With the blue dot's volume around -06 the hiss becomes instantly noticable and increases as the volume increases. Initially there is no noticable hum but that soon changes. Increasing the volume to around 00, the hum starts to overwhelm the hiss in my system. The hum gets louder as the volume goes up further. While in my regular listening the volume is usually much lower, I sometimes listen with the volume above 00 and sometimes even above +05. The blue dot is louder than my previous red dot, with trims set to zero but I did not have the trims set to zero with the red dot.

As I recall, Soundhound, you have a new hiss-fixed 950 and not a blue dot (rebuild) 950. There may be differences between individual units. As you know, and I'm grateful you did this, you measured a large difference in S/N between different red dot 950's in the past.

There may still be individual differences in the 950s, as well some environment being more hum inducing than others.

With my blue dot 950, the trims are set close to zero in all channels except the subwoofer. However, with the previous red dot 950, the trims were set much higher, which was necessary to get the red dot to go sufficently loud.

I have not calibrated my system, but I'm playing mostly in stereo. Others who have calibrated their system hear a hum at higher volumes. I know I should calibrate, but I'm not sure that will fix the hum.

However, fortunately when music is playing, I don't consciously hear the hum or hiss.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited January 14, 2003).]