Wok ... now I don't mean to open a can of worms and I am not worried about the price difference (400 vs 1100).

Ok I have a LMC right now much have absolutely love the sound. BUT I have a few problems ... the acquisition time (prob 2 second) bootup time ... lack of PLIIx on digital signals ... only 3 inputs and possible lack of discrete power codes may have me looking elsewhere.

As I said I absolutely love the sound .. so any of you who have or have heard both please elaborate on the sound of the 990 compared to the LMC ... I mostly (read 99%) listen to movies so that is most important ...

I would order it and listen myself but I live in Canada and would then have to eat the duties and taxes which I'm not willing to do plus I'm making a visit down south in a few weeks (end of July) (but after my 30 days with av123) and could pick it up then ...

Please help.

Ted

I have been watching the LMC-1 debate lately with some interest, and I've had a few concerns about it. The bootup time is pretty shockingly long (11+ seconds just to bring the unit up, plus the time spent winding up to the last volume setting), and the acquisition time sounds reminiscent of Outlaw's 950. The fact that they advertise Pro Logic II and IIx makes me really uncomfortable (which is why I've made a number of posts about the subject) because it feels like false advertising: Pro Logic II and IIx are supposed to work with Dolby Digital signals and I've failed to find even one other product that is unable to do so. Toss in the inability to do firmware updates in the field, and I just get a bit uncomfortable with the product - even before factoring in some of the feature omissions made to reach the desired price point.

As for sound, we've not yet heard what DACs the LMC-1 ended up using. We know what DACs the 990 has, and they are quite good - in fact, one of the DMC-1's biggest proponents (DOJ) compared the 990 to the DMC-1 and found very little difference sonically. I doubt that the $500 LMC-1 and the $2500 DMC-1 are sonically comparable enough to make the 990 a sonic downgrade from the LMC-1 -- in fact, it's most likely going to be a sonic improvement for both movies and music as well as a feature upgrade (start-up time is around 2 seconds, acquisition time is somewhere under half a second, PLII and IIx behave as Dolby intended, input names can be edited, firmware can be updated in the field, and all the other stuff in my SSP chart ). If the LMC-1 isn't working out with you from a feature standpoint, I think the 990 would serve your needs very nicely for features and sound.

Here's an interesting note to mix into the debate... In this AVS post yesterday, MLS identified the DAC being used by the LMC-1. It's a Cirrus CS42518. You can probably get some good feedback on its performance from folks with Model 970's, because the 970 uses a Cirrus CS42528 (which is listed on the same page of Cirrus's site as the 42518). The two chips are very similar -the only difference between the 42518 and the 42528 that I could find is an extra 4dB of dynamic range on the 42528. The concensus from folks who have heard both the 970 and 990 (including the Outlaws themselves) is that the 990's Analog Devices AD1852 DAC is a nicer chipset (as you would expect in a processor costing several hundred dollars more).

Gonk is right about the diff.
There is no contest.
990 beats 970 hands down !!!!
I had both. Fortunately outlaw take it back within 30 days.