can an AV reciever improve picture quality?

[sheedoe]

If you have a receiver with a good video processing capability, I'd say it will improve/upscale your SD DVD video. But I would not have blu-ray movie processed by the receiver and would use the "through" mode for video. Unless you have a reference series $5000+ Denon receiver with Silicon Optix Realta HQV Processing and Scaling or similar, it won't improve your blu-ray video quality.