Anthem AVM 20 upgrade vs RDC-7 upgrade

[Razvan]

The upgrade for the AVM 20 is now available for $300. It has everything that the RDC-7 upgrade has (except DTS 96/24) + the following:

1. phase and polarity control for the subwoofer,
2. crossovers separate by speaker and the range is 25-160Hz with a 5Hz increment.

The Anthem crossover settings kill the RDC-7 crossover settings and at a MSRP of several hundred dollars less the Anthem seems to be a much better deal than the RDC-7.

Razvan

[Burke Strickland]

Admittedly, the AVM-20's upgrade sounds like it provides a much more atractive and useful set of subwoofer adjustments than the RDC-7's. However we still need to take the total package into account when assessing "better value". If subwoofer control had ended up being the primary consideration in purchasing a pre/pro, I would never have purchased an RDC-7. In fact, when I set out to buy a pre/pro last year, flexible sub control was on my short list of "must have" features and at first I took home the AVM-20's predecessor (the AVM-2) instead of the RDC-7 because of that issue.

But I found that although the AVM-2 was loaded with bells and whistles, it lacked the fundamental performance qualities that make having a pre/pro instead of a cheap-o receiver worthwhile in the first place. So I took it back and decided I could live with less-than-desired sub control options because the RDC-7 was superior is so many other areas, including its performance on two channel music.

Rather than just looking at the spec sheet or listening briefly at the dealer, I'd have to put an AVM-20 through as rigorous an in-home test as I did the AVM-2 (several hours a day for a week) before I'd be willing to say it passes muster on performance (surpassing the RDC-7 in critical listenability areas besides bass management). And unless it does that, lower price becomes a non-issue.

But since the RDC-7 is performing admirably in my system "as is" (initial user-installed software upgrade only so far) and also has the distinct advantage of already being paid for :>) I'll guess I'll just have to keep it for now and hope that Integra Research comes to its senses and offers a quick and inexpensive user installable bass management update that includes the features it should have had all along.

Burke

[Razvan]

The Perfect Vision ranks the RDC-7 a Class 2 processor, better than the Anthem 20 ( class 3). For sound quality the RDC-7 gets a 4 ( out of 5) while the AVM 20 gets a 3.

Razvan

[Lex]

I would guess that is ranked right there with the MC-1 at level 2. true?

Lex

[Burke Strickland]

The only Lexicon controller in the latest Perfect Vision rankings was the MC-12. The MC-1 didn't make the cut this time around, so we don't know where they would rank it currently compared to the listed models.

They don't always include every model they have recent data on -- they reviewed the Integra Research RDA-7 power amp in the same issue as the RDC-7 pre/pro but it is not included in the power amp category. (They liked it in their review.)

Burke