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(More customer reviews)Sony ES series has unfortunately over the years saw a staggering and fast decline in sales, due to the fact that they are very expensive to manufacture and therefore carry very steep prices. Sony Malaysia has stopped selling ES components since the STR-DA5300ES, and Sony USA (one of the last countries to sell them) has officially stopped selling their ES range on Sonystyle since the STR-DA5600ES, so it is only a matter of time before these high grade components disappear from the consumer market for good.
I have been using Sony's standard receivers since the STR-DE845 and STR-DE495. Upgraded to the ES series when Sony released the STR-DA5000ES with Component video switching and up-conversion, and I have not looked back since. While some of the 5000 ES series seem to be cramped with too many features, like dual external component power switching, dual subwoofer pre-out, Digital Legato Linear function etc, and enough soundfield algorithms to give you a migrain everytime you open the receiver's menu, this DA3500ES (my first 3000 series) seems to sit somewhere in the middle between the really stripped down 1000 ES series and the monstrous 6000 ES series.
The STR-DA3500ES comes with the following important features:
1) Farouja DCDi HDMI upconverter for analog sources,
2) High bitrate audio decoding (DTS-MA, Dolby TrueHD) up to 176kHz sampling frequency.
3) 7 independent parametric equalizers for the 7 audio channels to compensate for the speakers' sonic quality differences. These parametric equalizers are not manually adjustable and depend solely on the auto calibration function to tell them which frequencies need boosting or cutting.
4) 3 sets of equalizer controls, Front, Center, Surround / Surround back to boost or cut the bass and treble by 10dB. Floorstanders can be made to sound really punchy with enough bass to even cover for a weak subwoofer.
A note about the sampling frequency capabilities of receivers: older and cheaper Sony receivers such as the 2004's STR-DE497 can only handle sampling frequencies up to 48Khz. What this means is that if you stream digital signals (multi-channel or otherwise) having sampling frequencies higher than 48Khz into the receiver, the digital audio equalizers, the parametric equalizers (if any) along with the majority of the sound processors will not function. In short, your sweet-sounding, carefully adjusted receiver will all of a sudden sound flat for no reason. The STR-DA3400, DA5400 and a few slightly older ES receivers can handle up to 88.1kHz, but no more. However, most DTS-MA and Dolby TrueHD soundtracks go as high as 96kHz, and in theory can go as high as 192kHz. Sony is trying hard to catch up, but higher frequency sampling means exponentially costlier signal processors. Lucky for us there doesn't appear to be a single BD title out there with sampling frequency over 176kHz at the moment.
5) 4 HDMI in, 1 HDMI out. All 4 HDMI inputs accept full definition digital videos, LPCM, Dolby TrueHD and DTS-MA streams. The STR-DA5200ES support only LPCM audio and the entry level STR-DA1200ES only switches the HDMI videos. Multi-channel decoding on the DA1200ES along with a few entry level (non-ES grade) receivers require a separate optical or coaxial digital input.
6) Zone 2 and Zone 3 features (Zone 2 supports analog component video (HD) and audio output, Zone 3 supports analog audio only)
What the DA3500ES are missing and not doing so well on are (but not necessarily bad things if they don't bother you):
1) No Super Audio CD support, not even DSD streaming via HDMI.
2) A somewhat unusual input selection layout. There's BD, DVD, SAT but at the same time HDMI 1 through HDMI 4. The BD input can be set to use the video input from any of the HDMI inputs (the DVD and SAT can do the same as well), but it can't use the audio fed through the same input at the same time. HDMI 1 through 4 are therefore most likely going to be used by anyone who connects solely with HDMI only. It would be odd and confusing to rename HDMI 1 as a second "BD" or "DVD" input.
3) There is no option to force the receiver to receive only high bitrate audio. So far the newer Sony BD players, such as the BDP-S370 will only output multi-channel PCM into the receiver if you set the BD Audio Mix function (on the BD player) to on. Some people may prefer this as certain BD titles are encoded with sound responses such as clicks and chimes to tell you a button press has been received. If you keep this function on, the BD player will decode the high bitrate audios on the BD player and outputs them as LPCM to the receiver.
4) The system takes awhile to switch to the correct decoding engine (standard or high bitrate), normally around one second. It appears that the only way to get around this delay is to make the BD player output LPCM signals (see item 3). Some may prefer to have the receiver's more powerful processor to decode those high bitrate audio tracks and process them at their purest forms.
5) The digital inputs might have been tuned to be a little too sensitive in detecting changes in digital streams being fed into the receiver. I tried playing audio CDs digitally with this machine (using the Sony CDP-CX355) and the machine switches off its PCM decoder too soon after a track fades and comes back a little too late to decode the next song. As such, I end up with tiny gaps between songs when I play certain CDs with this receiver. Perhaps a software upgrade can fix this little problem (Sony I hope you're listening, we're paying good money here), or perhaps there is something I've missed while reading the instruction manual. I have a very old Sony receiver (the STR-DE497) that has no trouble keeping its PCM decoder on throughout the playback of a whole CD.
6) No dimmer control under the GUI. For the longest time I thought the option simply did not exist. It took me awhile to find the dimmer control under the flourescent display interface. In order to access this function, you will have to turn off the GUI and access the menu using the built-in flourescent display.
7) HDMI is version 1.3 only, so does not support 3D sources (the newer DA3600ES does).
8) No networking function whatsover, this is strictly a "cables" only system.
However, it feels like I'm nickpicking here (except for item 5 in the negative column?). The main function of any receiver is to decode and deliver great home theatre sound, and Sony ES receivers (perhaps with the exception of the STR-DA5000ES) have never disappointed me before.
So, for those of you who have had the opportunity to use the more expensive ES receivers (like the DA5200ES or DA5300ES), you will notice a handful of items missing from the GUI controls. Nothing to worry about though, as they don't seem to affect the sound, at least not to my ears. I have intended to get the DA5500ES, but decided against spending that much money on a soon to be obsolete receiver.
The STR-DA3500ES sounds abosolutely visceral and truely elevates your auditory senses beyond those plastic satellite speaker home theatre systems. Get one and pair it with Sony's MF series HiFi speakers before they disappear from the market for good.
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