I was turning everything off from the power source. As to a additional player, I don't yet, but I will most likely purchase a new blue ray player in the next two weeks. I don't know if something finaly reset or if I have a phantom problem in a cable or something. I am going to replace the optical just cause I can. Its working for now and sounds great. I'm annoyed cause I dont want it to happen again..but time will tell.

Ok happened again. I replaced the optical and the problem is fixed. I put the old optical back in and nothing worked. So i guess it was the optical.

My issue is similar to HarleyShovel but with the 6channel bypass setting. I want the audio that is in bluray, not just stereo or the older Dolby. I had no center channel in the first DVD I tried (Shrek I) The Blu-ray disk of The da Vinci Code performs the same way. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. Every inserted DVD is an adventure; will it work or not. The frustration is that I cannot depend on it working. My wife is tired of my screaming at the screen. But; SACD disks do have the center channel thru 6channel bypass. The player is the OPPO BD-83.

I would be grateful If anyone could suggest a fix.

I still curse the Outlaws for not having a 6channel toggle on the front panel. I was without it when my original remote died. This reminds me that my 950 that is adjacent to my LCD Sony has had remote reception issues as mentioned in other posts and I, too, thought the 950 I/R was dying. It would be tough to move rather unit to gain separation.

Sounds like we need to do some troubleshooting for you, Bridge Guy. That's not cool.

So when you are playing a disc on the BDP-83 through the multichannel analog connection to the 990, you sometimes don't get any center channel audio? Do you also end up with no surrounds? On the discs that don't have a center channel, do you have dialog at all?
I haven't tried it in a while, but I thought you could use the front panel input button and the up/down buttons to scroll through all the inputs, including 7.1 Direct. Am I remembering that incorrectly?

Gonk-

For instance, at the beginning of Shrek 3 in the dinner theater scene, all of the dialog is in the center and I hear nothing. Switching 950 to the coaxial 1 brings up the disk’s Dolby 3/2. I realize that is all the DVD has but it seems to me it should also be available from the 6 bypass analogs.

There is a chance that by starting the DVD as coax and switching to the 6 bypass may be a work around. It did on one occasion.

This is but week 3 of my OPPO Blu-ray life and this other layer of set up steps is frustrating.

“I haven't tried it in a while, but I thought you could use the front panel input button and the up/down buttons to scroll through all the inputs, including 7.1 Direct. Am I remembering that incorrectly?”

I’ll have to fiddle with that; the inputs scroll through all but the 6. There is a bypass button I use with my phono preamp but it doesn’t report the 6, just stereo.

The surrounds follow the center channel, or at least the LR does. One channel of my 755 amp died a while back and dang thing is so massive I haven’t been able to get it out of the house for someone to look at is.

Thanks for your interest.

System
BDP-83
Outlaw 950, Outlaw 755, Magnepan MG1.6QR left and right speakers
Magnepan MMG C center channel
Outlaw LFM-1 subwoofer
Ancient Dynaco rear channel speakers
Sony KDL-52XBR6 LCD television

When you are using the 6CH input on the Model 950, the Model 950 isn't doing any processing. I recall that there is a quirk on the Model 950's 6CH input: if I remember this correctly, it acts as a stereo source if the 950 had been in a purely stereo mode previously. If you have it on an input that is in a surround mode (any mode will do - Dolby 5.1, Pro Logic II, Cirrus Extra Surround, or 5 Stereo) and then change to the 6CH input, it will work fine. It's been a few years since I had a 950 around, but I'm pretty sure that's correct.
I thought we were talking about the Model 990. The bypass button on the front of the Modle 950 is "stereo bypass" - no use for the 6CH input. The 6CH input is a toggle of sorts on the 950, as reading the manual has reminded me, and it doesn't appear to be anywhere on the front panel...

GONK-
I think your remark about the 950 quirk is correct having empirically tested this notion by accidentally switching back and forth with the original source in different conditions, stereo and surround. This confirms my getting stronger-every=day notion of a software glitch existing from day one.

What had led me astray was not having any difficulty with the Sony NS999ES CD/DVD player the OPPO replaces.

Yes, the bypass is stereo input only; this is how I input my Rega P5/Ortofon/Grado phono preamp (most of my music is via my 3500 LPs rather than the much fewer CDs on hand).

I do thank you for your thoughts, maybe I can move up to the 997 when it’s available.

gonk: Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

I just bought a new blu-ray player & I was trying to use the direct inputs. All I got was 2 channels. I wasted a week beating my head against the wall until I found your post here. Everything works fine now.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!