Best Receiver for “Mid-Fi” System?

Hey everyone, many thanks for all of your comments and suggestions…sure do appreciate it!

I’ve decided to buy a refurbished Marantz Cinema 40…looks like a solid unit, good reviews…maybe a little more than what I need but the refurb price is good.

Again, thanks for all the suggestions and features to think about!

I use an Anthem 520.  It was paired with an older Parasound channel power amp and the front speakers are Silverline Panatellas.  The Parasound gave up the ghost a few months ago and I was assured that the Anthem should be able to drive everything (the power amp was added to help a previous Denon AVR which definitely could not drive the system).  I do seem to miss the grunt of the power amp and am thinking of adding a new one.

  I mention this because someone up thread mentioned that the Focals are a difficult load.  I should mention that I have a second HT system in the home, different speakers, same Anthem 520 that drives everything well.  I value the Anthem Room correction quite a bit.

  If I was the OP I would seriously consider a used AVR because there is a lot of inexpensive choice out there combined with a 5 channel power amp with some grunt.

I had a Yammie a few years ago, It was the most weak kneed 100 plus watts ever. I coined the phrase Yamawatts.

Whatever you choose, make sure it has pre-outs so that you can add power amps later.

I chose the Denon X3800H and X4800H because they use the MultiEQ XT32 room calibration which is about as good as it gets for out of the box room calibration before going up to Dirac and other higher end room calibration.

@travelinjack 

good point about the pre out