I'll just point you guys back to this post and defer to the experts

WOW! That guy is a little over the top, but I bet his room sounds good. I would direct you to auralex acoustics. They have some fairly economical systems that are tastefull and effective. Their web site is also very educational. I have to admit, that room treatment is not practical for every application. The "wife acceptance factor" is pretty low on putting bass traps in the living room. However, if you have a dedicated home theater room, I think room treatment is a necessity.

I remember reading Jimna's post and thinking he has way more time than I do for this hobby. He did give some great tips on how to construct the traps and how to do it pretty cheaply. I have always wondered how he did the analysis of the room to get the traps placed correctly. Did he use some sort of analyzer or just his ears. Pretty impressive none the less.

Could be worse -- http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/52928-diy-anechoic-chamber.html

To be fair, I think the dude was looking to build someplace where he could play with speaker designs / measurements, but still...

I'd be happy with a 990 with HDMI inputs (and maybe a little smaller physically) and some upgraded audio transcoding. I've been very pleased from day one with my 990, which I upgraded to from a 950, which I also liked. I'll probably keep the 990 in my HT, I just want something good for the TV in the den. I was using a 970/7125 combo, but I have never been pleased with the 970. I finally had enough and put that combo in the closet and bought a small Marantz NR-1402. While not great, it is OK for everyday TV watching, it doesn't have the audio issues that never seemed to get fixed with any of the 970 firmware updates. I'd like to get the 7125 back into play as it is a nice sounding amp.

If you see in my signature that I also have an unused RR2150, it's not in the closet because I don't like it. It will be put back into service when I finally get my office reorganized, along with a pair of Boston Acoustics VR-60s. The RR2150 had an issue but Outlaw fixed it relatively inexpensively.

As you can see I've been a big fan of Outlaw's gear, and have spent a bit of money with them, but my patience has about run out. I've put off the upgrade of the 970 (Did I mention that I don't like it?) for two years waiting on "the next Outlaw pre/pro", but I'm about done. It isn't a matter of I need to upgrade nearly as much as I want to upgrade. Even though I already have tons of cables of various types so I don't really need to purchase anything new for connectivity into my older equipment and I don't mind wire clutter, I want the simplicity (at least from the user point of view) of HDMI. It's time to move into the 21st century as far as home theater cabling is concerned.

Now it's time to go back to listening to my analog two-channel system, which is something that I find myself doing more and more of lately. Hopefully Outlaw will somehow manage to extricate itself from this product morass that it has been in for the past couple of years. I really do want them to succeed as a company, a company that produces good products for a reasonable price.

Oh, before I forget; where is the ICBM-2? I could really use that to help blend a subwoofer in with my Maggies. I've been waiting over a year for that as well.

Jeff

I think your plight is not unlike that of others. And that is part of the problem. Despite the value of loyalty Outlaw has to have new products that will be worth the expense of upgrading and interesting enough to attract new comers to the "posse". If all they did was "update" HDMI the dyed in the wool types (who frankly are probably off with something from an esoteric outlier like Cary...) might be pleased but the majority of folks that really do appreciate room correction and other advances would look elsewhere...

(and bass management is sorta similar too -- I know a big part of what I would hope to achieve with more modern room correction is incorporate newer / more subs into my system, not a whole lot of value in picking up ICBM to put back on the shelf...)

The 975 is said to be a entry level processor. Does this mean there is no room correction? Not even Audyssey XT?

fallout - I don't think the Outlaws have stated one way or the other if the new processor will have room correction. Seems like it would be a bit of a gamble to exclude it though, as it's such a common feature these days in newer receivers and processors.

-John

Before this all spins into speculation, I want to confirm that the new entry level processor will not offer room
correction. The Model 975 employs a Cirrus Logic solution but we proactively chose NOT to include their room correction feature. For those of you who purchased the 990 we made the same decision back then to omit activating this part of their free library of features. It just did not meet our own performance goals.
We met recently with representatives of Cirrus and they told us that while there have been some improvements in the number of filters in that part of their software, their primary focus is really in other areas. We agree.

Peter

Good Lord....the hits just keep on coming.

Good luck with that. Seriously.

Best,