Call me stubborn, but I don't like to give up...

So the individual rooms are independently controlled, meaning (I assume) each is switched on or off separately and has separate volume control. How is that done with a single 7.1 processor? All three rooms would have to share the same active source, and the only way to prevent one room from controlling the volume in the other rooms would be to freeze the main volume in a single position and control volume for each space separately at the Niles. At some point, it would seem more flexible to simply have three separate processors for the three rooms - especially since you'd already have amps for all of them if the Niles is located at the pre-amp outputs. That's just my preference, though, based on my tendency as a geek to want to tinker and my limited understanding of the system and how it is being used.

I agree that the best bet is probably to split the composite monitor out if you want OSD at both the second room and the equipment rack monitor. If you can do without OSD in the second room, you might try running a record out to that monitor and using the composite monitor out for the equipment rack.

Gonk, your persistance is admirable!

Actually, the individual rooms don't have their own volume controls; rather, the 990 only "sees" one room (re the video and 7.1 output) at a time, via the niles av switchers. It is a good idea to switch the record out with the monitor out video, but in that case the video 1 output would be lost to that room.

But it may be an option, if the video 1 output was indeed sacrificed. If one did this, what would display in that room if another video output were selected...say, video 4? Also, if for example, video 4 on the 990 were selected, would the Video 4 audio be heard, along with a display in that room of the video from this input 4?

The record video out would behave the same as the monitor out except for the omission of OSD overlays, so when video 4 was active (and the pre-amp outputs were getting the audio from video 4) the record out would get video 4's video signal (as well as stereo analog audio, but I'm assuming that in this scenario we'd be leaving that unhooked). I haven't tried hooking the record video out up to a display and monitoring it on different inputs - have you verified that it cuts off when video 1 is active?

I guess we both agree re the normal output when video rec out is connected.

Re your question about the Video 1 input, I am indeed certain it is lost when video is output from the record out.

Just an update....

Splitting via a Y-Connector the Composite 990 Output did not result in any (noticable) degradation of video...even on a large screen projection display.

Not sure why that would be, since the p-p output on the 990 is listed at 1.0v. vs. a higher 1.5v. on the older 950.

I realize that splitting an SVIDEO output would be an absolute "no" .... but it seems that composite signals can tolerate alot more. Running the composite output to a switcher would still involve additional connectors and cables, so that it would seem that a simple y-splitter is not likely to be any worse.