Onkyo
Reddit take
AI summary of the Reddit excerpts below — not a quote
Onkyo is primarily recognized as a value-oriented brand in the home theater space, frequently praised for offering Dirac Live room correction at more accessible price points than competitors like Denon or Marantz. While many users report long-term satisfaction with older units, the brand's reputation is heavily colored by historical reliability concerns, specifically regarding HDMI board failures and overheating. Modern sentiment is mixed, balancing the high performance-to-dollar ratio against a clunky user interface and skepticism regarding quality control following the company's bankruptcy and restructuring.
Pros
- Value leader, often providing similar internal components to more expensive brands at a lower cost
- Inclusion of Dirac Live room correction, which many users prefer over Audyssey
- Support for features like AAC playback and pre-amp outputs on mid-range models
- Strong legacy performance with some users reporting 10+ years of reliable use
Cons
- Historical reputation for hardware unreliability, particularly with HDMI boards and capacitors
- Unintuitive and clunky user interface and setup process
- Limited multi-subwoofer support, with some dual-sub models only sending a single signal to both outputs
- Physical remote and software navigation can be frustrating compared to on-unit buttons
Caveats
- Reliability is a major point of contention; while some users claim past HDMI issues are resolved, others remain wary of post-bankruptcy build quality
- Recent firmware updates for connected TVs have been reported to cause intermittent muting issues with some receivers
Best for
- Budget-conscious home theater builders who want Dirac Live room correction
- Users looking for high channel counts (e.g., 9 or 11 channels) without paying premium brand markups
Avoid if
- You require advanced, independent multi-subwoofer calibration and management
- You prefer a highly polished and modern software interface
- You are unwilling to risk historical brand reliability issues
This summary uses balanced time weighting with about a 18-month half-life. The evidence comes from a window where the median source age is approximately 380 days, reflecting a mix of legacy brand sentiment and more recent product experiences.
Sentiment
11 positive (28%) · 10 mixed (26%) · 18 negative (46%)
Trust + time weighted score: -18% · raw score -18%
What redditors said (10 of 39)
I think my onkyo let me set front or rear heights but I don't have any overhead speakers.
The mass market likes of Denon, Onkyo, Yamaha, etc will not get the best out of those speakers.
Many receivers do have a mic that accomplishes this. My personal Onkyo has that feature which is verifiable afterwards
Parent context: OP I hear you. Electronics like TVs have become less expensive seemingly each year while AVRs seem to be getting pricier for whatever reason. I purchased a 9 channel Onkyo pre pandemic. To replace it with something with similar features today I’d pay multiples of the original purchase price. Reply: I purchased a 9 channel Onkyo pre pandemic.
And if only doing 11 channels, go with an AVR from Denon or Onkyo for instance over the XMC-2+
My Onkyo is also turning on muted since the last QM7K firmware update.
I find the Onkyo interface and Dirac live room correction really unintuitive and clunky. That’s the problem I am trying to optimize with the Onkyo. It’s purely emotionally subjective, but I just don’t like the Onkyo.
My 13 year old Onkyo dies just before black friday and I'm looking to replace it.
I guess Onkyo had issues in older models which gave them a unreliable image...
Onkyo, since it went bust and came out of bankruptcy, has questionable quality (same for Pioneer AV which Onkyo owns).