Davis S: I don't know how closely you've been following the various threads on the hiss issue, but it is a very real problem for a lot of people, including myself. Your fix is exactly the method I recommended awhile back to people who have gain controls on their power amps, but unfortunately a lot of amps don't have level controls, thus the people are stuck. It is really unreasonable to have audible hiss from more than a foot or so from the speaker in _any_ electronic component at normal gain settings. More to the point, I've personally made measurements on my 950 and that of another owner, and neither of the units met their published spec for noise, no matter how you cut it. A recent test in Sound & Vision magazine had similar test results. On top of that, there appears to be an unacceptably large variation in noise behavior between various units. The difference in noise between my 950 and the other one shocked even me (his was worse), especially given that they were both of very recent production. Your issue with the 'stereo 5' mode as opposed to the other modes is yet another variation that I've not heard of yet. I'm glad you found a fix you can live with, but unfortunatiely it's not so easy for a lot of people to get around this issue.

[This message has been edited by soundhound (edited October 05, 2002).]