Someone should call Onkyo and tell them they're doing it wrong selling 3 to 5 different levels of each product class. Or maybe they're doing it right since the only thing that they actually have to change is the name plate, because obviously the insides are the same on all of them.
Seems to work for them. They move a lot of product. A number of posters here are using Onkyo receivers.
I haven't seen an AVR with balanced pre-outs. I won't buy a pre-pro without them.
<shrug>
I used to think that way. Truth is, I never used my balanced outputs on the 990. Nice to have, for sure, but not a deal breaker for most folks. If that's all the 978 has going for it....
A factory in China will produce the same quality product produced in a factory anywhere else on earth so long as the people responsible for payment manage the process to their own standards. Dell and Apple computers are made in China and they're worlds apart in component and construction quality. An AVR and Pre-Pros being made in China don't have to have anything at all to do with each other, even if they're produced in the same factory.
Total BS. There is one thing that holds the attention of factories in China....cold hard cash...and lots of it. As a small buyer, you have an insignificant amount of power and little control over timing of production or quality of components. A Chinese supplier will lie to your face on an ongoing basis and then dare you to sue them (in China) for breach of contract. Been there, done that (and I speak pretty fluent Chinese). This is why I was chuckling back in January when Outlaw said Scott was "going over there" to get a status update during a time in the year when almost zero work gets done in China and people are traveling to their hometowns for lengthy new years celebrations. And here we are 7 months later and <shock>, the product still isn't here.
Onkyo isn't crap and any dig I made was only to imply it's a largely mass-market brand producing mass-market goods. A small shop like Outlaw can easily specify better components for their smaller production runs.
Sadly, that isn't the case in Chinese manufacturing. See above.
If Outlaw was building a clone of a mainstream AVR without the amps, I'm pretty confident we'd have seen the 978 out a few years ago. That's not something terribly difficult to have a factory turn around.
They're probably kicking themselves that they didn't take this route. Here we are 4 years later and they're still re-selling product from Marantz instead of an Outlaw branded processor while their own design has languished in vapor land. They've also been repeatedly leapfrogged by the industry on features while they continue off in the weeds with their supplier. Not particularly confidence inspiring. A dollar short and a day late, I'm afraid. I'm trying to discuss this without sounding harsh, but it's a harsh world out there...and the facts are not particularly kind to Outlaw in this case.
Best,
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