Am upgrading my HT system and seriously considering the 990. I have spent many an hour on this site and it has been very educational. A couple of questions:

1) It only recently occurred to me that the 990 (and prehaps most other similar products) takes an analog signal and converts it to digital (i.e. from the phono, tape player etc) Is this a fact? I understand that bypass does not convert. Given that I would be playing records or reel to reels (high quality) do you think there is much of a change in the fidelity of the signal when it is converted. I think I understand the BM issues associated with the various formats/signals

2) If playing DVD-audio and I want to use Dolby IIx with 7 speakers, will the processor take the analog signal and convert to digital?

2) I noticed that the AD chip used is an akm 5380. Just for grins I went to AKM's website and noticed that they had put a notice up that though this chip was still available, it was not recommended for new designs/manufacturers products. I assume that AKM is moving to a "better" chip (maybe the AKM 5383) Does anyone consider this to be an issue. It might have an impact on the first question above.

3. I will be using Def Tech BPVX's for the rear surround and Def Tech BP2's for the "side" surround. Will I be able to set the BPVX's to large and the BP2's to small and/or have a different crossover for both speakers. It was not clear to me from the instruction manaual.

Thanks very much

Hi Bernie -
I don't think the 990 converts analog signals to digital; it just passes them through, in both stereo and bypass modes. The latter mode means no tone control is available. I imagine Gonk will correct me if I am wrong! I bought mine over any other brand except the Sherwood - which as you probably know costs $400 more - because it has a phono input, and have been very pleased with its performance on phono and tape (both cassette and open reel - way better than the Adcom TPA500 I had before. Others can discuss the 990's surround and subwoofer capabilities since at present I'm running pure 2-channel stereo and thoroughly enjoying it.

Enjoy,

Paul Nay

I wouldn't worry about it. Digital technology moves so quickly that by the time the upgraded chip is on the market, AKM will have something else that will be recommended for new designs. It is a little disconcerting that the processor that I took delivery of a few days before is already outdated though.

Starting back in the late 90's, it became the norm for analog inputs to be converted to digital automatically. It started around the time that digital processing (Dolby Digital and DTS, bass management, and so forth) became so widely used and expected. In many cases, it was impossible to avoid this A/D process, but the ability to defeat it by selecting an analog bypass mode soon came about. I would expect any modern surround processor will convert steroe analog inputs to the digital domain unless the user selects a bypass mode. The 990 does offer such a mode, and you can configure an input to make this process take place automatically any time the input is active. If you have a very high quality analog source, I'd suggest giving this mode a try. On the other hand, the A/D/A process has proven to be remarkably transparent in my experience (using it with the 7.1 direct input on DVD-Audio and SACD sources) - the 990 may be able to run the signal over to digital and back more cleanly than you might expect. Even with that transparency, I'd still probably go with the analog bypass.

The 990's 7.1 direct input's do offer the ability to run through the digital bass management, but the input does not pass through any other processing. As a result, you cannot apply any surround processing (Pro Logic IIx, DTS NEO:6, or anything else) to that input.

I expect that the 5380 chip was selected when Etronics developed the Sherwood P-965 platform (the basis for the Outlaw 990). As long as the chip (which seems to have been a great performer in the 990) is available, I would see no problem with using it. Chips like this have pretty long service lives - Analog Devices may be pushing a newer (and therefore more expensive) chip to customers developing new products, but they'll want to keep older designs in production at the same time to satisfy customers like Etronics and Outlaw. Look at Cirrus for example - the 990 is using their 49400 processor, but there are still products out there using its predecessor even while the Cirrus has a successor to the 49400 in production.

You can set different crossover points for the side surrounds and rear surrounds, but I am not sure about setting the rear surrounds to large unless the side surrounds are also set that way. It's been a while since I messed with it, so I could be remembering incorrectly, but I think the rear surrounds would only set to "small" or "none" if the side surrounds were small.

Let us know if you have any other questions - the 990 is a great product, and there is a pretty good crowd around here to help you out.

This a great forum. Gonk's reply still has me a little confused.

"On the other hand, the A/D/A process has proven to be remarkably transparent in my experience (using it with the 7.1 direct input on DVD-Audio and SACD sources) - the 990 may be able to run the signal over to digital and back more cleanly than you might expect."

"The 990's 7.1 direct input's do offer the ability to run through the digital bass management, but the input does not pass through any other processing. As a result, you cannot apply any surround processing (Pro Logic IIx, DTS NEO:6, or anything else) to that input."

Taking these two statements together, it appears to me that the 990 does some A/D/A processing from 7.1 inputs, but only for bass management, not for other types of signal processing. Am I thinking of this correctly? In the instruction manual it states that Doblby IIx will process a signal from a 5.1 source. Perhaps the authors intended that to mean a dolby digital source only.

If the speakers are set to "large" the 990 leaves the 7.1 Direct inputs analog all the way through. If the speakers are set to "small" then the 990 converts the 7.1 Direct input to the digital domain and applies bass management only. Other processing is bypassed. Dolby IIx will work on Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 sources, but the 7.1 direct input is a wholly different entity as far as the 990's processing is concerned.

So analog inputs stay analog only in Bypass mode. Thanks, Gonk, for correcting me.

Paul Nay

Got the 990 and 7700 last week and spent most of the weekend setting it up. I seem to have a problem with the remote. I cannot access the osd pressing menu from the remote. I have to press menu on the 990 first. Once the osd appears (affter pressing menu on the 990) I am able to run all the functions from the remote. Any suggestions?

I had this issue at first too. Then I discovered there are two "Menu" buttons on the remote. I believe it is the one above the 4-way selector and to the right, not the one that immediately surrounds the 4-way selector. Might give this a try.