Oppo 105 and Cary 11 Surround Processor

I use an Oppo 105 with a Cary 11a. Some previous informations needs to be corrected. The 105 sets speaker distance in quarter foot intervals; subs can be farther away than mains; bass management is available if you set SACD output to PCM. The sound from one of top Anthems may equal that of the Cary, but that seems to be in dispute. If you can afford a Classe SSP 800, that would be a good choice, but I haven't seen one used for under about $6K.

The analog section of the 105 is superior to that of the 103. It has an HDMI port on the back and another on the front, as well as an asynchronous USB port. The 105 is essentially a processor, so if it has sufficient ports, you may want to skip a separate processor and go directly from the 105 to a multichannel amp.

I take analog 7.1 and balanced stereo from the Oppo 105 to a Cary 11a. The inputs of the 11a are set to bypass, so the 105 does the processing, sets speaker distances, crossover, and so forth. Video goes directly from the 105 to a projector -- a DirecTV HD-DVR uses the rear HDMI port of the 105, a Mac Mini the USB port. A Sony XA5400ES and phono stage are the other inputs to the 11a, so I need a separate processor, and chose the Cary 11a for its audio quality, knowing it was buggy with HDMI. Video and audio with the setup are superb.

db

I wouldn't argue for either the Anthem or Cary processors if the Oppo 105 provides sufficient ports. I doubt the Anthem provides room correction if the input is analog and re-digitization bypassed.

I use a Velodyne SMS-1 bass manager to provide room correction for my two HGS-15 subs where wave lengths make correction most critical.

If cost is important and OP needs more ports than a 105 offers, I'd look for a previous model Integra like an 80.1 to use with a 103 and go HDMI all the way from source to amp.

By the way, I use multichannel amp generically to mean multiple amps. I use Proceed HPA 2, HPA 3, and an Amp 2 that's rarely powered up, because it drives two rear speakers. The HPAs are 500 watts per channel into 4 ohms, the Amp 2 250 watts. The speakers are KEF Reference 107/2 mains and 102 center and surrounds.

db