Review: Rotel RSX-1057 AV Receiver
Ultimate AV takes a look at the Rotel RSX-1057 receiver. In case you’re a little new to this whole home theater thing, a receiver has a radio station tuner, several channels of amplification, and a switcher/processor. And a whole lot more! Receivers are doing much more heavy lifting than they used to, and this one is no exception.
This receiver goes for $1,299 and is rated at 75W per channel. But don’t let that low rating fool you - it is spec’d honestly and will probably driver whatever speakers you have with ease. On the other hand, the receiver has five channels of amplification instead of the increasingly common seven. But if you’re not going to use all seven channels anyway, you can just consider that lack money well saved.
This receiver has two HDMI, three component, and 5 S-Video inputs. Why do receivers always have two HDMI inputs? That’s not enough! You have you STB, DVD, and BD or HD DVD player. That’s 3 HDMI inputs right there. Then add a PS3 and you’re up to 4. Two just isn’t enough these days, folks! Ah well, it’s better than what my current receiver has - none!
All in all, though, it’s a decent receiver, with some caveats. For those, you have to read the excellent review!
Need a display for your home theater? Check out the HDTV Blog for ideas.
October 23rd, 2006 at 3:55 pm
Just for fun, I’m going to point out that taking a 5-channel solid-state high-fidelity power amplifier combined with a high-def-video/surround-sound-audio switcher/preamp/processor, throwing in an AM/FM tuner, and calling the resulting digital electronic tour de force a “receiver” (short for “radio receiver”, i.e. “radio”) makes about as much sense as taking a Ferrari, attaching some lawnmower blades to the bottom, and calling it a “mower”. Sure, it could mow the lawn if it had to (hello Monster Garage) but that’s missing the point! (And the price!)
I have yet to see any halfway logical reason for throwing an AM/FM tuner into a preamp/processor/power-amp combination other than that the very first transistor amplifiers were almost always connected to a radio tuner. So for
hystericalhistorical reasons, audio amplifiers are STILL permanently wired into AM/FM tuners, no matter how infrequently the purchaser of a Rotel RSX-1057 is likely to sit down in their home theater with 5 speakers and a subwoofer and a high-def projection television, and just kick back and listen to a local radio station. When was the last time *you* did that, oh reader of HTblog.net? And what kind of over-the-air radio stations do they have where you live? Here in Ottawa I’m not very impressed, that’s for sure.Me, I consider myself to have evolved beyond the concept of one of these here newfangled “transistor radios” that were all the rage 50 years ago, so in addition to my DVD player, laserdisc player, tape deck, VCR, computer, game console, satellite TV receiver, turntable [*], and videocamera, I also have an AM/FM tuner component that plugs into my preamp/processor right next to everything else. None of those other things belongs inside my pre/pro (or integrated amplifier if you prefer) any more than the radio tuner does.
Receivers: Just Say No.
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[*] OK, I haven’t used that one in a while, and I currently cannot locate either it or the 3 vinyl records I own, but some people swear by them… mmmm, Linn Sondek…
October 23rd, 2006 at 7:21 pm
So tell us how you really feel, Steve!
October 24th, 2006 at 7:05 am
I thought you’d like that, Henning. Oh, wait, you have a receiver yourself, don’t you…
Did you change my ^H^H text into an HTML strikeout markup manually, or did your blog software do that?
October 24th, 2006 at 7:37 am
I did that myself. You can use the “del” tag around words to accomplish that.
And yes I do have a receiver! I dream of maybe being like you one day Steve, with some nice separates and speakers the size of the space shuttle. But until then I’ll have to make do…
October 31st, 2006 at 12:51 pm
Ah I see. Let’s try that: struck-out text
I’m not trying to diss people who own receivers, just pointing out that for exactly the same price as a receiver, you could own an integrated amplifier instead that probably does its job better, without all that extra nonsense about AM/FM that you never use anyway.
And if you really do want AM/FM radio in addition to all your other audio and video sources, buy a respectable tuner (which can be quite cheap, since it only has to do one thing which requires nearly no power and next to no physical space) and you can keep it throughout the rest of your home theater’s life, no matter what happens to your preamp, power amp, integrated amp, etc. That’s all I meant.
October 31st, 2006 at 12:51 pm
OK, not so much luck with the “del” tag… I just put it in angle brackets like normal HTML tags and it got completely ignored.
October 31st, 2006 at 1:21 pm
Works for me!Make sure it looks like this (remove the spaces):
< d e l > Works for me! < / d e l >
October 31st, 2006 at 1:29 pm
As to receivers: I understand your points completely, and plan to own separates one day when I can. But your statement that you can get separates for “exactly the same price as a receiver” is not accurate.
If I wanted to buy separates for $1000, where would I go? I couldn’t. The cheapest separates I know of are from Outlaw Audio, where the least expensive amp / prepro combination is $1400. So for anybody shopping for anything less than $1400, separates are out of the question. Even then, maybe Outlaw’s products are not a good fit. What happens then? There are many many receiver choices at about $1400, and just one separates choice.
It’s only once you start paying significant sums of money do you start to get choice. And for those people, I think that separates are the way to go. I don’t think that buying a $5000 receiver is your best way of spending that money. But if your budget is $1500 or less, receivers are your best, and really only (unless you like Outlaw) choice.
October 31st, 2006 at 2:35 pm
I did put those del tags like you said, without the spaces. Here’s another try: strikeout. Maybe it’s Firefox that’s screwing it up, or your forum software that’s expecting IE to screw it up while Firefox is once again stirring up trouble by doing it right instead…
So as far as actual availability of the type of product that I am trying to recommend, it is indeed poor. In stereo-land, it is easy to get a wide range of integrated amplifiers at a variety of prices. But as soon as you go from two-channel to five-or-more-channel, manufacturers have decided that an AM/FM tuner is going to be included whether you want one or not. As I said, this is purely for hysterical (that’s supposed to be struck-out again) historical reasons and the practice should be discontinued immediately! Manufacturers, are you listening??
October 31st, 2006 at 2:40 pm
IE testOctober 31st, 2006 at 2:40 pm
Both Firefox and IE work fine for me.
October 31st, 2006 at 2:43 pm
anonymous user test
November 7th, 2006 at 12:59 pm
I should note here that the French translation of “receiver” is “ampli-tuner”, a much more descriptive term, at the expense of only one extra syllable. I think I’m going to adopt this term in English myself.
May 31st, 2007 at 2:46 am
Steve, don’t hold back!
It does seem odd these days to integrate a radio, especially if you have to attach an external antenna to it to make it work.