Hello everyone,

I have an Oppo-BDP-83 blu-ray player and a Carver 5 channel 125 per channel amplifier. I also have a 50" Samsung plasma tv and 5 high quality speakers. In addition I have a very nice Sunfire sub-woofer. Currently I have the analog outputs from my Oppo blu-ray player connected to an old Sony processor in an input bypass mode. The Sony processor is not on and just passes the information from my blu-ray player to my amplifier. I use the volume control on my Oppo to adjust my listening levels. I have an HDMI connection from the blu-ray player directly connected to my tv.

Now my question, I know the way my blu-ray player is connected is not the most ideal. I was told the volume should be turned up all the way and a preamp/receiver should be used to adjust the volume. I don't want to buy a receiver and was looking at a pre-amp/processor. I also don't want to spend more than $750 or so. I was looking at the Emotiva UMC-1, but have heard there are a lot of issues with it and the room correction is virtually useless. I have also considered the Outlaw 990, even though it is not HDMI and does not have the latest decoders or offer room correction.

If I use the Oppo to do all the decoding and pass the information to the 990 by analog and connect the HDMI cable directly to my tv, will this produce good results even without room correction? I want to have excellent sounding multichannel music (SACD) and excellent movie sound. Any thoughts on what I should do? Should I look for something with room correction? Is the 990 a good alternative or is just outdated technology. I would appreciate any objective responses. Thank you.

The BDP-83 is a great player, and it pairs up very nicely with the Model 990. The two have been used with great results by quite a few people in the forum. I even wrote up a BDP-83/Outlaw setup guide to help folks optimize the combination of the two.

As an anecdotal point of reference regarding room correction, my BDP-83 review talks a bit about the player's analog performance. As part of that, my wife and I found that the BDP-83 analog output (which had no room correction) sounded a bit better than the HDMI output going to an Onkyo PR-SC885 (which had Audyssey MultEQ room correction). Granted, our room is reasonably well-behaved acoustically, but it does help show how good the player can sound on its own.

If EQ and HDMI aren't big concerns, I don't think you could find anything in your price range to compete wit a 990.
I run one with an Oppo BDP-83SE and am very happy with the performance.

I am not so concerned about HDMI, since I would connect my blu-ray player directly to mt tv by the HDMI cable. And I would use the Oppo to decode all the audio by analog, but I am not sure if I should go with something with room correction.

It depends on your room and your budget. With a goal of keeping the cost under $750, you'll be hard pressed to find a receiver or processor with good room correction capabilities and an analog section that is on par with either the BDP-83 or the Model 990.

I ran my 990 with a BDP-83 for a year or so. I ran my video straight through DVI to the 990 then on to the TV. The other input was my DTV box. The Oppo let me use the analog direct mode and the DTV box got in via Optical. It worked great and was easy to use. My room is pretty tame so the Outlaw setup worked pretty well. Once I got my Onkyo and used Audyssey I could tell a difference in the spatial response in 5.1 movies.

Can anyone comment on how well the 990 performs when playing CD's or SACDS? How good would the sound quality be? Excellent, Good Fair? Thank you.

It does very well indeed. It doesn't decode SACDs , very few pre/pros do, so you have to use the 7.1 analog inputs. I use these with an Oppo BDP-83SE and the sound is woderful. The 990 still applies bass management.
For CDs I have a few sources. For 2 Ch. listening , I use the BDP-83SE's stereo outs to a Grant Fidelity tube buffer, then to the 990 that I run in bypass mode. Excellent results. When I wish to apply processing, I use Sony Megachangers to the digital inputs of the 990 and let the 990 do the processing.This also produces a very fine result.The d/a conversion and processing in the 990 are superior to anything else I've heard in it's price range.

I would agree with Koyaan - very good with CD's. If you don't plan to expand stereo to multichannel, the "Upsample" mode is worth trying. That's what I used typically when playing CD's.

The only digital connection that supports SACD is HDMI, so you have to use analog output from an SACD player. In that case, the player is going to be the deciding factor.

I would be using the analog out from my Oppo BDP-83 for listening to SACD's. How would you rate the sound quality playing SACD's under this scenario? Also, should I run the HDMI cable directly from my blu-ray player to my television? I was also thinking about running an optical cable from my cable box to the 990, and an HDMI to the television for the video. Is this an ideal set-up? Thank you!

I would rate it as extremely good. The BDP-83 packs a heck of a punch for the price - and even beyond the price. See my setup guide for tips to optimize the combination of Model 990 and BDP-83.


You can do one of two things. You can run HDMI straight from each source (cable box and Blu-ray player) to the TV, or you can get three HDMI-to-DVI adapters, run HDMI from both sources to the Model 990, and run a single cable from the 990 to the TV. The benefit of the second option is automatic switching between the two. Picture quality should be the same either way. Also, you are right to run optical from the cable box to the 990.

This seems to be the right thread for this, but I have noticed a very unexpected benefit since replacing my Outlaw 1050 with a 990, the video quality has improved slightly but noticeably. In my old configuration I ran component outputs from my DVD player and SA-8300HD DVR directly to my HDTV. Now I run them into the 990 and from there to the TV. I am using the same video interconnects into the same input into the HDTV that the SA-8300HD was on before.

I am not sure I can explain why. I have two guesses:
1) That this may just be the result of re-seating the RCA connectors
2) That because the 990 converts other signals to component, that perhaps it modifies component input in some minor manner.

In either case, I am not arguing with the result.

I have had the 990 for 4 years and with the BDP-83SE since it came out a couple of years ago. I have also considered the Emotiva processor but as you say, too many issues and bass management approach that is odd. I listen to a lot of hi-res surround in all formats, especially bluray now, lots of wonderful concerts are available.I was concerned about room EQ as well but made a significant improvement to my room with room treatments on the walls. I wish I had done it sooner. If your situation allows for putting treatments on the walls, I think you will be happy with the results. Basic treatments are simple (Google it) and you can refine further as you see fit. Much can even be done with homemeade treatments. Even if a processor has good room EQ, I feel now that room treatment is a must for the best sound. It is often overlooked or not possible(WAF)for many. You'll be amazed at the improvement controlling room reflections can have, improvements that cannot be had with EQ'ing. Have fun.

I bought a used 990 less than a year ago. Highly recommended. I am using an Oppo BDP-83 into the 7.1 analog inputs and a sonos box to toslink. Replaced a ten year old Rotel prepro and the sound quality improvement was significant.