Yamaha RX-V677 Review

Multi-Channel Maestro?

Yamaha RX-V677

The 600 Dollar Class in the AV-receiver world is highly competitive and most major electronics manufacturers wants to please the home theater fans with the best. Yamaha RX-V677 is the eagerly awaited successor to the RX-V675, and is a hot iron in the fire of this competitive price class. We have tested the 677 in detail for you.

Yamaha RX-V677
  • 91%
    Sound Quality - 91%
  • 89%
    Features - 89%
  • 89%
    Ease of Use - 89%
  • 82%
    Build Quality - 82%
87.8%

SUMMARY

The very well equipped RX-V677 from Yamaha is a great AV receiver with excellent operability and excellent multi-channel sound.

PLUS
Easy to set up and use.
Good sound.
Plenty of features.
MINUS
Not the prettiest to look at, but beauty comes from the inside, right?

Yamaha has kept the design of its RX-V line and once again presents us with a very neat home theater machine with a split front panel. The approximately 17 cm (6-3/4”) high AV receiver is adorned with a brilliant display with an underlying matte control section in a brushed steel look. This invites a comparison with the previous model, and it requires a close examination to detect any differences. New on the front is the Wi-Fi logo and the corresponding button to recognize that wireless network functionality is added. Otherwise, the fronts are alike as two peas in a pod.

Yamaha RX-V677 review

Features n´ Stuff

Why change all the great things that have been proven to work well in the previous model? The large knob on the right of the front and the line of function keys in the display area make for a neat look and allow easy control of the device.

The four centrally located "SCENE buttons" are assigned to a specific input source and sound program, and the "Compressed Music Enhancer" can be selected by simply pushing a button. By default, the SCENE buttons have pre-stored settings, but any personal preferences can be easily reprogrammed.

The Yamaha RX-V677 is equipped with the latest generation of HDMI and thus capable of 4K Ultra HD signals (4K 50/60p) or can scale up lower resolution signals to 4K Ultra HD. Six HDMI inputs and one output are available (of course with Yamaha 3D), provides an “Audio Return Channel” and a connection for MHL-compatible devices. This caters for multi-channel audio and video files that can be played up to 1080p. On the front panel there is an easily accessible HDMI port and USB digital interface for iDevices such as iPods, iPhones or iPads.

yamaha rx-v677 vs yamaha rx-v675

The Yamaha AV receiver can play high-resolution audio formats such as FLAC and WAV with a sampling frequency up to 192 kHz without interruptions (Gapless-Playback) and also works with the Apple Lossless audio format. With network and AirPlay streaming, and the stream from HTC-Connect compatible smartphones, Yamaha RX-V677 makes sure that everyone is invited to the party.

The Japanese manufacturer integrates the music streaming services Spotify and JUKE Connect, providing millions of songs to listen to for subscribers. For even more entertainment you can listen to traditional and Internet radio with the vTuner and the integrated FM radio. Yamaha RX-V677 uses Burr-Brown 192kHz/24bit DACs for all channels to process the audio formats. Compressed formats such as MP3 can be optimized with the Compressed Music Enhancer.

yamaha rx-v677 setup

Setup and Calibration

The high-resolution GUI with clear and logical-to-use menus makes it incredibly easy to set up the RX-V677. The menu can be displayed even during playback of 3D video signals. Yamaha uses the YPAO R.S.C. (Reflected Sound Control) sound optimization, a very fast-acting calibration device connected to the AV receiver. The measurement procedure detects the number of speakers and adjust the listening distance and level. After completion of the calibration, the results can be assessed on the screen and then either discarded or stored.

According to your own personal taste, the sound can be adjusted manually or customized by different DSP presets. With the "Dialogue Lift" voices in the center speaker can be raised optimally in the center of the screen. "Dialogue Level Adjust" ensures a clear and comprehensible dialog. Thanks to DHCP, WPS Wi-Fi and Wireless Direct you´re able to integrate the receiver into the home network in seconds. If your iPhone is already in the home network, the Yamaha RX-V677 simply transmits the network data via "Wi-Fi AVR".

Yamaha RX-V677 wi-fi setup

The RX-V677 In Practice

In everyday use, the Yamaha receiver is conspicuous by its excellent and convenient operation through various apps available for free for Android devices or iDevices. I particularly like the graphic display on tablets very much. With this, it is effortless to set up the RX-V677, rename inputs or listening zones as well as make acoustic settings.

Sound Quality

Yamaha RX-V677 shines in our listening room with excellent acoustic and sonic properties. We started with a manual calibration and liked the very balanced sound of the receiver, and you can easily detect fine details of the musical events. The spatial representation is also something that is surprisingly good considering the modest price of the 677 – there was no problem hearing or feeling the placement of the musicians on the virtual stage.

After a calibration with the supplied calibration microphone using the YPAO R.S.C., Yamaha´s bass sounded much more powerful and more open in the midrange. Multi-channel recordings of room-filling live performances can be quite thrilling to experience with the RX-V677.

Selected scenes from block buster action movies showed that the Yamaha is doing an excellent job at decoding the 1´s and 0´s. From deep, juicy, precise sounding bass to surround effect storms from all angles and corners and clearly understandable dialogue scenes with very fine resolved details, this powerful receiver offers everything that may thrill the soul of a home cinema fanatic.

Conclusion

The very well equipped Yamaha RX-V677 is a great AV receiver with excellent operability and excellent multi-channel sound. This piece of home theater hardware will process movies and music in such a high quality that it´s impossible not to enjoy.

GET IT ON eBay!

  • Features
  • Specifications
  • IN THe bOX
  • 7-channel powerful surround sound
  • 105 W per channel (8 ohms, 1 kHz, 0.9% THD, 2-ch driven)
  • 90 W per channel (8 ohms, 20 Hz-20 kHz, 0.09% THD, 2-ch driven)
  • HDMI® (6 in / 1 out) with 4K Ultra HD upscaling, 3D, Audio Return Channel and MHL® support
  • The latest HDMI version support for 4K Ultra HD 50 / 60p input
  • AirPlay®, Pandora®, Rhapsody®, Spotify, SiriusXM Internet Radio music streaming service and AV Controller App
  • HTC Connect for music streaming from HTC Connect compatible smartphones
  • HDMI input on front panel, USB digital connection for iPod®, iPhone® and iPad®
  • FLAC, WAV 192 kHz / 24-bit, Apple® Lossless 96 kHz / 24-bit playback and gapless playback compatibility
  • Virtual CINEMA FRONT provides virtual surround sound with five speakers in front
  • YPAO™ Reflected Sound Control sound optimization for automatic speaker set up
  • YPAO Volume to ensure natural sounds even at low volume
  • Multi-zone audio support (Zone 2)
  • Dialogue Lift and Dialogue Level Adjustment for natural dialogue and vocals
  • Advanced GUI on-screen display with (English, German, French, Spanish, Russian, Italian, Japanese and Chinese)
  • ECO mode operation for about 20 percent less power consumption

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*


This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.