Marantz or Denon receiver ?

Go with the Marantz.I have a Sr 880.Its a great unit for Home Theater.

I traded up my Denon 2800 for the 3300-total outlay of 7 bills (Audio Store purchase, the 3300 was 30 days old and a trade up on the 4800)- I've been running in my HT for 3 months, some real heavy use, like letting it spin CD's all day when I'm at work and haven't had any problems. I feel it's a well built piece of gear. It uses a 3 stage cooling fan and vents that have to remain relatively clear of obstructions. The fan will cycle on and off as unit's temp calls for. I haven't found it to be problematic as it is very quiet. The 3300 really shines on DVD titles like Matrix, 3 Kings , and Star Wars. Denon has a very informative website www.del.denon.com-- which goes into excellant detail of the build quality and componets. If I had to replace mine I'd give serious consideration to either Outlaw Audio's 2 products [ home theater 6.1 chan int. amp for 6 bills, or their HT monster 165 WPC- 5 channel amp for $1K (outlawaudio.com)] or the ATI 1505 for $1500 (150 wpc/ 5.1). You didn't mention whether you're going to use it for tunes. I had no idea that the dynamics and power requirements are so different between movie soundtracks and music. I found out after a friend let me test drive some tube gear with my source gear and speakers. Now I'm a bottle freak (wannabe) :-). So the 3300 remains for HT, where IMHO it flat out rocks. For tunes the fire bottles rule! hope to have been some help have fun!

Yamaha RX-V1 or the Denon AVR-4800 they are very similar I actually prefer the Yamaha myself because of previous purchases. My dealer sells both and says its a toss up. How about Sunfires Theater Grande II?

You might also want to check out the Nakamichi AV10; I listened to the various Denon, Marantz, and Harmon Kardon receivers at around 1-1.5K and this was (to my ears) the best of the bunch. You should be able to get a new one for between $900-1000. Also, check out the reviews on www.audioreview.com.

What a timely post as I am currently considering the Morantz SR-7000 and the Denon AVR-3300 for 50/50 HT/Music. Seems to me the Denon offer more for less $. But I haven't heard it yet and the Morantz may still hold the high groung as far as sound quality.