Well today marks a week with my 950. It first arrived on Friday a week ago minus the remote and manual, but a overnight Saturday delivery solved that problem. Great work by the Customer Service team.

Now I must say that Philip Hamm who had also owned the same model Newcastle I did was correct and DPL II was worth the difference. As I have Dish Sat. System we get a lot of stereo channels and they are great with the 950. Likewise the 5.1 channel input for SACD was much improved over the Newcastle. I also have more options for movies and music and will have more when I go to a 6 or 7 speaker system. Since I am still using a theater loop and listening to CD and Records through my tube preamp and my phono preamp I cannot really compare a lot of the analog, but I will get around to that. My set up is also simplified as I do not use a lot of the inputs from the Outlaw as the 2 channel work is still handled seperately.

Now for a question. I expect to and do get different output levels, from device to device and even station to station on the Dish, DVD and VCR and SACD. But I have a very large change in Db levels when going from any digital programing to say the SACD analog. We are talking possible equipment and hearing level harm if I do not adjust volumes down prior to changing over, a roughly 20 Db difference. The First time I hit the 6 channel button on the remote I almost straightened my hair. ALso if I use the stereo bypass while in digital mode such as DPL II I get the same effect, a 20 Db increase in volume. Is this typical for others, or do I need to contact Outlaw. Thanks.

Welcome to the club. Did you calibrate your system (make sure the main volume is set to 0 before starting)? After calibrating my system, while there was an output difference between sources, the difference was more like 2 to 4 dB, not 20. I think others, maybe soundhound, had some suggestions for setting up a system to equalize the output levels.

If you are hearing a true 20db difference, then something is probably amiss somewhere. Most rock recordings on CD are "normalized" to have extremely high sound levels (and little dynamic range) relative to other types of music (jazz, classical), and this will cause relatively large jumps in volume when switching between these recordings. My DSS video is uneven in levels between stations, but nowhere near 20db. Some channels are compressed more than others and "appear" louder, but the actual difference in level is not that much.

Beyond calibration, there is nothing I can think of specifically to check. You might narrow down a particularly loud component like a CD player or such by plugging each component one at at time into the same input of your 950 and noting any level differences.

I did calibrate starting the main volume starting at 0. I also have a uneven levels in channels with the Dish, but they are more like the 4 to 5 db. I had one tonight that actually got up to about 8db difference between the channel I was watching and the one I switched to which is the biggest difference I have run into between 2 channels. Dish is bad about compressing both the picture and sound on certain channels, so there will always be a variance. That is not the big problem.

This major variance in analog vs. Digital is what bothers me, and it it not only the gain of the CD player or the compression of certain CDs as I had classical, rock, jazz and accoustical guitar loaded in the CD changer and all exibited about the same general Db difference. Now I did have them all in 5.1 channel input for SACDs, but I also noted the same DB difference by just changing using the bypass to convert the satelitte signal to analog from a digital source (DPL II). Every channel I did this on had the major db increase. So it appears to be the analog vs. the digital formats for the major shift. I did not get a chance to play with it tonight, I will try again tomorrow. BTW when I say 20 DB change, I am estimating the change based on the levels that I am using and the change I have to make in the main volume to get it back to that same general sound range to my ears when I hit the bypass or the 6 channel button. The rest of my system is set up through my 2 channel system and I use the loop to cross this over. I did set it up initially with a sound meter. Thanks

[This message has been edited by OFCCM (edited July 28, 2003).]

I'm glad to hear that you're happy with DPLII thanks to my recommendation! ENjoy the 950, it's quite a nice piece of equipment.

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Philip Hamm