Review on Denon S650H 5.2 Channel AV Receiver, 4K UHD Home Theater Surround Sound (2019) with Music Streaming, HEOS Built-in, eARC, Upgraded HDCP by Ashley Williams

Like many people, I'm watching more and more streaming videos. At first it was short videos on youtube or netflix tv shows but when i started watching some movies i realized that there is no surround sound! After a bit of research, I found out that most streaming is in AAC format on DVD/BluRays as opposed to AC3 and dts audio formats. I uploaded some test videos and found that my 19 year old JVC AV amp played 6ch AAC as stereo, but when I converted them to AC3 they played as 5.1ch surround. (By the way, both formats play as 5.1 with VLC on my computer). So I decided it was time to upgrade to a new amp capable of AAC decoding. When I researched what to buy I couldn't find any descriptions that mentioned if they could decode AAC correctly. Hoping that all new AV amps now decode AAC, I bought a Denon AVR-S650H. Sounds good! It's nice to have HDMI inputs that JVC doesn't have. I love how it uses Bluetooth to connect to my phone, Google Home integration, and HEOS radios around the world. But it doesn't decode streaming AAC into 5.1 surround sound! It deducted 1 star. The other, which is actually a half-star dip, is the old, pixelated setup and on-screen display of information. Maybe one day there will be a firmware update that fixes these problems and I can give it another thought.