I have a rep that believes that we really need to pick up the Marantz audio line.

Marantz is kinda flashy stuff. But how about reliability, ease of set up, discretes (multizone/room) and integration? You like it compared to Yamaha & Denon?

Marantz kills yamaha every time!! Video & Audio no doubt! Denon on the other hand is very similar (though i don't like there remotes). We've been dealers for a long time and i really don't have any complaints with either tech support. the product or the compant in general except that AVAD carries them now, but hey thats the worldwe live in. I'm waiting for the day i can order Krell from AVAD, perfect fit i think.

(Please read last line with sacastic tone.....Thank you, The Management)

We've been selling Marantz for years. It' reliability is above average, not perfect. Good integration, good multizone once you figure out the methodology. FYI Marantz just went to distribution through AVAD, so the exclusivity of a dealer-direct-only line is now gone.

It's extremely rare that we don't set up a PC based MX remote with every system we set up so the remote that comes with is nothing more than a chrome gas pedal.

I'm mostly concerned with reliability. Yamaha has been nearly bulletproof over the last 10 years. Denon has been less reliable but excellent sounding. Both have the right amount of descretes to do about anything.

How about Marantz? Yes, AVAD is making quite the push.

I have only been dealing with Marantz for about 3 years myself, but I have yet to have any product go bad on us - considering Marantz is our biggest line, those are pretty goood numbers - well, there may have been one DVD player I think. As far as discretes go - You got 'em! I do all the remote programming for our company, we use pronto, and Marantz has been extremely accomadating with discretes - at least for my purposes (on/off, tuner presets). I don't think you can go wrong with the stuff. The other benefit is that Marantz is one of the few, if not the only mid-fi company that you won't find in the big box stores.

We were Marantz dealers from about 1997 to 2003. The first several years went very well with the exception of the DVD players. I don't know what happened, poor quality control, but in the last year with them we had HORRIBLE reliability.

In one order of a case of 4 SR-8200's we had to send back 3 of them. DVD players constantly had to go back.

Problems ranged from no video switching, error message on start-up, blown amp channels, IR lockup when using the IR jacks in the back, etc... We had one system with a Marantz cass player and Marantz receiver. Whenever the cass player was on the receiver would not accept IR commands. We have another receiver that will not accept IR commands when a plasma is on (35 feet away and two rooms over). The other NINE components in that system have no trouble.

Sound quality and customer service were always great, but the DOZENS of hours making free service calls, troubleshooting and sending, receiving and reinstalling components was killing us.

If reliability is #1 factor, run from Marantz.

Thanks DDeca. anyone else on either the thumbs up or down? Mostly over the past year?

Thumbs Up

thumb sideways - better choices for same money

We've sold Marantz for years, and had good luck generally. As a programmer, I hated the DVD's, but we've always sold more Pioneer Elites. The only real problem with receivers was a bad batch of memory caps... Lost digital input memory... No sound=emergency service calls... They seem to have fixed the latest batch...
PS Yamaha and Marantz both blow away Denon on the sound quality front, IMHO

Thumbs down is all I can say about them in good taste. Product reliabity was 50% in the past year was what I will say.

Marantz smokes denon any day of the week. Most of our theaters use marantz receivers and rarley do i have a problem........ thumbs up

Another problem was inconsistency.

Removable power cords on some of the components but not others. Different IR code labels for different receivers (DSS is TV on some, VCR2/DSS is VCR on some, DSS on other and AUX on other), no switched outlet on the preamp?, IR port on the rear works with IR sensors on some receivers but requires a Xantec interface on others. 12V triggers on some receiver, not other.

How bout this one... The first batch of DVD3200 (??) had no discrete power codes, later batchs did have them.

Mostly little things, but they can drive you crazy when troubleshooting.

DVD3200? What in the world is that? When was that?

I can't remember the model #, thought that was it. It was a $350 single disc DVD player from 2 years ago. I checked the Marantz site but apparently they have no info on non-current products. Nice support.