After reading many posts on the forum and I appreciate the replies you guys have given me to my 990 questions.

I decided to call Outlaw, to get their view on some issues I was concerned about. I had a 20-25 min conversation with Steve. Nice guy....

phonecall Highlights:

Q: "Steve, I know you guys have the consumer-direct business model thing going, no factory of your own, keep your overhead down etc..What if one of the 100 or so 990's you sold needs repair, how do you handle that? do you have enough techs to support?

Steve Reply: First off, 990's hardly ever break, of the over 2000 990's we have sold to date only
2-3 have required repair.

Vince: But there are only 20 active guys on the outlaw forum!!!

Steve: Yeah, I guess most 990 owners don't post on our forum....Steve went onto to say, if your 990 does need repair, you send it back to us, one of our techs will repair it, or at our discretion we may send you a new 990....We stand by what we sell

Vince: What about these bass issues I read about? These guys are waiting for an update from you? and the seeing all the parameters on the 990 display itself?

Steve: If you have speakers set to small, and sub-yes, that 97% of the users you are fine now. We are real close to bass fix for the other 3% users with a software update only. Giving them all the parameters from the 990 display itself is a tougher challenge, not solved at this time, and might require software and firmware change, not known at this time.....

Vince: Steve, What about these guys who say Arcam is the ultimate, take your 990 back!!

Steve: Very few guys of the 2000 send the 990 back to us...Give us a try, if you don't like its sound, send it back to us..............

Vince: what about your new balanced amps? Why should I buy one?

Steve: The new 5-ch and 7-ch amps are very sweet sounding, there was some blurb about rail voltage, true balanced etc..he said there will be some pro reviews soon............

Conclusion: Overall I was impressed talking with Steve...I'm real close to pulling the trigger on the 990 ...The debate is over the outlaw vs anthem mca50 amp?

Vince

hey, glad you posted this for all to see. I've only had my 990 for less than two weeks at this posting.

Yeah something i'd have done different on the 990. I'm not sure I completely understand that "bass issue" people are talking about. Although I do have to say...that i'm having trouble finding the right balance in my bass with the 990 pre.

It's either to low for home theater and to loud for 2 channel listening. Not sure if this is the problem or not.

Also, i use a set up disc i use in my DVD player.. and manually set up all the speakers. I start with Dolby Digital, then once those levels are set with a SPL meter.. i usually move on to DTS and run the set up manually again. What i noticed is that there is no difference in the DD and DTS settings. The pre doesn't remember different settings for both formats.

I'm used to setting up for DD then for DTS.. and my Marantz would remember the different setting for each format. We all know that both DD and DTS sound different.. so the 990 pre should remember the settings for each different format. Meaning one size doesn't fit all.

Interesting conversation, indeed. I've always said that most Outlaw owners never even register here, much less post - but owners who encounter problems are significantly more likely to post about those problems (the squeaky wheel principle). I'm looking forward to seeing what tidbits crop up in the firmware update (there have been some good ideas tossed out by 990 owners).

What does an Anthem MCA50 cost? At $1500 (or actually $200 less if you factor in the package discount with the 990), the 7500 seems like a pretty nice bang for the buck.

You may want to try dailing it in for home theater and then using the two channel sub offset to dial it down for that stereo listening.
The 990's channel calibration is global - while DD and DTS do sound different, the two should not vary between individual channels (DTS is generally about 4dB louder across the board, but that may vary somewhat from disc to disc depending on how the DD and DTS tracks were mastered). I've generally had good results using the 990's internal test tones for channel calibration.

When i first got mine.. i did the automatic set up too. the distance was spot on.. but the levels were all set to 0 i found that very odd. I went in and measured all the speakers using a SPL meter and found that the surrounds were to low and the center was to loud.

I use the test tones manually - just change the "TEST TONES" option in the CHANNEL CALIBRATION menu from "OFF" to "MANUAL" and as you move the cursor to each speaker you'll get a test tone. Be sure the master volume is set to 0dB (or whatever point you calibrate to reference) and adjust to get 75dB.

The MCA50 retails for $2100, most dealers offer 10% off, some of the shady dealers will do 20% off and ship out of their zone. Anthem has gestapo rules on shipping out of your local dealer zone.......

If I go the outlaw amp route I save a decent chunk!!
Vince

I was in Vince's position almost a year ago before the 7500 came out. I was deciding among the Outlaw 755, Anthem MCA-50 and Rotel RMB-1095, all 5 x 200 W/channel amps. All three were quite acceptable. The differences were small, as they should be for well-designed solid state amps of similar power. I was getting a pretty good price break from the Anthem dealer (unlike the Rotel dealer) but the MCA-50 was still going to cost a few hundred more than the 755. I chose the Anthem for a number of reasons. It has balanced inputs; the 755 did not. A power amp should be useful for a long time, and I wanted the possibility of balanced inputs in the future even though I am happy with unbalanced 0.5-m Outlaw cables for now. It is hard to imagine anything can be more quiet than the 990 with the MCA-50. I would describe the 755's bass being controlled and tight (some have described it as a little lean), and the Rotel as just the opposite, somewhat full or warm. I found the Anthem's bass to fall between the Outlaw and Rotel (just right?). I like crystal clear highs with no sizzle and found the Anthem revealed details in some recordings that I did not hear with the other amps and that human voices sounded just a liittle more like real voices than recordings of voices. That all being said, without very careful side-by-side comparisons, the differences are small, and I admit I might horribly fail a blind A/B/X test. I am still happy with my decision.

Though I tend to be skeptical of "audiophile" adjectives, and I have not heard any of the new Outlaw amps, some of the descriptions I have read elsewhere and on this forum (you say Steve described them as sweet sounding) lead me to believe the 7500 may have moved somewhat in the direction of the kind of sound the MCA-50 has, so I would encourage you to try them out as I did and judge for yourself. Who knows, with the balanced inputs in the 7500, I might choose it over the Anthem if I were making the choice today.

I am glad to hear the results of your conversations with Steve. I bought the 990 along with a few hundred dollars worth of cables, and tried out and returned the 755. I exchanged a few phone calls and emails with Steve and Scott before and after purchase and they were very helpful. I am looking forward to the 990 software update, and hope they can address a couple of my favorite issues.

I hate to bring this into the mix... but the Sherbourn amps are quite lovely... and rather substantial discounts are often available for new and used!

--TDA

Guys,

Thanks for the amp comments...In my case my gear has to fit into the wife's ent cabinet. Closed front glass door, and 18" wide shelves "wall to wall" Sherboun I think are 18+" width... The outlaws and anthems fit just right....

I came close to buying a used B&K amp at a super price. I called B&K on the phone they told, their tech support told me there amps are powerful and sweet but they give off heat like a toaster oven...no closed cabinet...

I have the option of boring the back wood panel and I will let the amp have 6-9" above to the 990 shelf...

Are the outlaw amps hot like toaster ovens?
I have read the anthems run cool...........

Thanks Vince

I've never found my Model 750 amp to be hot like a toaster oven - it actually runs cooler than my old 1050 receiver did. My 750 is currently in a closed cabinet with a cut-out slightly smaller than the rear panel (for wiring access) and a dead space of probably a foot or so above it. The hottest I've measured the air directly above the amp is somewhere under 100F if my memory serves correctly (haven't measured it in a year or more) - it is if anything slightly cool than what I experienced with an open front and an inch of clearance above it. Any class AB solid state amp with the output ratings we're looking at is going to put off some heat, but the Outlaw amps do have a whole lot of heat sink surface area to reject that heat pretty readily. If you can open up the back panel and give it the 6" to 9" of breathing room clear above it, the 7500 ought to be pretty comfortable.

Gonk:
Unfortunately, channel calibration is NOT global. If I calibrate a regular input to, say, -5dB and then switch to the CD input set for Upsample, that CD input will be +5dB louder than the regular input because the channel calibration doesn't apply to it.

So then to get the CD input at Upsample set to -3dB below the regular input, you'd need to set the 2-ch offset to -8 - which, by the way, is the lowest it goes. If you have to set the regular in put in the above case to -8dB to get the sub to balance correctly and you wanted the CD input at Upsample to be -3dB below the regular input, it would be impossible since the CD input would then need to be at -11dB which it can't go to.

As Skyblazer said - "It's either to low for home theater and to loud for 2 channel listening. Not sure if this is the problem or not." What he is experiencing is EXACTLY the problem I described above. He may be able to use the 2-ch Offset to lower the 2 channel music to an acceptable level unless he had to set the Sub Offset to some level that would not let him do this.

2-ch offset is not a value that is additive to the regular sub offset.

I had to calibrate my system so that the sub offset was 0dB by adjusting the volume of my subs to below what SVS recommends. Then the 2-ch offset could be used to acceptably lower the sub volume for 2 channel music.

I've worked around it for my setup but this is NOT how the sub offsetting should work. It doesn't make sense and is not global like every other pre/pro and receiver I've owned.

I haven't run into this condition myself when using upsample, but if I get a chance I'll try to reproduce it so I understand the situation. I assume this +5dB that you're seeing is in addition to the level variations that exists between DVD (which is mixed at a lower level than CD to provide more response range) and formats like CD, VHS, and cable (which are mixed "hotter" to sound "better" even though it can lead to them clipping sooner).

My 7700 stays on all the time and gets "slightly" warm, that's it. Granted I am not driving it very hard, have efficent speakers & don't crank it up that much but I cannot see this amp getting "hot" even when driven hard.

I really love this amp; I had the 7125 which is very nice but the 7700 / 7500 are "overbuilt" with very heavy gold plated fully insulated 5-way binding post, even the RCA's are gold on these amps, very pretty rear end. I cannot believe I just said that about an amp.

ZoFo,

Was there a sound difference when you moved from the 7125 to 7700 amp? could you hear that 75 watt delta per channel?

thanks Vince

My 7500 is typically cool, even after a movie workout. Compared to the B&K it replaced, very cool, as the old B&K positively gets hot. And the other nicety: dead quiet, I hear nothing in terms of buzz etc.

Vince32837, human hearing responds to proportional changes, not absolute ones. The perceived difference between a 100-watt and a 200-watt input to a speaker is just the same as the perceived difference between a 1-watt and a 2-watt difference, except the sounds in the first case would be described by the typical listener as being four times as loud as those in the second case. Yes, I mean four times as loud - not 100 times as loud. Read any text on psychoacoustics, or even introductory psychology. That's why sound levels are measured in decibels - a logarithm-based figure - and it's why amplifier power levels ought to be converted into DBW, or decibels above one watt, before trying to compare them. My nOrh Le Amp II monoblocks are supposed to be able to deliver 400 watts into my 4-ohm Magneplanars. That sentence tells you just exactly nothing useful - if it pushes any emotional buttons, I'm sorry. But 400 watts translates to 26 decibels above 1 watt, or 26 dbw. Okay - if I know that and know the sensitivity spec for my speakers, which is about 85 db for 1-watt input (on the low side), then I know my amps can push my speakers to peaks of about 111 db each, or 114 db together. I also know that's about 24 db more than my condo neighbors can reasonably be expected to tolerate, or that I would tolerate from one of them. How much power would it take to drive my speakers to the max acceptable level? About three watts, which is 5 dbw.
Which is why I think people ought not to be impressed by astronomical wattage specs.

Paul Nay

So the guys who bought 7500/7700 amps having hum or buzz issues all turned out be outside gear, cable box etc true? no hum from within the 7500/7700 amps?

Paul,

You are right when you take that 100 watt amp and a 200 watt amp, gut at best buy thinks 2X, but reality it 20*log(200) - 10*log(100)= 23 dB -20db =3 dB differnece in power..plus how some manufacturers measure power/THD etc not standardized

Vince

All the hum and buzz issues I've heard about have been due to ground loops or other external issues (dimmer switches, etc.).

Gonk:
My above comments are while using either the built in test tones or while using RoomEQWizard test tones. I'm not talking about measuring levels from a CD and comparing that to DVD levels. This is a pure calibration issue.

Did not hear a difference Vince; I went with the 7700 because I plan to keep this Amp a very long time and I want to have the power to run any speaker I might ever desire and this amp will do that.

When I installed my 7700 I did have a ground loop problem that I did not have with the 7125 and this was because the 7700 has a 3-prong plug where as the 7125 does not. I found the cause of the ground-loop hum in a couple of minutes - it was a dimmer switch for my ceiling fan. I have been wanting to put in a remote controlled fan so this was the perfect time to do it; the remote controled fan (Hunter) also dims the lights with the remote so no dimmer switch is needed.

Vince, one slight correction: dB are always 10 but never 20 times the common logarithm of the numbers in question, so the difference dB difference between a 200 watt amplifier and a 100 watt amplifier would be, as you state, 10 log 200 - 10 log 100 = (10 x 2.30103) - (10 x 2.00000) = 23 - 20 = 3 dB.

I forgot to add that a 1-dB difference in loudness is the minimum loudness difference that can be reliably detected by alert listeners in lab conditions, a 3-dB difference would correspond to "a little" louder or softer, and a 10-dB difference is reported by listeners as about twice as loud (or half as loud).

AndrewS, I think I'm finally getting a good handle on what you are running into. If I have time this weekend (which I may not - family and work are looking to pretty well occupy both days), I'm going to try to confirm my suspicion. Excuse me if everybody else already had this figured out and I'm re-stating the obvious, but what's happening is just starting to click with me. You report that the channel trim imbalance appears in upsample mode - does it also occur in stereo bypass? What it sounds like is you are using a few modes that bypass some or all of the digital processing sections of the unit (which is typically done to maintain as clean a signal path as possible, and is limited to a few "special" cases). The only modes that I thought did this in the 990 were stereo bypass (which obviously avoids it because it remains purely in the analog domain) and the 7.1 Direct input (which only enters the digital domain if the speakers are set to small, and then solely for bass management), but it is entirely possible that upsample behaves similarly to the 7.1 Direct mode. When this happens (as I've heard of happening in a number of other processors as well, not just Outlaw gear), the trim settings can be bypassed. If you had significant amounts of channel trim on the left, right, or sub channels, you would notice that difference very readily in a stereo mode that skipped the channel trim. Since I have almost no adjustment to my left and right channels (either 0dB or -1dB) and not much more trim on my sub (-2dB), I've never noticed it. Like I said, though, I'm mulling over some ways to test this and verify it.

Very interesting

I've spoken with Steve - totally awesome guy!

I had an issue with a scratched 7700 and then bought the 990. I love the combo.

I am not sure about his saloon. Very few active posters and very little traffic but that does not say that nobody buys Outlaw.

I admire their openness to let people criticize on their site.

As for me, I'm a convert

Rob

Vince

I am not sure if I am one of the "20 Active" forum members, I do post from time to time. I have had my 990 since the orignal batch shipped, and could not be more happy with it performance. I use an Outlaw 755 with two Outlaw M200 in a 7.1 system. I run all large speakers so the base-management issue is not a concern of mine. Also I run the video via HDMI and DVI/HDMI of my HD Sat box and DVD straight to the Tv, so I do not switch video with the 990. For on srceen menue I run the 990 monitor out to a 13" LCD. For me the 990 is an Audio Machine and a very good one at that. I just recently added a turntable into my system, a cheap one. My Tehnics SL1700 MKII needs an new cartridge and Tonearm drive belt. I am very pleased with the 990 Phono Performance. I have been listening to records I purchased in late fifties to the early 80s and they sound fantastic on the cheap turntable, can't wait to hear them on the 1700. My only problem with Phono was finding my 25 year old Discwasher brush. IMHO anyone considering new HT/Audio equipment should take advantage of Outlaw's 30 trial period and listen for themselves.

As the title of the thread indicates, it appears that LOTS of people buy from Outlaw!

It is really kind of typical to see a small number of stallwarts in any forum such as this, where a core of enthusiasts are around and help those who come in for a question and then go back about their business.

I have been enjoying the 990 so much that I have not been posting much. All I can say is, the combination with the Anthem MC50 in my system is truly impressive. The Anthem is one of the most neutral and potent amps I have heard. Back when I was younger, I had owned an older Krell and Threshold amp, so I am familiar with subtle sounds/colorations an amp can impose.The Krell did not do it for me. It was a bit bright and hard to listen to at higher levels. The Threshold was detailed yet powerful, and never fatiguing. For that reason, I held the Threshold in high regard. That is what the Anthem reminds me of; very neutral and dynamic.

For the money, the Anthem is hard to beat, and as a combination with the 990, a class act.

Gonk:
Where this "trim" issue appears is with Input 1-5 vs the CD input. I set both modes to "Upsample". I renamed one of the inputs to DVD and used it to calibrate via test tones. When I switch to the CD input and check calibration levels, the sub "trim", if it is negative on the DVD input, is now basically 0 on the CD input.

Note that I am not using any analog sources. The CD input is coax digital and the DVD input is optical digital.

Now that's interesting... I'll have to play with that a bit - I've got an input set up that way already.

EDIT: Does it only affect the sub, or does it affect the trim across the board?

Guys,

It's nice to see the old-timers coming back to post at the Saloon....

It appears internet-direct audio gear rules!

About 4 years ago, I though I was nuts to send, that little company av123, 2 grand for speakers I never heard before! Those Swan Diva are as beautiful rosewood today as back then...+ sound as good too..

I never had a sub, until last Dec, I picked up an Axiom EP500 from Canada...The bass that thing puts out during war of the worlds, required me to move the kitchen fishtanks to another part of the house...I see some guys have 2 or 4 of them, that's twisted!!!

Outlaw appears to be part of that same path!

Thanks Vince

All I can add is after auditioning a 990/7125 combo they should be flying out the warehouse compared to most offerings of slightly less or alot more.This was an outstanding combo and while I went another direction I still whole heartedly recommend the combo.I hate to think someone would buy an avr for $1 to $2k and not get close to this quality and sound for that same price range.Its also a crime that some seperate and avr units more than double the price can't outperform this combo.

A very impressive bunch to be sure offering the very best bang for the buck in audio,Good work Outlaws.

Gonk:
It affects the sub. It may affect the other trim but generally the sub is the one that could be way negative compared to the other speakers.

Neekos: Glad to hear there is another happy Outlaw 990 + Anthem MCA-50 owner out there.

I had some questions about sub levels and sub 2-CH offset and got some suggestions from customer support. Turn down the gain (volume) on the sub so the sub calibration level does not need to be so negative. Mine had been at -12 dB, and oddly enough -10 dB is what appears in the example in the manual, so this must not be unusual. I turned down the sub gain below its mid-level, which is what is suggested as the starting point, so the calibrated level is now only -5 dB.

Only 20 people in this forum? Hey, we've had 15 people post to this thread alone...

wolverine:
Agreed. Adjusting the sub gain is how I got my 990 to be calibrated correctly. My point is that this is NOT how the sub trim should work. I am actually setting my gain on my subs to a level not recommended by SVS.

Other pre/pros that I've had have let me adjust the gain to my liking and have the sub trim apply equally to all inputs.

I love my 990 but this issue is an annoyance.

Hey guys,

Add a 16th person to this thread ~8^) (990/7125/LFM1) and very happy about it. I'd like to fix one issue but maybe the problem is on the other sire (see new thread).

my credit card company trapped the 990 order due to 2 major purchases in 1 day (990+mca50 amp)....

always something,
Vince