After owning two Yamaha receivers (an R-100 and a DSP-A3090), I've become a big Yamaha fan. After decades of service, both still perform flawlessly. They're built like tanks and have that almost intangible aura of 'quality'. Both are capable of driving my 4ohm speakers to realistic levels without clipping. Both were top of the line in their time. Neither do hdmi switching however so when it finally made sense to buy an hdmi switch, receivers with hdmi switching appeared to be the better value. I have external amplification for my center and mains and the Onkyo has pre-outs for external amplification. The Onkyo pre-amp specs were about as good as it gets, the reviews mostly solid but bottom line, for the price, nothing else I found had the same bang for the buck. So after about 3 weeks of living with it, I'd have to say 'save your receipt'. You can literally heat a small room with this receiver. Even with the 4ohm mains using external amplification, you could literally fry an egg on top of the case. I've owned many electronic products over the years, over clocked computers and lived with electronics housed in cabinets without much ventilation. I work for a company that manufactures many non-consumer, heavy duty electronic products but nothing, nothing I've ever encountered releases this much heat into the room as the 806 (except for an electric floor heater in my garage). Heat + electronics usually equal a short life. I suspect that I'll be lucky to get three years out of this. I probably should return it but I have it installed in a tricky location and reluctantly purchased an additional cooling fan for it. I'm going to give it a go. If it dies after a couple years, I'll go back to Yamaha. In the mean time, here are a few tips: 1) do not try to drive anything but speakers rated at 8ohms. The 806 has a 4ohm setting but at that setting the power rating drops to almost un-useable levels. If you try driving 4ohm speakers at the 8ohm setting, the amp can get so hot that you risk fire (only in my opinion) or damaging your speakers from clipping. 2) if you install this in a cabinet, make sure you have front to back ventilation and at least six inches on top. Do not block airflow by placing any other component on top of this receiver. 3) buy an external fan and place it on top of the receiver on the right side with the fan aiming up so it sucks heat out of the receiver. I bought the fan from CoolerGuys:[...] To sum up: the 806 can make sense as a high functioning, low cost, hdmi video switching pre-amp but I have concern over the amount of heat this generates. Quite frankly, if I had to do it over again, I'd probably go with Denon or Yamaha even if it meant spending a couple hundred more. The heat issue seems to be a common theme among Onkyo receivers.
UPDATE: the cooling fan I purchased completely solved the extreme heat issue. Evidently all the 806 needed was a little help lifting and diffusing the heat that was collecting inside the receiver. I placed it on top of the receiver blowing upward. I wouldn't be surprised if the fan added years to the life of the receiver.Get more detail about Onkyo TX-SR806 7.1 Channel Home Theater Receiver (Black).
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