It has been a long while since we had a Marantz AVR in for review. The premium brand has taken something of a back seat while its parent company (previously Sound United, now Masimo) has instead focused on sending products from sister brand Denon out for review. That makes sense to a degree.
We review on a performance-per-pound basis and Denon products, though far from cheap, are performance-per-pound masters. , though, tend to be priced a bit higher and have usually been styled to a degree that Denons have not. Now, though, we have the new Marantz Cinema 30 in for review.
A UK-exclusive review, no less. So what has changed? We suspect that Masimo simply feels that it has a great-sounding AVR on its hands. One that can justify its premium price with an equally premium performance.
If that is its evaluation, we have good news: it’s very much our evaluation, too. Price The Marantz Cinema 30’s premium price is £4000 / $4500 / AU$7900. That makes it vastly more expensive than the with which it shares some components and features.
It’s also much more expensive than the preceding was at launch – though that was in 2020. It’s much less expensive, though, than the Award-winning , which has only seven channels of amplification compared with the Marantz’s 11. It is worth noting that the US and Australian versions of the Cinema 30 have an FM/AM tuner whereas the UK (and EU) version does not.
We have been assured that the units available in each region are otherwise identica.
