A/V or Not A/V? It's not even a relevant question.

A lot of people try to cheat nowadays with Home Theater in a Box systems (HTIB) for the home theater setup. Not me. Personally, I am an A/V Receiver guy. The prices in the A/V market have been coming down so substantially, that you need to begin to question whether plunking down $200 to $300 on a cheap HTIB is a better value than doubling down on an A/V receiver (and separate speakers of course). And the chances are, you probably already have a set of speakers you can use if you do not feel like the added cost of a new set right now. Most A/V units now push a 7.1 surround, but your old 5.1 seakers will work just as well until the coffer you emptied for the perfect value receiver gets refilled (screw my 401k, the cookie jar is calling).

I have been waiting for the right time to buy a new A/V receiver that pumps out a truly high end HD format for a respectable price. The Onkyo TX-SR606 was the latest target of my A/V envy, despite it only moderately improving upon the game-changer that was the 505 last year. But now Sony just put themselves back into my line of sight with the new STR-DG920. Check out Cnet's video below or check out the full review after the jump.



If the Sony is not for you here's Cnet's Matthew Moskovciak with a nice roundup of the latest in the A/V category. The time to buy might be right now. And it starts and ends with A/V, not HTIB.