So I'm a noob that just blew a wad on the 901. I'm not an audiophile but like the convenience of the powered 2nd zone and the net-tune stuff (it's playing on BOSE AM6III - no snickers please, small room, wife didn't want big speakers) and it sounds awesome! Only problem is that my router shows the line stepping down from 100mbps to 10mbps when hooked up to the unit. Now I ran and crimped the cable myself (I know... dork!) but when I put a laptop on it the router light for the port goes back green (100 mbps). Just wondering of anyone else has seen the same. I know the unit runs on its own protocol so I'm hoping this is a by-product of that and not evidence of a future problem. Called Onkyo product support and they said... huh?
Jason: the NR901 is only 10Base-T at the RJ-45 jack on the back. Simply put, it doesn't "support" 100Mbps Ethernet.
The reason the manual "suggest" a 100Mbps "switch" is because ethernet switches are better at sustaining maximum bandwidth between two devices on the network / switch.
So, the 100Mbps light will never come on when you connect the NR901.
geekboy: thanks for the info! That sucks though... I was debating stepping down to a cheaper receiver and getting the net-tune unit separately as I was concerned with getting caught in a "tightly coupled" situation and now I'm wondering if I should have gone that route. Any insight as to whether ot not Onkyo intends to remedy in the future? I'm sure 10mbps is enough to stream a single mp3 but it seems like a silly oversight on their part.
Jason: I have no idea. It is very strange that they didn't choose to put in 100Mbit support. Most of these decisions, however, come down to the cost of parts, or other design issues. They may have tried the 100Mbit but got a lot of interference/RFI/EFI from some other internal components and couldn't get the 100Mbps speed to work. So many reasons...
10mbps is plenty. I've had the 901 for a while After 8 months of research, the Onkyo 901 is the best decision I could have ever made. The clean sound and raw power can not be beat. Nobody has anything like net tunes either. I found a work around where I can actually view the mp3's on two seperate TV's on seperate floors. With RF remote (even if you wanted to use the IR it would work) I can keep my surround sound and all hardware in the basement (zone 1) but select mp3s with the onkyo remote on a TV upstairs playing through the upstairs zone 2 speakers. If anyone wants to know how to do this just email me
Love more details on your config! I'm going in the same direction but zone 2 for me will be screened-in porch. Did you get a second remote? Can you designate a second remote exclusively for zone 2 or do you have do constantly hit the zone 2 button first? I'm waiting for the RF component to come in so I can give it a whirl!
Happy to share the details of the config. To view the net tunes on two screens in different zones:
Take a Y jack and place the male end into the monitor out of the receiver. Then take a male to male RCA and plug one end into one of the female ends of the Y jack, and the other into the DVD input of the receiver. Take another male to male RCA cable and plug one end into the OTHER female end of the Y jack and run it to your Zone 1 monitor. Your last wire is yet another male to male RCA cable and it runs between the Zone 2 OUTPUT on the receiver to the video INPUT of your Zone 2 monitor. Just draw your self a picture and it will all make sense. If not, call me at 703-338-5527 and I can walk you through it. It works!
Basically you are taking the monitor out info in the receiver, looping it back into the receiver, then outputting that info from zone 2 to the 2nd monitor. Have fun.
I have some questions about how you're doing your RF. Any specifics may help me.
Thanks. I assumed that the net-tune screen would display to zone 2 output without the loop back. Seems odd that you have to do that...
On the RF front I just want to be able to have 2 remotes. 1 for zone 1 and 1 for zone 2 and be able to dedicate the zone 2 remote to zone 2 without constantly hitting the zone 2 button. I haven't tried this yet but I will be in the future.