This topic came up a few weeks ago and led to a great dialog on what was desired in the 990, but an underlying issue got left by the wayside. I'd like to restart it to better understand whether there's a bug or a design choice (feature) in the way you can set up the speakers.

I'm currently running a 2.1 system (see below). I expect to add my surrounds in the next week or two, but my center channel will take a little longer to pin down. I am unable to configure a 2.1 system, and I've now worked through just about all the combinations I can think of.

If I set the Mains as "small," and the Surrounds as "none," the Center sticks at "small." If I set the Mains as "small" and the Surrounds as "small," I can set the Center to "small" or "none." The Sub goes through some interesting changes depending on the above but doesn't affect anything else.

If I set the Mains as "large," and the Surrounds as "none," the Center can be either "small" or "large," but not "none." As above, if I set the Surrounds as "small" or "large," I can set the Center to "small," "large" or "none."

The design choice, for better or worse, seems to be that you must have either a Center channel or a pair of Surrounds (with or without the rear Surrounds). You can't just do Mains and Sub.

Assuming that this is a choice and not a bug, what would be the rationale for it? I can't think of any, but I'm a newbie at this game, so I'll give the Outlaws the benefit of the doubt here. As I recall, some folks were quite certain that it is a bug, but the consistency across various configurations leaves me unconvinced.