Just to throw out...if any have problems in the future. Several 'hum' type threads I have roamed recently where weeks were spent trying to isolate the culprit turned out to be the coaxial cable 'ground' (to the ground).

I've watched at least 4 people through very long Convoluted threads asking for troubleshooting help (and trying just about every know method of isolating the hum)finally track various noise in a system to this source...they had spent a lot of time isolating due to 'clues' which sent them looking at various components when hum exhibited only on 1 or two inputs when selected but not active. In these instances 3 had problems due to the fact that the cable had been grounded to a second location rather than the 'main' location the rest of the house was grounded at (2nd pole in ground).
One just needed to retighten screws which snugged the ground wire to the grounding stake.
As Jeff stated: "And your system includes just about everything connected to your home's electrical system - from the breaker panel on in."
This can be a hairpuller when these issues arise.

I got to agree with SLL ... I thought I had a hum problem when I first got my 950...then I turned my cheap halogen lamp to the bright setting (to check out the back of the system) and the hum went away. Quite distrubing to know that something plugged into an outlet across the room can affect your system that way (I even have a Monster HT2500 power filter/suppressor!) and it was just the darn dimmer switch on a $20 ($15US...damn exchange rate) lamp.

BTW...love my Blue-dot unit

Oaf- Hum and halogen lamps:

I had a dimmable halogen lamp on the same circuit as my HT. (Used it turned all the way down for "backlighting" during movies.) Never 'eard a thing when I had the Sony pre/pro in there. Got the (red dot equiv) 950, and immediately apparant was lot's o' hum. Swapped it for an incandescent lamp with a 7W bulb, and I'm hunky dory. (This was a few months ago.)

And with Lena's good catch with the CG amps, might just be a particular interaction there. (Heck, we all know about the "particular" interaction between the red dot 950's and Klipsch speakers and either/or Acurus amps and hiss... )

Oh yeah, so the 950 *is* more senstive than some of the other components we've used, and maybe some CG amps (and probably some others too) are more senstive than some amps, bam, you put both of them together, and maybe you get ... an interaction.


[This message has been edited by Kevin C Brown (edited January 16, 2003).]

I think the blue dot 950 sounds better than the red dot 950. I also like that the blue dot can be played louder than the red dot.

I hope future products from Outlaw won't be as sensitive.

The 950 isn't alone in that area. My Velodyne HGS 18 subwoofer is also quite sensitive. It auto-powers on when it receives music, like it should. But it also auto-powers on when I turn on incandescent lights in the room, and when the refrigerator motor in the kitchen cycles on.

I've heard Velodyne has a newer version of the HGS 18 that supposedly fixes some of the problems in the original HGS 18.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited January 16, 2003).]

The 950 isn't alone in that area.

Will, - I think your right with that remark. I went back and looked at the posts on the Sunfire CG amps above to see what gear was listed used in conjunction with the cinema grand that had interactions.

In order of post listed, here’s what the posters detailed:

Meridian 561 processor/bohedner graebner 820’s, 420’s 220. Denon DVD
Martin Logans
Theta Casablanca with Cardas cabling.
Lexicon DC-1 processor/ Paradigam Studio 110 Ref 450 and Titans.

Not bad gear. Is it just me or does the window of opportunity increase proportionally for ‘interactions’ to occur throughout an entire system as it enters the realm of ‘higher end’ more complex components with higher performance level capabilities?

Until I got into separates and HD, I just don’t remember having these many issues and delicate balances involved which could go out of whack every time you changed/added a new piece.

It has its own rewards however, (for a newbie) one minute I want to scream, (over the next glitch), the next minute I feel like I won the ribbon when I sort out an issue myself. A satisfying feeling of something I just accomplished.

My latest glitch fix…which I’m very proud of, involved a (usually knife thin red) line running vertically down the extreme right edge of my Sony 60” LCD screen. It was a known ‘interaction’ with a combo of the GWI LCD and the DTC100 HD receiver using an RCA RGB to component adapter.

The day I purchased my display the storefront admitted the issue when I asked them, and I let them know that according to the forums you could fix it by adjusting raster, they requested I fax the info. for another client they had whom they were trying to service. Unfortunately I found that raster could not entirely rid the screen of this problem. And when talking to my storefront a few weeks later they had found the same (reduction of line but still there or simply moved to the other side) I went back to surfing 3 forums no one had a ‘fix’ listed for this issue. So I ended up living with it. A few nights ago I ‘found’ the fix just playing around when I put my old DTC100 back on line after returning a demo of another HD receiver. It simply involves changing the retrace timing to get rid of it.

I’m beginning to feel….especially as (just me) have lots to learn. Like living around my AV is life in an ongoing detective novel.