Yamaha RX-V483 Review

One step up from Yamaha’s entry-level model (RX-V383) you’ll find the RX-V483. Despite the modest price it includes multi-room and network capabilities as well as most other features you’d expect to find in a Yamaha AV receiver.

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Design and Build Quality

The look and design are pretty much the same as on its predecessor with a two part front panel. The upper part consists of a large and easily readable dot-matrix display hidden under an acrylic surface. The display is flanked by a standby button and input for the calibration microphone on the left and a ‘Direct’ button which lets you bypass any unnecessary processing of the audio signal on the right. Just below the display you’ll find the buttons to control the radio tuner.

The lower part houses most of the controls, such as a headphone output, input selector, SCENE buttons, a 3.5 millimeter input plus a USB-A port, and of course a large volume control knob.

The RX-V483 is, despite its relatively low cost, decently put together using quality aluminum and plastic, and by removing the single piece top/side cover we could take a closer look on the inside to see if the engineers at Yamaha have decided to use components of lesser quality to meet any budget restrictions that an AV receiver at this cost undoubtedly entails.

We spotted a Burr-Brown PCM9211 digital transceiver and PCM5101A 32-bit D/A converters, Toshiba C5198, A1941 and two large Nichicon output transistors, a Cinema DSP from Texas Instruments, ARM microcontroller from Toshiba, MN864788A HDMI 2.0 interface from Panasonic and Yamaha’s own NW-01 wi-fi module. This is all topped off by large aluminum cooling fins. So… no. No ‘restrictions’ here it would seem.

Moving on to the back panel to see the connectivity options; here we find three (3) inputs for analog audio devices and three (3) for digital devices (one optical, two coaxial), four (4) HDMI inputs and one (1) output. You’ll also find AM/FM antenna inputs, an ethernet port for those who want to hook up to a local network, wi-fi antenna, and an output for an active subwoofer of course. The speaker terminals are of standard type and you have the option to bi-amp the front speakers if you want more control. The power cord is unfortunately not detachable.

Features

We’ve gotten used to the fact that most AV receivers in the budget segment have more features than you can shake a stick at and this is definitely the case with the Yamaha RX-V483. Apart from the usual list of suspects, it also features MusicCast allowing you to connect the RX-V483 to devices in multiple rooms with access to all your stored music using a centralized control. Add to this support of high resolution files such as DSD128 and various streaming services like Spotify, Deezer, Pandora, Tidal, etc..

On the video side you get support for 4K Ultra HD, HDR, Dolby Vision, Hybrid Log-Gamma, and also BT.2020. Bluetooth and Wi-Fi is a given and so is AirPlay, and the USB port on the front allows you to connect an external Hard Drive. If you happen to store a lot of compressed (mp3 for example) music on your HD you’ll be very pleased to know that Yamaha has included their Compressed Music Enhancer function, which improves the quality of compressed music (well, most of it anyway) with surprisingly good results.

The included paraphernalia is a remote contol (with batteries), AM and FM antennas, User Manual on a CD-ROM, Quick Guides to the receiver and MusicCast, and the YPAO calibration microphone (making it very quick and easy to set up the receiver and get good results even if you’re a home cinema noob).

Sound Quality

We started off by calibrating the RX-V483 by using the YPAO microphone. Yamaha’s proprietary system does a pretty good job att setting the relative volumes and getting a well balanced sound, and watching movies was quite enjoyable without any obvious flaws. Ultimately, we did a calibration of our own using a level meter and our ears just to make sure we’d get an optimal performance.

Having 80 watts of power per channel should be plenty enough to drive a small to medium sized speaker system without trouble, but we did notice it having problems breathing when using more demanding speakers. We used Klipsch Reference Premium and Polk Audio Blackstone to do the more serious testing and the initial impressions was a clean, open and direct sound.

With Mad Max: Fury Road spinning in the Blu-ray player, we were presented to a thoroughly enjoyable ride through the desert – powerful explosions and excellent dynamics paired with fine details and a well-defined three-dimensional sound stage.

Music

As far as we can tell, the RX-V483 is using a different set of D/A converters compared to the previous model – the PCM1681 is now replaced by the PCM5101A (384kHz/32-bit). This should in theory mean a (slight) jump in sound quality, right? Well, Yamaha usually offers a detailed and clean performance and we can not only confirm that this is still the case but also confirm that is has indeed improved. With the new chip, details and textures are more finely resolved and this is of great benefit for both movies and music. The added sense of detail is even more evident when playing high resolution music – everything opens up and you can easily follow even the most complex music.