Anyone who has ever hired a contractor knows that attempting to improve your lifestyle can be a frightening experience. Will  your new kitchen capture the grandeur of your original idea, or will the renovation be as disastrous as Michael Jackson’s cosmetic surgery? Unless you have used the firm before, you cannot be certain of the final result.

Upgrading a home theater system can be just as frightening. The audio and video equipment that you have grown comfortable with disappears, replaced with unfamiliar, indistinguishable black boxes. Although your old gear worked and worked and worked for you all those years, who knows if your new acquisitions will be as trustworthy?

---

Extensive front-panel controls help make the PT-7010A (right) easier to operate. The 7/2100A (below) features a full set of professional-style XLR balanced inputs to match the PT-7010A’s XLR balanced outputs. (Click images to enlarge)

---

If you choose the latest electronics from Sherbourn Technologies, you need not fear your new black boxes. The PT-7010A surround processor and 7/2100A seven-channel amplifier both spring from proven designs—so they both work great and are refreshingly free of annoying bugs.

Few high-end audio companies design their surround processors in entirety; most rely on outside firms to design the control and digital processing sections. (When I find out that a high-end company has designed its own processor, I usually cringe—few of them have the digital engineering talent to create a reliable, user-friendly product.) In the case of the PT-7010A, Sherbourn had the wisdom to employ the same basic control and digital circuitry as found in Sunfire’s Theater Grand IV—which I consider the easiest surround processor to use. And actually, the PT-7010A is even easier to use than the TGIV, because you can select sources (such as DVD, CD, and satellite) directly from buttons on the front panel.

Speaking of sources, one thing I love about the PT-7010A is that unlike most surround processors, which sit there mute until your installer configures all of its inputs, it needs no configuration to begin producing sound. With the PT-7010A, your installer simply plugs, say, the DVD player into the component video input and the coaxial digital audio output, and the PT-7010A automatically figures out which video and audio inputs to use. And there are plenty of inputs and outputs, including professional-style XLR balanced outputs for all channels, and Zone 2 outputs that let you pipe the sound from any source device connected to the PT-7010A into another room, regardless of which device is playing in the main room. I do wish the processor had HDMI or DVI digital video switching, but that’s still quite a rare feature among high-end surround processors.What configuration your installer does have to do can be done in mere minutes, all from either the front-panel display or the on-screen display. During my time with the PT-7010A, I never pull the manual from the box, because I never need to.

We examined the 7/2100A in our May/June 2004 issue, but a brief recap seems in order. Sherbourn’s twist on home theater amp design is to give each channel its own power supply, so the 115-pound 7/2100A includes seven separate power transformers. The advantage to this design is that the channels do not fight for power from a single supply; when, say, the left channel is running full-out, all the other channels still enjoy a full reserve of power.

This amplifier is nearly foolproof—accidental shorting of the speaker cables simply shuts down the affected channel, and the front-panel indicator light for that channel extinguishes until the short is removed. This feature is especially important in complex custom installations where wires can easily be accidentally shorted—and because there’s no circuit breaker to flip or fuses to change, it will eliminate many service calls.

Fortunately, many other surround processors and amplifiers also reside at my home during the Sherbourn components’ stay, so I enjoy the luxury of comparing the Sherbourns against their competitors. The processor immediately commands my attention with an impeccably smooth midrange; voices, brass instruments, and saxophones sound particularly realistic. The treble sounds cleaner than that of the other processors I have on hand, although some of them produce a better sense of sonic envelopment than the PT-7010A delivers.

The processor’s sparkling sound complements the amplifier’s sonic signature well. I have come to associate Sherbourn amps with exceptionally robust, dynamic sound, and in particular with perfectly defined deep bass. The 7/2100A lives up to its family reputation, sculpting the subterranean bass line in singer Holly Cole’s version of “Train Song” with greater precision than any other amp in my possession.

Choosing the Sherbourn PT-7010A and 7/2100A as your home theater audio electronics is like hiring a contractor who with a few simple instructions on your part does a fantastic remodeling job on your kitchen—and as you’ll note if you read the accompanying specs box, doesn’t pad the bill.

 

DESCRIPTION
PT-7010A: Surround-sound preamp/ processor. Decodes surround sound, controls volume, routes audio and video from source devices (DVD, satellite TV, etc.) to TV, amplifiers, and speakers. Includes AM/FM tuner
7/2100A: 7-channel audio power amplifier with 200 watts per channel

SURROUND MODES
Dolby Digital EX and Dolby Pro Logic IIx, DTS ES and Neo:6, Party Mode

CONNECTIONS
PT-7010A: three component video inputs, six composite and S-video inputs, two component video outputs, three composite and S-video outputs, nine RCA unbalanced stereo audio inputs (one phono), eight-channel audio input for DVD-Audio/SACD player, five RCA unbalanced stereo analog audio outputs, six coaxial digital audio inputs, four optical digital audio inputs, coaxial and optical digital audio outputs, line-level unbalanced RCA and balanced XLR outputs for all channels, additional unbalanced RCA stereo output for left and right side axis speakers, fixed- and variable-level unbalanced zone 2 audio outputs, DB-9 connector for RS-232 control, IEEE-1394 input for software updating, 3.5mm IR control inputs for main zone and zone 2, block connector for zone 1 and zone 2 12-volt trigger outputs, 3.5mm minijack for 12-volt DC output (main zone)
7/2100A: XLR balanced and RCA unbalanced input for each channel, five-way speaker cable binding posts for each channel, block connector for 12-volt trigger input

DIMENSIONS
PT-7010A: 6 x 17.7 x 16.6 inches (hwd)
7/2100A: 7.7 x 17.7 x 18.3 inches (hwd)

PRICE/CONTACT
PRICE: PT-7010A $3,000, 7/2100A $3,000
CONTACT: 978.663.7385, sherbourn.com