Why You Can Trust CNET Yamaha YHT-492AU review: Yamaha YHT-492AU
Yamaha presents the YHT-492AU, a complete home theatre system in one big box, which is a fine choice if you're after no-fuss home theatre shopping.
Home theatre systems generally come in two flavours: there’s the DIY approach of separate AV component matching, or you can opt for the one-stop shop and get yourself a home-theatre-in-a-box system. Generally speaking, the former is the way to better audio and video performance, while the latter is convenient and hassle-free. Fancy a bit of both? That's where Yamaha's range of home theatres come in to their own.
Yamaha YHT-492AU
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
Design and features
Combining the best of both worlds, the Yamaha YHT-492AU comprises a "proper" AV receiver and a 7.1-sub/sat speaker system with an iPod dock thrown in as well. All you need to add is a DVD or Blu-ray player, a TV and you're away. The engine room is the RX-V565 receiver, which boasts a 7x 105-Watt output, the latest surround audio decoding including Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio, full HD 1080p video support and decent HDMI connectivity with four inputs and one output.
The compact satellite speakers all share the same two-way design and are tonally matched to provide an even spread of surround sound. The active subwoofer provides the bass using an 8-inch driver powered by 70 Watts of amplification and all are automatically calibrated on the receiver using its YPAO (Yamaha Parametric Room Acoustic Optimizer) speaker set-up and supplied microphone. Finished in a piano black high gloss with real timber baffles, the satellites look well constructed and will fit with a modern interior décor.
Yamaha's YDS-11 Apple iPod dock and a decent system remote complete what is a well designed and implemented AV surround sound system.
Performance
We like the uncomplicated calibration and accuracy of Yamaha's YPAO system. Speaker sizes, distances levels and delays are set and the guesswork's taken out of what can be a fiddly process. And the beauty of a sub/sat system such as this is that it needn't dominate the room with speaker boxes, but it will fill it with decent surround sound. That's precisely what this Yamaha delivers, especially in 7.1-channel configuration and the combination of substantial bass courtesy of the subwoofer and an even spread from the satellites soon had our AV room buzzing with convincing surround sound effects and nimble placement.
The centre speaker is a little bigger than the rest with an additional 55mm driver and — despite still being very small — it lends plenty of body to what is the most used channel in any surround sound system. Dialogue and other centrally-placed effects are handled well with speech locked centrally to the screen, while for a small speaker it disperses quite well and doesn’t sound too localised. The same goes for the remaining satellites, which do a decent enough job of producing larger sound fields than you'd expect from such small speakers. Don't expect to fill a stadium, but this Yamaha collection will furnish the average living room with plenty of sound. A touch of the massively powerful sounding War of the Worlds had the subwoofer rumbling to its limits, and while it put in a valiant effort there's only so far it — and the rest of the speakers, for that matter — can be pushed.
The RX-V565 receiver's a goody, much like the current mainstream Yamaha crop and proved it was more than capable of driving the 7.1 speakers. On-board decoding can handle all that Blu-ray has to throw at it and for a relatively inexpensive unit the RX-V565 is well reasonably spec'd and delivers plenty of movie soundtrack thrills and spills. Any action sequence from the BD of Casino Royale demonstrated this well with the Yamaha capably generating the sonic speed and dynamic energy to match the on-screen mayhem. It steered and placed effects nice and tightly, produced a big, open soundstage and generally went about its movie surround sound making business without complaint or duress.
With music, the picture wasn't quite so rosy and we found the system lacked some warmth and detail in straight stereo. Things improve with a little bit of DSP help, such as listening in Pro Logic II Music mode, but if you're planning on serious music listening, a more sympathetic receiver and speaker package would be better auditioned. For everyday "chuck a CD on" music or background FM radio while you’re doing something else, then this system's fine.
Conclusion
Home theatre-in-a-box systems can be downright nasty. Yamaha's trying to raise the performance levels of said systems and give them a bit of AV cred, which it's successfully doing so with the likes of the YHT-492AU. If you don't want the hassle of mixing and matching, here's one solution in one box, albeit quite a big one.