Pioneer has made a triumphant return to the AV receiver market after a four-year hiatus, launching a pair of mid-range models: the VSX-LX505 and the focus of our in-depth review, the Pioneer Elite Vsx-lx305. While marketed as part of the ‘Elite’ range in the USA, branding differences aside, the VSX-LX305 delivers the same high-performance promise to discerning home theater enthusiasts worldwide. This receiver is packed with features designed to elevate your movie, music, and gaming experiences, making it a compelling option in the competitive mid-range category. Let’s delve into what makes the Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 a standout contender.
Sound Quality: Immersive Audio Performance
The Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 immediately showcases one of Pioneer’s core strengths: a powerful and dynamic delivery of multi-channel film soundtracks. If you crave a cinematic experience that is both grand and impactful, this AV receiver warrants serious consideration. While its musicality might not be its absolute pinnacle, the VSX-LX305 compensates with a dramatic and engaging performance that truly brings movies to life.
Take a film like Elvis, for instance. The VSX-LX305’s precise Dolby Atmos decoding transports you directly into the vibrant concert halls, rendering each musical number with remarkable clarity and focus. The tight, impactful bass adds weight to the drums, enhancing the overall energy and excitement of the music.
A vibrant scene from the movie Elvis, showcasing the Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305’s ability to bring musical performances to life with clarity and impactful bass.
The receiver truly shines with action-packed blockbusters like Edge of Tomorrow. The VSX-LX305 nimbly decodes complex multi-channel audio, leveraging its nine channels of built-in amplification to create a truly immersive sonic landscape. The chaotic beach landing scene becomes a visceral and exhilarating assault on your senses, highlighting the receiver’s ability to handle dynamic shifts and intricate sound design with ease.
The processor expertly steers sounds between speakers, creating a seamless and enveloping soundfield. The inclusion of Dirac Live room correction further refines the audio experience, providing a noticeable improvement in tonal balance compared to Pioneer’s proprietary MCACC system. This ensures a consistent sonic signature as effects move around the room, adding to the realism and immersion. Crucially, even during the most intense action sequences, dialogue remains crisp and clear, ensuring you never miss a word.
Experience the frenetic action of Edge of Tomorrow with the Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305, delivering nimble decoding and powerful amplification for a truly visceral sonic assault.
Black Adam provides another excellent demonstration of the VSX-LX305’s capabilities with bass-heavy and bombastic sound mixes. The receiver delivers the necessary scale and slam to complement the film’s larger-than-life action, perfectly capturing the power and presence of the titular anti-hero. The Dolby Atmos track is utilized to its full potential, enveloping you in a bubble of sound as gunfire ricochets around the room and a deep, malevolent rumble accompanies Black Adam’s flights and powerful attacks. The Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 orchestrates all channels effectively, creating a believable three-dimensional soundstage, especially when utilizing four overhead channels for a truly immersive experience with Atmos, DTS:X, or IMAX Enhanced content.
While the receiver offers various advanced surround modes like Classical, Drama, Game, Action, and Sports, purists will likely prefer to experience the original audio mix without sonic manipulation. However, the Dolby Surround and DTS Neural:X upmixers are surprisingly adept at revitalizing older soundtracks, breathing new life into legacy content.
Living with the Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305: Design, Features, and Connectivity
The Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 maintains the brand’s classic AV receiver aesthetic, featuring a familiar layout with an input selector on the left, a volume control on the right, and a central display. Below the display, you’ll find essential controls, a headphone jack, and a convenient front-mounted HDMI 2.0 input, alongside a USB port and a microphone setup jack for room calibration.
The build quality is commendable for a mid-range receiver, presenting a brushed metal front plate and available in matte black or silver finishes. However, the included remote control is a notable letdown. It’s a basic plastic remote that feels somewhat cheap and lacks backlighting, feeling like an afterthought in an otherwise well-featured package.
Fortunately, the Pioneer Remote App is a significant improvement, offering an excellent, user-friendly interface. The app grants access to multiroom and streaming functionalities, comprehensive control features, and various setup options, including Dirac Live. This app-based Dirac Live interface marks a first for AV receivers, streamlining the room correction process.
Around the back, the Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 reflects a modern approach by streamlining legacy connections. It includes single optical and coaxial digital inputs, along with four analog stereo inputs. Vinyl enthusiasts will appreciate the inclusion of a phono (MM) input, and a built-in DAB/FM tuner caters to radio listeners.
The focus is clearly on HDMI 2.1, with six inputs and dual outputs on the rear panel, all supporting cutting-edge features like 8K/60p, upscaling, Dolby Vision, and ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode). One output supports eARC (Enhanced Audio Return Channel), enabling lossless audio transmission from compatible TVs. The second HDMI output facilitates multi-zone audio, typically for a second room setup.
For network connectivity, the VSX-LX305 provides an Ethernet port and extensive wireless options, including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, AirPlay 2, and Chromecast. Multiroom audio is supported via DTS Play-Fi, Roon Ready, and Sonos Connect, and music streaming services like Amazon Music, Spotify, Tidal, and Deezer are readily accessible.
The on-screen user interface has been significantly revamped, presenting an informative, intuitive, and visually appealing experience. The setup process is simplified thanks to a guided wizard that walks you through each step. A web-based interface is also available for more advanced configuration and tweaking.
The Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 incorporates nine channels of built-in amplification, utilizing Pioneer’s Direct Energy Class AB amplifiers. The 170W per channel output should be ample for most room sizes. It’s important to note that there are no pre-outs (except for dual subwoofer outputs), limiting power upgrades.
This receiver supports Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, and IMAX Enhanced, but processing is capped at 9 channels, matching the amplification. This limits speaker configurations to a maximum of 5.1.4 or 7.1.2 setups. For those seeking a more immersive experience, a 7.1.2 configuration is generally recommended.
One unique setup aspect is the global crossover setting, which applies to all channels simultaneously. This differs from many receivers that allow individual crossover settings per speaker. The Pioneer offers selectable global crossover frequencies of 50, 80, 100, 150, and 200Hz. The chosen frequency will be limited by the speaker with the highest low-frequency response in your system.
Pioneer has long included its MCACC room correction in its receivers. While user-friendly, it has historically been less effective at bass management. The VSX-LX305 addresses this by incorporating Dirac Live room correction, a superior third-party platform, implemented here with an innovative app-based interface.
This app-based Dirac Live implementation simplifies the setup process considerably. Initial setup is done via the receiver, followed by microphone connection and step-by-step instructions within the Dirac app. The app displays results similarly to laptop-based Dirac implementations, though fine-tuning options are somewhat limited. Direct comparisons between MCACC and Dirac Live clearly demonstrate Dirac’s superior bass smoothing, improved cohesion, and enhanced overall tonal balance.
Conclusion
The Pioneer Elite VSX-LX305 stands out as a muscular and heroic performer for multi-channel audio, making it an excellent choice for film enthusiasts. Its array of streaming options also caters to music lovers, and HDMI 2.1 connectivity ensures gamers can enjoy next-generation gaming features like 4K/120p and VRR.
It supports all major immersive audio formats, including Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, and IMAX Enhanced, and handles various HDR formats flawlessly. The addition of Dirac Live is a significant advantage, offering superior room correction and user-friendly app-based operation compared to Pioneer’s MCACC.
The design is minimalist and functional, build quality is respectable for its class, and the display is informative. Connectivity is comprehensive with ample HDMI ports and wireless options. While legacy inputs are streamlined, essential connections like a phono input and built-in tuner are retained. The remote control is a weak point, but the excellent app compensates for this.
The nine channels of amplification and 9.2 channel processing are sufficient for most medium-sized rooms. However, the lack of channel expansion or power upgrade paths might be a limitation for some. For those anticipating larger rooms or needing more power, the VSX-LX505 offers increased power and channel processing for a modest price increase of around £200.
Listening Notes:
Black Adam (4K Blu-ray)
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson brings his signature muscular charisma to Black Adam, and the Atmos soundtrack elevates this comic book adaptation. Experience bullets whizzing around you, overhead channels working overtime, and deep bass underscoring every super-powered impact.
Elvis (4K Blu-ray) This Oscar-nominated biopic, featuring Austin Butler’s star-making performance, boasts a fantastic Dolby Atmos soundtrack. Enjoy all of Elvis’s hits with style and clarity. The ‘If I Can Dream’ sequence is a particularly moving test of a system’s musicality.
Edge of Tomorrow (4K Blu-ray) Imagine Groundhog Day meets Saving Private Ryan in this time-loop sci-fi action film. The newly created Dolby Atmos soundtrack will push any system’s coherence to its limits during the repeatedly intense beach assault scenes, while deep subterranean bass will expose any low-end weaknesses.
