Imitation

I would assume you could wire another IR receiver into your other room that held the zone 2 speakers so you could adjust the zone 2 volume with the smaller remote. Pretty sure there's a jack in the back for it. Least that's how I would assume it works

Sorry, I wasn't clear, I've got my TV hooked up via HDMI, but the volume only shows up on SD signals, it can't overlay the volume on an HD signal on HDMI or component.

It shows up on the screen when i'm watching SD content, but it doesn't display on the screen when I'm watching HD.

I've got a yamaha 1800 that I got as a replacement for my 1700 that wasn't cooperating with HDMI. The 1800 is pretty nice and the 2 extra HDMI are more than welcome compared to the 1700. Even though it has a better video scalar I really can't tell a diff when its on and scaling SD cable to 720p for my tv or when my tv does it itself. The sound is pretty nice though, when I bought the 1700 initially I compared to denon and I found I liked the yamaha a little better. The denon seemed to make the klipsch just a touch brighter, while the yamaha seemed a little smoother and more balanced. When the 1700 was in the shop I had a lower end yamaha as a loaner, it didn't sound nearly as good as the 1700/1800 does. I'm sure the better DAC's and amp in this model was making the difference. One thing I HATE about it though is the small volume numbers on the front screen. Even though technically you can just turn it up loud enough for the situation sometimes its tough to do like when the wife goes to bed and I need to turn it down to a certain point. Supposedly you can change it with some software and a serial cable from a pc but sadly both my wife's lappy and my desktop both don't have a serial port. Serial ports haven't been used much on the consumer pc landscape for 5+ years but yamaha still tacks them onto their receiver models Good luck with yours, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. It would be really tough for me to NOT enjoy something I got for about 35% of MSRP!

Innertuber makes some great points here. Lossless is definitely the minimum you'll want to encode in if you're looking for the absolute best quality as at that point you lose NONE of the audio when pulling it off the CD whereas MP3 or AAC is a lossy encode. A lossy encode uses an algorithm to cut out portions of the audio that your ear "can't" hear, but the more you compress the more it cuts out, and even though its designed not to sound different, most people can tell a difference, esp as you compress it heavily. On my mp3 player and using some fairly cheapo earbuds I can tell a difference between lower quality mp3 rips(128, 160, and 192kbps) and a 256kbps rip. 256kbps is pretty good compromise for me and is what I use on my mp3 player as mine is only 20gigs and I like to carry all my music around. But for playing music in my living room I've ripped all my music lossless as I can tell a difference between it and any type of mp3. So essentially i've got 2 copies of my collection on the same pc, but that's not a big deal for me and hard drive space is so cheap these days. I'd also like to point out that your ipod isn't the best source for playing music on real speakers. The DAC's and processing hardware in the ipod isn't going to be nearly as high of quality as most higher quality PC soundcards or a universal disc player. I'd say its average at best, but if you can't tell a difference, then it would work great for you. It's decent enough for any type of normal headphones or earbuds though. So, like InnerTuber said, play around with it and see what you like. I'd go with one of your favorite CD's and rip it a couple of different ways, AIFF, lossless, maybe a 256kbps mp3, and a smaller one like 192 or 160. If you can't tell a diff between any of them on the ipod, then you might as well rip it all in 192 as it saves the most space. To me, mp3 players are all about compromises, so you have to decide on where yours should utimately be. Hope that helps!

I'm not going BR right now for 2 main reasons. 1. I've only got a 37" 720p LCD tv and a 2.1 setup. My upconverting dvd player makes dvd's look noticably better than standard res and the DVD selection is endless. 2. Price, BR players are still pricey in my opinion, esp if you want one that has all the BR features, I would much rather be saving my money for a larger 1080p tv or better speakers than starting to dump money into BR without using it to its full potential.

Well the definition of quiet is definitely subjective. When the 360 is playing games, it's definitely on the loud side imo, but on the dashboard or playing music its in idle mode so it's much quieter than when playing games. It's definitely not cd or dvd player quiet of course, but if i have the volume at a fairly low level, say about -45 on my yamaha 1800, I can't hear it when music is playing. Course i've got one of the older 360's as well, i'm not sure if the newer ones are quieter than the original design. edit: As for other music types, I know it can obviously play mp3, and it can also play AAC as long as it's not DRM protected. Pretty sure it won't play FLAC or ogg.

I personally use an xbox360 for my streaming needs. I've got an older model so it's feeding my receiver via optical instead of HDMI but that's fine. It streams off my window vista pc in the office and it streams all my lossless WMA files via wifi without any hiccups. It actually works pretty well and is fairly intuitive. My wife uses it all the time to play her music in the living room. Only downside is I guess you have to have it hooked up to a tv to display the lists as there's no screen on the 360 so if you're looking for a standalone box for a 2 channel setup with no screen around, the 360 isn't for you. I really enjoy the versitility of the 360, streams audio, video, and in the late fall, it should be able to stream netflix movies assuming you have a netflix account.

Yeah that's what I got the 54's for last year except the dealer only had silver which wasn't bad considering they were less than half msrp and brand new. I'm leaning toward trying to cut a deal like you said and see if I can possibly get a set of 63's since I can get the full value I paid for the 54's from my brother since he's interested in expanding his living room toys now that he's got a sweet tv but only tv speakers. I'd love to just get the low end 663 and go external amp sometime down the road, but there's TONS of different amp brands out there, I've really go no idea what is a good deal and what isn't right now. But I can tackle that later. Thanks for your input!

Hey guys long time lurker first time poster, Through some events that have transpired over the last year since I bought my original yamaha 1700, yamaha has decided to finally replace it with a new 1800 instead. Without going into those issues, I would like your guys' opinion on a thought I had recently. Right now I'm rolling a pair of RVX-54's that were VERY on sale last year which is also when i bought the 1700. Now the 54's are pretty nice, but I guess i've got the upgrade itch. The wife won't let me spend another 5-600 bucks on speakers to replace the 54's with say RF-82's or 63's, BUT if I maybe try to swing a deal with the local shop to keep the 1800 and maybe give me a 863 or 663 and some store credit I might be able to swap out the 54's and still keep the wife from blowing a gasket. One other thing to keep in mind is that I've currently got a pretty capable sub to go with them, an Epik Valor, so the bottom end that the 54's lack is more than covered by it. Also, I'm not really looking to go to 5.1 right now, the living room isn't setup very well for it and the current tv stand doesn't even have room for a RC-52. So, If it were you guys, would you attempt to cut a deal and come home with less receiver but maybe RF-82's or 63's or take home the 1800 and call it a day? Thanks guys!