I also listen to vinyl, but did not find the lack of a turntable input on the 950 to a deal-breaker. Plenty of small standalone turntable pre-amps are available. Expensive models cost several hundred dollars, but I am very happy with a less expensive model that was only about $50.

It is not much bigger than 3 or 4 inches, so space is not an issue. As a plus, it amplifies the signal very close to the turntable, so the longer run to the 950 is already amplified and so it is much less susceptible to picking up hum.

It's nice to know that vinyl thrives, however CE manufacturers are faced with a real problem of having to cram more and more connections on the back panels of their units as tech is added, and in prioritizing it is not surprising that they're marginalizing the phono preamp. Units comparable to the 997 (ie Anthem Marantz Parasound) that include balanced outs and HD switching are going the same way.

You may think this is a good or bad thing, but were I enjoying vinyl, I would want a separate phono preamp for two reasons: so I could buy a nice prepro or receiver without limiting my options, and so I wouldn't end up being stuck with a supbar built-in preamp in any unit that I did buy.

Hey Sluggo, point well taken, but I already have a separate phone pre-amp (a holdover from my 950) and celebrated, along with others on this forum if memory serves, the inclusion of a phono input on the 990). I still think that Outlaw could have easily gotten rid of some analog space-wasters (I mean, VCR and cassette deck input/outputs? talk about needless!) and included a decent phono pre-amp in the design of the 997.

Until one can record using HDMI, analogue connections will be required for some form of recording device - be it a DVD Recorder or, in future, BDR (since I doubt that Hollywood will ever permit digital to digital recording.)

And I don't know what they might be, but just as we used to have a set of analogue RCA jacks that could be unjumpered to allow an external processor of some sort, I can imagine a future where one could insert some device in a similar fashion - only through the use of an HDMI connection.

Heck on the phono side, why not an external device that acts as a phone pre-amp / click and pop reducer / dynamic range expander, etc. all in one - with an HDMI output?

Just getting carried away.

OUCH! Please tell me you were just kidding.

For me at least, the whole point of vinyl is it's musical / sonic purity. Dynamic range expanders (not really needed anyway) and click and pop reducers must by their very nature compromise the sound. Analog processing of this type just does not work. Dynamics processors in particular have a horrible time dealing with mixed program material, owing to their one-size-fits-all time constants. For recording, dynamics processing is used all the time, but that is with single instruments, especially vocals, but that's a completely different usage.

And HDMI - are you saying you would want to convert your vinyl analog to digital, then back to analog again before it goes to the power amp? Doesn't that defeat the point?

Vinyl playback offers the most musically direct connection to the original recording artists possible. I sure wouldn't want to muck up that purity with any manner of post processing, especially considering it's not needed.

For the record (pun intended), I would recommend an outboard phono preamp for the highest quality possible from the medium. Also, I would recommend a separate stereo preamplifier for music only listening, with a HT preamp like the 997 feeding it's left and right outputs into one set of inputs of the stereo preamp for movie sound. HT preamps, no matter how good, just cannot match the sonic purity of a dedicated stereo preamp due to the extremely complex and lengthy signal path necessary to accommodate all the HT inputs/outputs/features.

Altec,

well said and explained.

John

OK, I'm only posting this so that Altec's conservative thoughts will look positively progressive. (Actually I think I told him this story once.)

MANY years ago, I purchased a Granada model Victrola at an antique store. It's an ancient acoustical, windup record player circa 1925 (unfortunately, my ex-wife took it in the divorce). When I got it home, I put in an old acoustical recording and, despite the high level of surface noise and the artificial resonances of the acoustical recording (no mics here, they sang into the horn and a needle scratched the wax), there was SOMETHING about that recording that sounded incredibly real. My only explanation was that some aspect of the performance was directly conveyed in that primitive recording process that was missing with the advent of electrical recording.

Would I want to listen to music that way? Absolutely not. But it taught me that A.)I'm crazy (high likelihood), or B.)the human ear is capable of resolving incredible subtlety in sounds, no matter what compromises may be in place.

Sooo, there is something that IMO is even more direct than electrically recording vinyl playback and that is acoustically recorded vinyl playback.

OK, it's time for me to return to the secure area. I'll write again when the doctor lets me near the computer. (Sure beats writing with crayon.)

We now return to our conversation about the 997 (which I'm HIGHLY anticipating, by the way.)

It's hard to follow behind bob's post (glad they let you trade the crayons for a keyboard, by the way), but I think it's worth remembering what we're facing when talking about a modern SSP. There's the long-familiar aspects of home theater (component video inputs, coaxial and optical audio inputs, and a 7.1 analog for those stubborn multichannel analog sources). There's the new face of home theater (HDMI v1.3, with its army of new audio codecs, its digital video, and its ornery HDCP police). There's the bevy of speakers to support (7.1 output, bass management, time delays, channel trims, RCA/XLR output requests, calls for multiple subwoofer outputs). There's the long-familiar video switching (including transcoding composite and s-video to component for those random devices like VHS, LaserDisc, and some game consoles as well as the component inputs themselves). There's the new era of video processing (transcoding all those analog sources to digital, scaling and deinterlacing, 3:2 pulldown, video bypass modes, and so forth). There's an expectation of room correction (be it Audyssey, Trinnov, or some other creature). There's a remote that is expected to control the SSP and probably whatever other devices are around it (although I still prefer a third-party universal so I can get just what I like). There's an interface for installing firmware updates, maybe an RS232 port for integration with fancy control systems, and the occasional request for a network interface. There's a second zone for feeding those dining room or deck speakers. There's even the radio, which is no longer merely AM/FM - now we're asking about HD Radio, XM Radio, and Sirius as well. The only reasons we see stereo analog inputs at all is because we need them for those same devices that we're keeping composite and s-video for (and because by "simply" feeding them through an ADC we can lump them in with everything else) and for the occasional high-quality analog source (which could be a standalone DAC, a high-end CD player, or - yes - a turntable with phono pre-amp). After all of that gets taken care of, is there still time / energy / budget to include a phono pre-amp of significant performance (something on par with what the RR2150 got)? If something is going to give in all of this, it's not surprising that the phono pre-amp is high on the list, especially since many home theaters aren't going to include vinyl.

Well put, Gonk...my post earlier started with details like yours, but I'm glad I edited down, yours is much better.

The most important thing to remember about this unit is that it cannot be all things to all people. Being that it is a Home Theater preamp, it must be all things (or as close to it as possible) to the HT enthusiast, all other considerations are secondary.

In this forum and others there are tons of posts from stereophiles jumping through hoops to maintain separate listening settings for their HT and 2 channel listening in the same setup. While it's good that people have been able to do so (and my admiration to those who did for their fortitude), it's clear that the two specialties are becoming divergent in enough ways that high quality all-in-one solutions will fade away.

I'm with you guys on the 997 not having a phono input, my dedicated H/T room is simply that, for gaming, movies and watching the satellite, have no desire to listen to music in that room, if I wanna listen to music, I go to the 2-channel setup in the game room. I only asked about the phono input for another guy on another forum. The 997 not having a phono input by no way makes a deciding factor on my purchase of the 997, as a matter of fact, once the pre-order opens I'm hoping to be the first in line to place my order (provided I have the funds at the time).