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Universal player - Multi-channel HDMI question?

I am reaching out here because I am inexperienced in this matter and am hoping for a lesson. I have a Denon Universal 3900 and an Anthem Statement D1 preamp AND the upgrade bug.

I want to replace these two pieces with a high end processor and a universal player that can do all the multichannel formats without the old 6 analog cable connection. In other words - HDMI probably.

I have a pretty decent budget up to about $15,000 for the two pieces and I don't mind buying clean used pieces here on A-Gon so there should be quite a few good choices.

I don't know how to get started with this research. Multiple searches turn up one solution or another but without any baseline for comparison and without my understanding of the pros and cons.

I also don't know how to get really good D/A conversion accomplished. Do I just rely on the D/A convertors in the preamp? Do I run HDMI into an HDMI capable D/A convertor (if such a thing even exists)??

I am really confused on this whole mess of how to do multi channel digital well. Can I get some help here please?

Thanks,
Russ
sashua

Showing 1 response by sashua

sashua OP
10 posts
 
Thanks for the responses so far guys. I know that the Anthem Statement has a lot of support here on the forums but I have owned a D1 for a few years now and I must say that I feel its D/A conversion is pretty lackluster. It is, all-in-all a very functional processor but it is a bit hard on the ears when it comes to reproducing music. Perhaps the upgrade to D2 status would allow it to run with the pack to a greater degree but with the cost and the HDMI 1.2 instead of 1.3 implimentation I'm holding off.

I guess I have heard quite a lot over time about the EMM/Meitner, Theta and even Denon with it's proprietary "Denon-link" and I just assumed that many more multi-channel solutions with reasonable sound quality had made an appearance by now.

Maybe I need to pop my head back under the sand for a few more years :-(
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