Yamaha HTR-5550 6.1 Channels Receiver

Pros: Nice price with plenty of features!
Cons: No THX, Dolby EX or DT EX!

The Yamaha HTR 5550 Surround Sound Receiver gives you true digital sound with Dolby Digital and DTS decoders built-in. It gives you 75 watts of power times five speakers to give you the Home Theater Sound. This receiver lists for $399 but can be found...

Pros: Good receiver and plenty of power for your money.
Cons: Not enough treble control or bass control.

This is a good all around receiver for your hard earned buck.As an entry level receiver you cant go wrong with the yamaha HTR-5550.With everything you need for the home system it has all the s-video input/outputs.You have alot of digital sound fields...

Pros: Great sound, fully featured universal remote with LCD display, wide array of inputs and outputs
Cons: this is an older model at this point, look at newer HTRs for latest technology

I bought the floor model of this unit when the newer HTR series was coming in because I couldn't resist the sale price. However, despite having been out on the sales floor, I still had no problems at all with the receiver, and it sounds great. There is a varied selection of inputs and outputs (Composite, Component, S-Video, digital optical audio, speaker), but the unit is still easy to set up and figure out. There are more options (EQ, input/output selections, etc) than I could possibly discuss here, and I've never been unable to find a way to hook something into my HTR-5550. The only caveat is that inputs and outputs are processed individually, so the types have to match, meaning that if you want to output S-Video, your input also has to come in via S-Video (not component or composite). Not really a problem, but something to be aware of.

I definitely would highly recommend this receiver. I've already convinced 2 family members to purchase as well! It was easy to hookup and combined with the Yamaha yst480 speaker system has an awesome surround sound. The remote works great and controls the dvd player as well.