Harman Kardon AVR2600 7.1-channel black home theater receiver

Take control

Hey, your home theater's receiver is maybe its most important piece of equipment. Sure, the HDTV displays the video played back by your Blu-ray player, DVD player, or satellite receiver, and your surround sound speakers actually do the work of reproducing your favorite music and sound tracks. But it's the receiver that acts as a hub for it all, linking and coordinating all of your home theater components into a seamless and unified system. However, most receivers don't give you much of a hand at all when it comes to actually controlling your system. While many receivers offer awkward on-screen menus, the Harman/Kardon AVR 2600 brings you a high definition graphical user interface. Navigating, accessing, and controlling all of your system's functionalities is simple, using the interface on your video display and the included learning remote control.

First, the audio (HD audio, nonetheless)

Harman/Kardon's AVR 2600 takes audio seriously. Not only does this home theater receiver serve up powerful, multi-channel audio output, but it also equips you to experience the studio-quality surround sound found on HD sources like Blu-ray Disc. First, using Harman/Kardon's acclaimed, high-current, ultra-wide-bandwidth amplifier sections, the AVR 2600 is able to serve up a full seven channels of audio at 80W each. Now, you might be wondering what you're going to do with a seven-speaker audio system in your living room. While DVD video offered 5.1-channel, compressed surround sound, Blu-ray Disc is able to achieve a full 7.1 channels of uncompressed, studio-quality audio. And ensuring that you experience every nuance of every Blu-ray movie sound track just as the director intended, the AVR 2600 features integrated Dolby TrueHD and dts-HD Master Audio decoding. For powerful surround sound decoding for a variety of other sources, this Harman/Kardon receiver also sports multiple other Dolby and dts technologies, as well as Harman/Kardon's Logic 7 processing, which generates virtual 5.1- and 7.1-channel audio from traditional 2-channel sources.

And then, the video (DVD meets 1080p)

While the AVR 2600's HDMI inputs and output are ideal for transmitting Full HD 1080p video from your Blu-ray player to your HDTV, they're also essential for sending your 1080p DVD video to your HDTV. Whoa! Hold on just a second; did we say "1080p DVD video"? Yes, we did. Featuring built-in Faroudja DCDi Cinema video upconversion technology, the AVR 2600 is able to upconvert standard definition video sources like DVD to near-HD levels, ideal for viewing on your HDTV.

Into the second Zone

Let's say the rest of the family is in the living room watching a movie, but you want to kick back in the bedroom and listen to a favorite album. Now, you could go and invest in a second audio player and receiver for the bedroom, or you could use the AVR 2600's multi-room audio capability. The AVR 2600 lets you divert two of the channels from the 7.1-channel surround sound configuration to a second area as a stereo pair. The AVR 2600 even lets you direct a second audio source to your new second-zone area, allowing you to use a single component to create two home audio areas.

The advanced connectivity of HDMI

Bringing you the absolute best in connectivity, Harman/Kardon's AVR 2600 features four HDMI inputs and one output. HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface) is the only interface in consumer electronics that can carry both uncompressed high-definition (HD) video and uncompressed multi-channel audio in all HD formats including 720p, 1080i and even 1080p. Your incoming media content comes in a variety of sizes, resolutions and formats, and with that in mind, HDMI systems automatically configure to display that content in the most effective format. Since HDMI carries all channels on video and audio, there is only one cable to plug into any HDMI-enabled source and display device. No more complicated cable set-up when installing your home theater system, and no more ugly cable mess behind your components. HDMI supports standard, enhanced, or high-definition video, plus multi-channel digital audio on this single cable. Also, HDMI is fully backward-compatible with DVI. (Please note that a physical adapter, sold separately, is needed to make the conversion from HDMI to DVI.)

Your HD lifeline

High Definition Multimedia Interface, or HDMI, is the only home A/V connection that allows for both Full HD 1080p video and 7.1-channel studio-quality audio to be passes along a single cable. In other words, in order to take full advantage of your home theaterâ€™s high definition potential, you need to HDMI cabling to link HD-capable components. Itâ€™s only natural that you might have questions regarding how best to outfit your personal HD system. Vannâ€™s sales representatives are here to explain all of your options. Call the 800 number at the top of this page for expert advice.