The reason you're hearing hiss w/ the analog and not the digital is because in some version of the 950 (maybe the blue dot?) outlaw introduced muting circuits on the digital signals. So, if a digital input is not receiving a signal (the CD player is off or on pause), the muting circuits click in and you get silence.

The "hiss" you speak of is completely normal and you won't ever get rid of it. Nor should you expect to. *MAYBE* if you upgrade to a top-top quality pre-pro (maybe top-end meridian or something similar) you might get a little less hiss, but it's there in every piece of gear. My brother-in-law owns a Lexicon MC12B, uses balanced cables from mc-12 -> amplifiers and a PS Audio PP1000 to supply "super-charged" rejiggered power to both amp and preamp, and if we turn up his volume to the max setting, there's some audible hiss at the listening position.

So, don't worry about it.

There are a few things you can do to lower your noise floor though. One is to make sure that all your power cords are seperated and not touching any analog ICs. Another is to try a balanced power unit. I was surprised, but I recently hooked up a BPT Ultra 1 balanced power unit into my system (balanced power units use a transformer to condition incoming power from the wall and then sends 60v down the hot lead and 60v down the neutral lead, instead of the normal 120v down the hot lead and 0v down the neutral, you can read about it various places). I now feed all my equip. except my amps off the BPT unit, and I noticed a pretty good reduction of the noise level.

Sorry to repeat if somebody else mentioned this, but did you try recalibrating your 950 with a SPL meter? If not, go down to your local Radio Shack and pick up their analog SPL meter. It should cost you less than $40. Then try recalibrating with that. As SH and all the posts above point out, if you're still able to sit in the room, after recalibrating, when listening at those high levels, something is definitely amiss.

Whew! Thank you, soundhound, Jed M, seattleguy, jgubman and Jason J, what you said make me feel much better. My situation is similar to what Jed described, the hiss disappears at the listening position while the volume is reduced to around -2dB. Based on all I heard from you, this is not something I would worry about any more. Just received my center speaker (the last piece of my HT system) today, cannot wait to start the evaluations with DVD movies.

Jason, I already got a RS SPL meter and calibrated my speakers following the instructions on 950 user manual. Both of the front speakers were set to -10dB.

Soundhound, I could not find your post about the 950 testing with lab equipment, can you do me a favor and provide the link? I am curious to know what you had done and found.

I would also like to extend my thanks to the whole forum, here I got answers to many of the questions I had during my research process. This is also one of the major reasons I decided to buy from Outlaw.

mhua, if you find yourself needing to turn your 950 up to 0 or into the positives you could always recalibrate to -20 to give yourself more headroom. I think I actually calibrated at -25 @ 70db, so I am usually hanging out in the high 30's when watching tv.

The hiss issue was discussed around the summer and fall of 2002 if i'm not mistaken. If you're interested, search around that time period. Unfortunately, the search function doesn't work any better for me than anybody else.

Jed, I have not tried to recalibrate my speakers at any volumes lower than 0dB. So far the highest volume I have ever played while listening music is around -7dB and it's already pretty loud to me. However, more headroom is always good, just wonder why Outlaw and many people think the calibration with 00@75dB is the best, will this bring any benefits to sound quality?

jgubman, I forgot to mention that your explanation about no hiss from digital input makes sense to me. And thank you for the noise reduction suggestions.

soundhound, if your post we refer to was submitted in summer or fall 2002, that's maybe exactly why I could not find it. It seems that you can only retrieve the posts at this forum no further than one year.

Bummer!

The only reason for 75db calibration is so that when you play a DVD at "0" on the main volume control, the sound pressure level will be the same (in theory) as the film was originally mixed at.

Have you checked the 950 Archive ? There are posts in there from back into 2002.

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gonk -- Saloon Links | Pre/Pro Comparison Chart | 950 Review

Yes, seems that the archive contains all the old posts. I found the one soundhound mentioned back to September 2002, lots of very good discussion there about the hiss issue. Thank you gonk for the info!

soundhound, thank you for the explanation on calibration.

Looks like it will take some time and learning to become a real "Gunslinger".

Correct me if I am wrong, but it makes no difference whether you set your reference level (calibrate @ 75db) at 00 or at -30 on the dial. Its just a measure of output.

Thanks for the reminder of the archives Gonk. I went back and read a few of the classic threads. I wonder if Ricky is still among us.