Marantz vs. Oppo or Theta

Hey @alan_a  Well sad to say I have no SACD's at all here.  I am strictly looking for a good sounding 4k/8k HT processor with MANUAL EQ settings.

I dunno Erik so take this for what it’s worth, but those Theta Casablancas seem to be held in really high regard, even as stereo preamps, to this day.  So, if I’m going for absolute sound quality and the Theta has the connections/features you’re looking for I’d have a hard time picking either of the other two over it.  But that’s just a dumb guess FWIW.  Plus, owning a Theta would be kinda cool, so there’s that. 

For HT duty only, the Marantz will be great. Had one and now a Denon for HT. Same company, similar HT performance. And all the modern software/firmware to manage modern HT sound decoding is a plus.

Hi @soix I had the Casanova and it was outstanding. The reasons I'm not seriously considering Theta right now is many-fold. First, they were SO far behind in getting HDMI working, plus of course the massive cost of a unit today. Lastly, they are not an enthusiast brand.  They are a uber-high end billion dollar mansion builder brand.  I'm not their target market/customer at all, especially not if I want to configure everything myself.

I’m also not sure Theta has the manual EQ features I’m looking for.

@nwres Yes, the Marantz would be HT only, using a Luxman stereo to handle music. My concern is just that the mass-market Japanese HT brands were just ... really so bad that I’m afraid of going back to a Japanese brand for HT.

Oh my. My SA-8004 is certainly not harsh.