New Yamaha RX-V377 targets budget home cinema buyers

£250 five-channel AVR to hit shops next month

Yamaha has today confirmed its first new AV receiver of 2014, the entry-level RX-V377.

Priced at £250 and available from April, it's a five-channel design (power quoted at 100W per channel into six ohms) and with four-in, one-out HDMI connectivity. The HDMI output offers 4K passthrough and Audio Return Channel (ARC) compatibility.

While the lack of Ethernet or Wi-Fi means the RX-V377 can't be used as a media hub on a home network, it still offers some handy features to the budget buyer. Novices will no doubt appreciate the YPAO speaker setup/calibration system (with supplied microphone) and SCENE presets for simplified operation, while iPod/iPhone owners can utilise the RX-V377's front USB input for music playback and device charging. The AVR is also compatible with Yamaha's YBA-11 Bluetooth adapter, enabling audio streaming from Bluetooth sources. Onboard Compressed Music Enhancer tech works to buff up the quality of MP3s.

Other features of the RX-V377 include a discrete amp configuration, 192kHz/24-bit Burr Brown DACs, low-jitter PLL circuitry and a SILENT CINEMA mode for headphone listening.

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