier. The power amplifier should be good for 15-20 years (might need a repair or two). The digital pre amplifier might be outdated in a few years by a new DVD video codec, i.e. dts2.

The only real drawback is the 2-way remote control. It is next to useless.

One thing you might want to look into is the Pro Logic decoder. Before I got my current set, I had the previous Sony AV Flagship - VA8-ES Analog Amp + SDP-90ES decoder (around $2,000 retail). The analog amp could decode an analog signal to Pro Logic. The decoder could decode a digital signal to Pro Logic. The difference between the analog pro logic and digtial pro logic was HUGE. Much larger than the difference between DD and digital pro logic. My current set decodes incoming analog and digital pro logic signals very well.

Reviews on the E9000 here:
http://www.audioreview.com/PRD_118410_2719crx.aspx

Edit: Forgot to tell about the surround setup routine. It is quite easy. The amp asks some simple questions, like are your front speakers large, medium or small and what is the distance from listening position to the speakers. Then it is all set. My old amp asked for delay and other strange values.

heh, they guy just admitted he's dealing with stolen merchandise and you guys are still helping him.

You can't be sure about that, maybe it just fell off the back of a lorry

Beyond any technical specification, consider the quality of user interface.
For our "family room" system we got a (relatively) lower end Marantz because it was easier to use than the next model up.

Some criteria (subjective):

1) up/down buttons for volume suck compared to a knob.

2) A single knob to choose the source is easier than 6 separate buttons (but wafer switches wear out, so the knob should control relays or electronic selection). This is a minor consideratin if the buttons are well marked and separate from other function buttons.

3) stylish crap like grey on black lettering is hard to read unless you have good light at the right angle.

4) If you want to hook up a portable player or cam corder, a set of inputs on the front panel is handy.

Or maybe he gets a receipt that says hardware instead of speakers and is writing it off as company expense. I should prefer not to speculate any further.

$3000 for an amp is too much for an amp, in my opinion. There's no need to spend that much for getting a sonically transparent amp or receiver.

definately not.
again, less money on the amp and more on the speakers would be wizer

Nopes not dealing with stolen stuff. but insurance policy discarded stuff.

When som customer buys a insurance on his equipment in the shop
and somethin is broken.
The insuranvr company pays the customer money to buy new stuf if its to expensive to fix the old.
Yhe old "damage" stuff i still standing in my shop... Its not the customer (he's got his money to buy new stuff) and the insutance company dont' want it.
So we have to threw them out.


Lets take en laptop example (my favorite) a COM port pin is broken. To repair that you can't jsut solder it back (quality demands), you have to ecxhange the entire motherbaord...
Motherbaords sparepart + workmanship pays is more then a new laptop. So the customers get money to a new laptop.
Now I'm sitting with a "broken" laptop which only problem is that one pin in the Com port is broken.... i can live with that. or maybe fix it cheap my self.

insted of threwing them out i keppe them...and save the enviroment for some polution 0:-)

This happens som many times that i can't belive the insurance company can earn money..but they do.

Its rthe same thing when i customer buys a HP printer+camera combo.
Printes dies. Vustomer get money for new combo. and there is still a work cammera that belongs to nobody (or rather belongs to the insurance company that doesn't want them)


phew a long tale.. :-)

anywa thanx alot for the help. but i guess this question is harder then asking what the best audio codec is :-)
Yhink i'll just go out and listen to some of the AMP you guys have writting about.
thanx