Well everyone I finally managed to get moved and have been enjoying my 950/7100 for about 2 weeks now. As I have said I decided to upgrade after my trusty Yamaha HTR-5150 decided to start giving me troubles. I was asked to give my impressions on the differences between the Yamaha and the 950/7100 so here they go.

WOW…….that is the best way to start out. The first thing I tried was music CD’s and the Outlaw combo blew the Yamaha away. I always considered the Yamaha to be weak on music but I did not expect the difference to be this dramatic! I know this has been said many times before but I really did hear things (mainly background noises on live recording) that I never new were there using the Yamaha. On Kenny G Live I could here the people in the audience cough, laugh, and sometimes even breath. I will say this. The Outlaw is very unforgiving. If a recording is done well the 950 will make it shine. On the flip side if a recording is done poorly you’ll be sure to hear every mistake. Some people would call that “Bright” I would call that Detailed. The sound I hear doesn’t seem to be coming from my speakers anymore it seems to have moved out into the room. It’s like the speakers disappeared and the band was playing in my home. I would have to say that the soundstage has truly opened up………WIDE!! There is also a lot more Mid-Bass in the music. I would tend to believe that is from the 7100. It is very hard to get that Mid-Bass punch from the amp section of a receiver IMHO.

Next I moved on to SACD and DVD-A. I only have 3 titles (I just bought the DV-563a) so this test is limited. The first one I tried was Metallica The Black Album DVD-A. The first word that came to my mind was Crystal Clear. As I listened on I noticed some distortion so I started checking things. It turns out that at certain points the recording was pushed to its limits and that is what was causing the distortion. Like I said earlier if the recording or mixing was done poorly the Outlaw will let you hear it so the distortion was no fault of the Outlaw but in the recording itself. Need less to say Playing Metallica gave the 7100 a good workout and you could feel the heat coming off the top of the amp. I would not say that it was ever boiling hot but it did get quite warm(warmer than the Yamaha ever did) I don’t believe this to be a problem just the nature of the amp. Next I tried Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon SACD. This is one of those disk that the Outlaw makes shine. I can’t recall ever hearing this album sound this good. I sat through the whole album just glued to my seat in sonic nirvana. The only button I touched was the up on the volume. I will have to admit this SACD sounded great on the Yamaha also but not like the sound produced by the Outlaw. After finishing DSOTM I had to play my last disk Queen A Night at the Opera. This was another jaw dropping experience. I pushed the volume way up and was worried Freddy was going to break all the glass in my house. His voice truly was amazing and all the fans of Queen will truly miss him. The 7100 has incredible power for being rated at only 100 watts so for those of you who are worried about power that have living rooms that are not the size of auditoriums the 7100 is plenty trust me.

Next I moved on to Movies (after all that is what the 950 was built for right?). Going from 5.1 to 7.1(really .2 I have 2 subs) does make a difference but for a fair comparison I started out just using the DD/DTS 5.1 modes. There was a noticeable difference in clarity and width/depth of the soundstage but the difference between the Yamaha and the Outlaw was not as dramatic on these soundtracks as it was on music. The Outlaw was the clear winner but not by as big a margin as it was with music. Add in the cirrus extra and the Outlaw really shines. I’ve probably watched 7 or 8 of my old movies over in the past 2 weeks and a lot of my music collection.

The Outlaw has made me very happy so far and allowed me to enjoy my music again. I don’t think anyone going from a receiver, Yamaha or another brand will be disappointed with the Outlaw separates. Not in any way. I would highly recommend them to anyone ready to upgrade to true quality sound. My next upgrade will be to the 950’s big brother (whenever it arrives) and I will never own another receiver.

If I left anything out that you would like to know please ask. If I misspelled anything please forgive.

Hope this helps anyone thinking about the upgrade. Hats off to the Outlaws for one great product!!

Lasher

Great first impressions, Lasher. Your review takes me back in time. I absolutely agree with your reactions to the 950.

There are some great MC discs out there. Looking forward to hearing more as you expand your collection.

Again, really great read...thanx.

As you watch more DVDs, let me know if you start hearing things in the sound track that the Yamaha did not reveal. I found this to be true over my HK. Even a year later my wife and I still discover sounds that the 950 reveals. Welcome to Outlaw!

I wholeheartedly agree with your impressions of Outlaw.

Yes, once your system reaches a certain level of performance, it is the quality of the material, or lack of it, that begins to garner more of your attention. When one can hear details of performance, instruments and the environment of the recording, it makes a very strong positive impression on me. When portions of a mix in a popular music title are not handled with finesse, I react with, “that was poorly done.” To restate one of your ideas, stepping up to better reproduction exposes both excellence and non-excellence alike in the material itself.

Alejate:

You are quite right about the 950 revealing new things in movies. I just watched the movie Ghost Ship over again (I’ve had it for some time now) and there is a lot of creepy little sounds going on around that ship that my Yamaha never let me know about. I’ve also found a lot of my old CD’s have me falling in love with the music all over again, or saying what was that mixing guy thinking....lol. Needless to say my upgrade bug has been squashed…………………..at least until the next Outlaw news letter

Lasher