MEDIA SERVER REVIEWS

I owned a demo unit of the vsx -53 and I loved it great sound, it blew and I now have a 2012 sc-65 Pioneer elite though I love it and it sounds great but its missing something from the vsx-53 I dont know why and the sc65 sounds great but I still wish i had the vsx-53 so good for you still using one

I had long been looking for a HDD-based unit to use as a storage and playback of my CDs. This fits the bill well. Good build quality and quiet. Has an intuitive interface and sounds great. Expandable by virtue of the USB port in the back. I had ripped most of my CDs to ALAC files for use on an iPod Classic, so I was pretty much ready to go. Files transfer faster with a wired network connection, so I set the unit up with that for the initial transfer, and now just do the additions over wi-fi. Has it's own screen for navigation, and the iphone app works well. Some downsides related to the app: the app must reconnect with the player every time you want to use it--I think this is more related to the iphone than the player. The app has the ability to turn off the player but won't turn it on, since it can't connect to the player when the player is off. (Do'h!) Also, the player doesn't automatically power up when you want to transfer songs from your computer, you have to turn it on first--can be an issue if your player and computer are far from each other. The player sometimes turns off in the middle of transferring, stopping the process, but will pick up where it left off once the process is re-initiated. I haven't been able to figure out how to get the transfer program's auto-transfer feature to work. Also, I have a fair number of SACDs, and since there is no program to rip the DSD from them to my computer, I still have to play them on an SACD player. Haven't really gotten into computer HR audio tracks yet but I will try it soon.

Not to pick nits, but the unit appears to also have an optical digital input.

is the OG Apple, not trying to become them..