o.k. - bear with me hear, I am new to this. I have decided on the Outlaw but am wondering what I am missing out on regarding DPL II? What are the benefits to having this feature that the 1050 does not give?

thanks

Not much really unless you have alot of VHS tapes laying around you want to listen to in 5.1 or you have a gamecube which also uses Doly prologic II. Other then that All DVD's come in Dolby Digital or DTS which the Outlaw does really well so your not missing much unless you MUST listen to stereo recordings in 5.1 beside pro-logic II doesn't even accurately produce "true" 5.1 from stereo recordings anyways.

It depends really, if you have a lot of cds lying around and you are more of a music person than a movie person then Dolby Pro Logic 2 is the way to go. It is really a trade off you see, if you get a receiver with DPL2 then odds are it will not be 6.1 if you stay in the $500 to $800 price range. So choose wisely my friend, and by the way the 6.1 on the Outlaw 1050 in not discrete 6.1 either.

I'm a HT newbie going to purchase my first surround AV receiver, speakers, and DVD this summer. I have been researching all this for four months till I'm ready to puke. I could into the local box stores and be disappointed or go to the local high end stores and walk out with nothing I could afford. I have a very small house.

I was ready for a 1050 until I saw no Pro Logic II. I have 200+ VHS tapes and hundreds of CDs. I can't be alone in this. I have 2, yes two, DVDs. I'm moving into the DVD world.

What are your recommendations since the 1050 is missing something important to us "oldtimers" (Yes, I had an eight-track) with lots of CDs and VHS tapes? I can listen to 2-channel with my existing system. I feel like I'm back at square one. Oh well, maybe time to see what Onkyo puts out this spring.
Ross

What are your recommendations since the 1050 is missing something important to us "oldtimers" (Yes, I had an eight-track) with lots of CDs and VHS tapes? I can listen to 2-channel with my existing system. I feel like I'm back at square one. Oh well, maybe time to see what Onkyo puts out this spring.
Ross[/B][/QUOTE]

i've been checking out the Denon 2802 or 3803 Receiver...looks pretty good.. good luck

Just to weigh in as a new 1050 owner with LOTS of CDs, I listened to a number of DPLII receivers and went with the 1050 anyway.

The way I see it, the "music mode" DPLII is really just another form of digital signal processing for two channel records. I don't care for any of the other DSP modes I've heard on any receivers to date (the 1050 included) and DPLII in "music mode" didn't particularly blow me away either.

The 1050, on the other hand, sound exceptional in two channel mode and serves my CD collection quite well. Now I understand if you find DPLII handles Dolby surround decoding better (...lots of "old" VHS tapes...) but as an audiophile with lots of two channel stereo CDs, the 1050 is a superb choice.

-Andy

I'm not too happy with how stereo is played back on my system, but there are so many variables involved, it's hard to pin down. One complication is that my center's tweeter is much brighter than the mains, which colors the sound a bit. So I was wondering if I could get some sort of EQ to adjust for this.

However, I'm now thinking maybe the problem is that the Pro Logic is just dumping too much of the signal into the center. The various DSP modes do not change the sound on my system, possibly because I have an early 1050; would it be worth trying to upgrade my 1050 internals? Or, do the DSP modes use the same algorithm to determine how much signal goes into each speaker?

I guess I'd like to see a system that didn't collapse so much of the sound into the center, when listening to stereo sources, particularly since the center is not as good of a speaker as my mains (not to mention the reduced soundstage).

Today is a sad day as I just shipped my trusty 1050 to a new owner. Just couldn't wait to upgrade for the new Outlaw Receiver.
Picked up a sony strda7es at Tweeter for a price I couldn't walk away from, and sold the 1050 on Audiogon in 1 day.

The main reason I made the move was for PLII.
I watch a good amount of cable tv and HD and the difference is really noticeable. I thought about going the 950 route with the trade, but I am not really into separates right now and it would have cost considerably more.

It sounds like you are using Pro Logic with stereo sources and are underwhelmed with the results. You are far from alone in that: Pro Logic often struggles with pure stereo sources like CD's, and many people have found it seriously lacking for surround processing of CD's (it relies on the source to include the steering logic to help it break out center and surround signals, so sources that lack that logic are prone to collapsing completely into the center channel). You might consider turning the center channel off and using a phantom center -- it will keep the data in your mains rather than steering it all to the center, although you may still lose some imaging. With main speakers that are so much better than your center, you may prefer a phantom center channel or even just stereo mode for music listening.

The 1050's implementation of Pro Logic is very similar to any other receiver's Pro Logic mode, and there were no changes to the 1050 during its production life that would affect your unit. The collapsing to center is a characteristic of Pro Logic, no matter whose receiver it is in.

For what it's worth, Pro Logic II certainly does a better job with this sort of material, but it still is a computer manipulation of a program that was created for stereo reproduction. I use PLII on my 950 for cable TV and DD2.0 DVD's, but most of the time I still listen to CD's in stereo mode.

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gonk -- Saloon Links | Pre/Pro Comparison Chart | 950 Review

Well, that explains that!



I'm not sure if I would call collapsing the sound into the center "good imaging", so I am not sure I have much of an alternative.
;-) I think a theoretical moderate use of a center would be an improvement, but you're probably right that this is the best answer.

Or, start buying all of my music in 5.1 format. :-) (Still a poor selection, IMO.)



Actually, early 1050's had a bug which caused the extra DSP modes (Jazz, Hall, etc.) to sound the same as Surround. Mine seems to have this bug, but normally I do not use DSP modes. (All of them I've heard really just make a mess of the sound and are annoying!) SO, I guess what I was wondering was whether or not Natural would treat the steering logic and use of the center channel differently than Surround.



And regardless of DSP mode?

[QUOTE]For what it's worth, Pro Logic II certainly does a better job with this sort of material, but it still is a computer manipulation of a program that was created for stereo reproduction. I use PLII on my 950 for cable TV and DD2.0 DVD's, but most of the time I still listen to CD's in stereo mode.[QUOTE]

Actually, I don't mind PL so much for TV viewing either, particularly since so much of it is mono anyway, or in the case of movies & shows, probably is mixed for DPL.

SO, I don't think it's worth trying to get PLII just for CD/radio. If I wanted further processing, I'd look into a more advanced algorithm.