The Yamaha RX-V665 7.2-Channel Home Theater Receiver

I had purchased a new Large screen HDTV, and wanted the latest and greatest sound system to go along with it. I have long been an admirer of Yamaha audio components, so I checked online to see what they had.

I found the Yamaha RX-V665 7.2-Channel Home Theater Receiver for around $500.00. While the Yamaha RX-V665 is not the best Yamaha has to offer, it does have some great features. One thing that really struck me is the display which is white, instead of the older orange. Frankly I never liked an orange display on electronics. It always reminded me of the old computer monitors that were either orange or green.

The display is a minor thing, but it attracted me to the Yamaha RX-V665 in the first place. The sound quality is what kept me there.

The sound quality on the Yamaha RX-V665 is top notch. You get four scene buttons across the front of the receiver, to select DVD, CD, TV, and Radio. Selecting one of these buttons gives you the optimum sound for each of these functions, though the DSP (Digital Sound Processing)

Yamaha's Parametric Room Acoustic Optimizer (YPAO) automatic speaker calibration system sets up your speakers, by sending out a signal to each speaker, and determines how for each speaker is from the listener, and if they are hooked up properly. Then it calibrates the speakers so you get great sound.

I got the speakers, and my TV and DVD player hooked up to the Yamaha RX-V665 relatively easy, plugged in the included microphone (this is needed to test the speakers) then I pressed the start button on the menu for the YPAO, and had my speakers calibrated in minutes. I don't think I ever had such an easy time setting up a sound system in my life.

You can connect the Yamaha RX-V665 to XM and Sirius Satellite radio, and there is an input for your iPod. You get four HDMI inputs, which just about took care of what I had.

Now for the downsides of the Yamaha RX-V665. The remote has so many small buttons, that it can be a challenge to hit the right ones at times. Also the video output on upconverted DVD images is a bit jumpy. There are no S-Video inputs, which is not as big of a problem as it might have once been, but I do have some older components, that are not HDMI ready. Speaking of HDMI, there are no front HDMI inputs either.

The bottom line is that the sound quality makes up for any of the downsides to me any way. I like the Yamaha RX-V665 and I would recommend it.