The Cambridge Audio Azur 551R receiver
(Credit: Cambridge Audio)
A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post about AV receiver feature glut. Today's receiver manufacturers put an inordinate amount of time and money into designing feature-laden receivers, and feature glut might be part of the reason why today's receivers don't sound as good as receivers did in the 1980s. I get it, today's consumers rarely compare one receiver's sound with another receiver, but they can count HDMI connections, so that's where the money goes.
It's not that Denon, Onkyo, Pioneer, Sony, and Yamaha aren't trying to make great-sounding receivers, just that they think they have to sell receivers jam-packed with features. Features aren't free; receiver manufacturers have to pay licensing and royalty fees for autosetup, GUI menus, AirPlay, iPod/iPhone/iPad compatibility, home networking, HD Radio, Bluetooth, HDMI switching, digital-to-analog converters, and Dolby and DTS surround processors, sourced and manufactured by other companies.
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