Review Of The Sony STR-DN1000

Consumer Electronics — By Ricky on September 25, 2009 at 8:45 am

The sum ‘n’ Substance:

Thumbs up: Deadly sound quality; superb feature set; 4 HDMI ports; good user interface; built in Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio decoder; automatic speaker calibration; Sirius satellite radio ready good feature to price ratio.

Thumbs down: Poor image quality on converted analog formats; multi-channel analog input is absent.

Inside the trunk: Amplifier Outputs 110 Watts – 8 Ohm; 7.1 channel surround system; Surround Sound Output Mode; analog to HDMI up conversion up to 1080p; built in decoders such as Dolby TrueHD , DTS-HD decoder , Dolby Digital Plus, DTS-HD Master Audio , DTS-HD High Resolution; AM/FM and Digital Radio tuner; Infrared Universal remote control; ipod docking and automatic speaker calibrations.

The whiz kid speaks:
The new DN1000 launched by Sony is the follow up to last years STR-DG920. having quite good designed and equipped features similar to the DG920, let’s find out it if the DN1000 is able to make its mark.

Talking about design, you have to realize that Sony is a company who’s products; always go hand in hand with the latest trend. But AV receivers are something that performed really well, but had a standard matte black finish to it. the DN1000 however is a bit different. It comes in a shiny black ink like covering, with the chrome Sony logo at the top. There is a tiny LCD panel in the center of the receiver, a volume control and the selector buttons on the right and a power button on the left. At the bottom there are eight buttons, an AV button and automatic mike calibration hidden by the plastic panel covering it. the universal remote control looks a little cramped, although it provides all the necessary functionality.

The graphic user interface that Sony has included is very simple and it displays information of which speakers are active, the configuration for surround sound and so on. Moving into the setup, the DN1000 has automatic speaker calibrations that worked just brilliantly. To begin with, it was very quick and it was able to set the sound optimum in three modes. The DN100 is able to balance the sound equally in three parts of the room. But this is not applicable while watching movies, for that, you will have to sit in the centre, besides it doesn’t really matter if it does not work for movies, because you need to sit in front of the TV and not in any part of the room. to help you set up quickly, there is an auto setup function that identifies the speakers and its capacity but it was not up to the mark. Other features of the DN1000 included four HDMI ports and three component video inputs. The DN1000 is capable of converting any ordinary analog video inputs to the HDMI format right up to 1080p. Also featuring is the S-air, Sony’s wireless audio system and the onboard decoders such as Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD.

The Sony STR-DN1000

Dolby Digital Plus.
The performance of the up-converted HDMI videos was not up to the mark. Audio quality was very good, the bass lines were well- defined and the highs were lively and crisp. Video quality was good but inconsistent. The colours were natural looking and vivid. The power source is in built, just plug in and begin set-up.

Nitty-gritty: The STR DN1000 has done exceptionally well in the audio department, but the up scaled videos were lack lustre. The feature set is good and is more than enough to keep you busy for a long time. For a price range of $322.92 – $499.99, the DN1000 does not give you much to complain about.