I own the 950/770 combo. For the past 20 years I owned receivers: Pioneer, Akai, Technics, and two Harman/Kardons. Why the switch to seperates? Speakers! I had a combo of 8 and 6 ohm speakers & my H/K ran hot driving all of them. I wanted to add a pair of 4 ohm speakers to the mix and was concerned about the receiver's amp. Not any more, the seperate amp can handle this load easily. So I no longer have to concern myself with any future speaker purchases. All I will have to do is upgrade my pre-amp and leave the amplifier alone. By the way, the 950 is fabulous, even my wife immediately notice the improvement - and that's saying a lot! Hope this helps.