Setup questions for TGR3

Got my TGR3 Monday. Beautiful receiver. For those of you that have similar systems, I would like to ask a couple of questions, if I may.

I wanted to just hear how the receiver's tuner sounded, without hooking up all the speakers. I hooked up my two mains, followed the owner's manual on how to set up speakers (programming the center, side, back, & subwoofer speaker settings to OFF). It wouldn't let me into the CALIBRATE option, I assumed this was normal with all the other speaker settings turned OFF.

My problem is I'm only getting sound out of the right main ( no left main sound) & that's only when I crank the volume up over 50. I checked my speaker wires for breaks (there were none) & swapped the speaker connections to be sure my left speaker was working. It is. I reset the receiver back to factory defaults after working with this for about 45 minutes, still have the same problem.

Am I wrong in assuming I could listen to the receiver with only 2 speakers? Will it only function with a 5.1 or 7.1 speaker setup?

Please forgive my naiveness with this, I'm on a learning curve here. I figure if I don't know something, I'll ask someone who does. Thanks in advance for your help. You all have been a great source of info, I really appreciate it.

You swapped both speakers side to side AND the speaker wires independently? If so, I'd say you have a faulty unit.

On my old pre-amp one speaker keep going out but at different levels. Found a cracked output on the Pre-amp. Another time I added some e-bay interconnects and one speaker didn't work, swapped interconnects and the problem followed. Found a bad interconnect. Sounds like something is kicking off in the receiver itself above a certain DB? Can you send it back? Where did you purchase it? New, used? Tell us a little more about the receiver? Thanks

Just an update:
I tried a different set of speakers & different speaker cables, same problem. It really doesn't kick out at any particular setting, just no sound from the left main. The right main isn't audible until you crank the volume to 50 or above. The rest of the functions on the receiver appear to work, just no sound.

I bought the receiver new from Richardson Audio in Georgia just before Christmas, they're listed on Sunfire's website as being affilitated with Sunfire's Flagship Dealers Program. Bob Richardson is the owner & he's been a lot of help with this. I'm packaging up the reciever to send back to Sunfire on Monday. Bob got my return authorization number & talked with Sunfire himself in order to get this resolved. He did all this yesterday after just a 10 minute phone call.

Hopefully, the gurus at Sunfire can get my little lady back up to snuff.

I had a similar issue with my truck audio system & it turned out to be a bad/corroded connection between the head unit & RCA interconnect plug. Cleaned it up & squeezed the tabs for a tighter fit and VIOILA! -- no more problem! I'd recommend a good cleaning of all the RCA inputs & interconnections.

Just purchasing this "new" before Christmas your doing the right thing sending it in for inspection. Maybe something happened in shipment? Let us know, good luck

Just talked with Bill at Sunfire. My TGR3 is on its way back to me. He said the ribbon cable between the motherboard & preamp was faulty. Supposedly everything else checked out OK.

Now we'll see how it sounds once I get it back.

What did they charge you to replace the ribbon cable ???

Repaired under warranty, it came from the factory with the bad cable.