There may be another reason I was having such trouble with DDSOTM and Hotel California and other SACD and DVD-A playback. About the time I was exploring other ways to calibrate my 990 due to the way those two discs sounded it started to drop all audio when I was listening to 5.1 sources. I'd get some random snapping in all five speakers and then, sometimes, the audio would drop. I initially noticed it dropping audio during movies but my family, who watches more TV, said it was doing it on cable too. I could restore audio most of the time by switching between Dolby modes but not always. In a few days it wasn't randomly dropping the audio but doing it on a regular basis.

As I understand it the 7.1 audio is separate from the processed audio, but the calibration is not. And there were times when the center channel was louder than other times with the same source. Could how those two discs sounded been the first clue my 990 was having an issue? Maybe.

My 990 is now at Outlaw for a thorough check to see what is going on. My compliments to Edward at Outlaw who did not hesitate to have a look at my 990 after I described its symptoms. His actions are consistent with all my other dealings with Outlaw; they provide excellent customer service!

Now that I don't have it I realize how much I enjoy it. I've moved an Adcom preamp and amp into its place and running everything in stereo. While I really enjoy 2 channel music, stereo just doesn't cut it for movies. To paraphrase Dire Straits, "I want my Nine Nine Oh".

I would tend to agree it is the "mastering" or "engineering" that is at the root of this. When I play SACD...I find that the multichannel sound is fairly equal across all speakers (only a slight variation at best). But, when playing a movie with DD or DTS...or playing a CD and letting the player "engineer" multi channel sound, I find a wide variance in sound levels.

With Blu-Ray, selecting UNCOMPRESSED PCM, and using analog out...I find the sound levels are very similar to SACD. Probably because they were mastered in multi channel as is SACD.

Marcus

The sound levels in any particular speaker are totally determined by the choices made by the recording and mixing engineer (except for stereo or other formats with additional processing in your preamp, obviously). There is no "spec", "standard" or any other factors involved except for artistic choices made during the recording and mixing sessions.