Digital Trends

Onkyo Envision LS-V500C April 9th, 2003 | by Doug MacLean

Main Features

While reviewing this unit I had to approach it as three separate systems. There is the DVD player, the receiver and the speaker system. While they work in near perfect unison they each have features distinct to their function.

The DVD player exceeds many popular stand alone models. The player is a 5 disc carasoul and can support a mixture of formats including: DVD-Video discs, CDs, VCD, audio CD-RW/R, and MP3 CDs. The player has the ability to play Pro Logic II, Dolby 5.1 and DTS discs. Only six channel formats are supported for the later two formats. This blue lit digital display on the DVD player is easy to read, clear and for the most part informative. There are the usual extras for the DVD player as required by the DVD standard. Among these are freeze frame, slow motion, fast forward and reverse frame advance. For the fast forward mode you can choose from three speeds, 2x, 4x, 8x and 16x. For reverse there are 2x, 4x and 8x. I did notice that the picture resumes at the exact frame you are on when you return to normal play mode. In many players I have tested there was a little skip not present here. The repeat mode offers the whole disc, chapter, title, track or even all five discs. There is also an A-B repeat where you can specify the portion of the current disc to repeat. Up to nine bookmarks can be specified. Unfortunately, the bookmarks are specific to the current disc and are erased when you move to another disc in the tray. For fans of Quentin Tarantino that want to watch the movie Pulp Fiction in chorological order you can specify the order each track is played. One nice little touch is the ability to pop a graphic menu on the screen. This way instead of hunting for the button on the remote control you can use the left, right and enter buttons to choose most common functions. When a function changes there is a little dialogue box that opens on the screen to keep you informed. For playing MPG3 files your disc's directory structure is shown permitting you to build a play list for listening. Again, turning off the machine or going to another disc erases it. Of course other DVD functions such as parental control, password and aspect ratio (4:3, 4:3 letterbox and 16:9) are all present. If you are playing a recordable disc, DVD or CD, the disc must be finalized before play. Basically, this means you have to close the record session and write a standard table of contents before the player will recognize the disc.

The receiver is consistent with modern technology and can hold its own with many mid-range separate units. It provides 100 watts RMS to each of five speakers, front, rear and center. There is a pre-amplifier output for a powered sub woofer; no provisions are made for a passive sub.  You can select either the main six channel speaker output or a two channel remote speaker set. Throw a couple of out door speakers on the second set and you have music for a rocking patio party. Consider the amount of music a MPEG3 disc can hold and with a five disc tray you can part for a long time without going back to insert new discs. Once you have all your home theater equipment cabled to the receiver it is rather easy to select which component you want to use. The default mode for AV1 and AV2 are the high end digital audio connections. AV1 defaults to the optical jack while the AV2 prefers to use the digital coaxial port. The VCR port and AV1 port provide both input and output so you need to place any recording equipment there with the source of the recording located on AV2. The Envision can connect to either a standard interlaced television or a newer progressive scan, component sets. The display is of course the same as used by the DVD player, again, nice and easy to read. If all these sources of music are not enough for you the Envision also has an FM and AM radio tuner. You can preset up to thirty radio stations or go into free form mode and search for the station of your choice. There is a provision for boosting weak stations but I found it only marginal in its effects. Unfortuntely there is no bass and treble tone controls. These settings are configured through the onscreen menu and is calculate by the distance between the speakers. You set the size of the room and distance yourself; the tone is factory set at “flat”.

Some cost to performance trade off has to be made with a complete home theater in a box. Usually, as is the case here, the speakers are the trade off. They are good starter speakers and provide good performance but they are on the small side and suffer a little bit with low frequency response. The front and rear speakers are satellite two way units. The enclosed mid range gave a smooth response with all but the highest frequency. The woofer held without rattle for most of the rest of the audio spectrum. There where no tweeter for the higher frequencies. The center speaker is also two way and did a passable job with the dialogue. The active sub woofer is rated at 150 watts and was the best of the provided speaker set.

There is actually four parts to this set. The remote control is great. Unlike many universal remotes provided with home theater sets this one not only accepts a manufacturer code to add functions but it is a true learning remote. Just put it into learning mode, point another remote in front of it and the function is transferred. The remote's memory is enough to learn most of the functions you need but where possible stick with the preset functions. The remote light up with a soft green glow and is easy to read in the dark.