Title says it all, really. My amp is on its last legs. I'd like to replace it and an AV receiver would allow me to have all my hdmi things plugged in at once, currently I have to swap the consoles over all the time.

I don't always want to use the amp for TV, I'm happy enough with TV speakers for boring TV stuff. I've already worked out that the amp I'm looking at does pass through on standby so that's fine. But I really can't be arsed with surround sound and subwoofers and cables and all that Shite.
If I only hook up two speakers is it normal for av receivers to downmix to 2.0? Or do I have to relay on the devices output 2.0 with varying degrees of success?

Looking at this amp: http://m.richersounds.com/#!/product/ONKY-TXSR333-BLK

I've got an ONKYO AV Receiver and it has the option to pick what speaker setup you have. I've got mine as 5.0 because I have no subwoofer. All my devices output 5.1 over HDMI and I let the receiver decide what to do.

Just turned off the surround speakers + centre speaker and it downmixes to 2.0.

There you go

What Ant said - I use my receiver for 5.1 and for stereo. It's an old amp now, and has a button on the front to force whatever you're putting through it into stereo. Might be best to download the manual from the manufacturer's site if they do one and check from there...

I have the Onkyo HT-R393, it has a different menu set-up to Ant's, but does exactly the same thing in letting you choose which speakers are attached to it. Until recently I only had front left and right connected, due to moving and being too lazy to run speaker cable where I needed it, and had the amp set to 2.1 without having to change any of the source audio.

Perfect! Thanks (and to graph and matt).

So onkyo are OK then? Sounds like a brand of yoghurt, as long as music doesn't sound like it's got added Fraudulide R then I'll be happy.

I did find the manual earlier to find out about pass through when the amp is off. Didn't think to look up down mixing :$

Onkyo seem pretty popular and I remember when I was looking fairly priced. No issues with mine. Got a reasonable deal on it a few years ago. Never actually bought a decent speaker setup though.

Cool. I'll decide if I can face spending the money next week.

Onkyo was and is a good brand, I wish I had purchased their 6 disc CD player years ago.

6 discs at once? That'd sound horrible.

Oh, brother.  (fail)

Damnit, I'm sure that amp was £150 when I looked at it originally. £180 now :(

Or there's this one for £185, with NETWORK AND ANDROID APPPP1!!!1

http://www.richersounds.com/showclearanceproduct/YAMA-RXV477-BLK/Yamaha+Rxv477.html

That says £205 here. Are you reading these properly?

VIP club.

What, Kos is a VIP? Pffffff

I joined when I got my amp. Meant I got whatever percent they were offering at the time, plus another £10 and it was on sale. I don't think the guys behind the counter (I actually went into a real shop!!) appreciated all the reductions I got.

Like Ant says, I'm a VIP so get 10% off on clearance items.

Stop dithering and get some beats :@

Also, I've been put off Onkyo because of past overheating and HDMI board issues - but they might've fixed that nowadays...