Hello All. I just yesterday bought a six month old 990 from eBay. After two years, I'm finally getting my basement home theater going and have been spending hours and hours picking gear. Here's what I've got, or will have shortly:

Outlaw 990
Adcom 6000 5 channel
Adcom 545 front

Paradigm 9se front
JBL Studio center
4 small MTX surround speakers for now
"tuba 18" powered folded horn sub

DishNetwork HD box (video HDMI, audio optical)
Panasonic 1080i plasma, probably the 58" (last thing to order)

Cobalt cables in the walls (HDMI to the TV), Blue Jean (Belden) interconnects (unless you guys can recommend something else, although I don't want to start a cable debate!)

...and an Oppo, I just don't know which one to get. They have the 981 and now the 980. It looks to me that the 981 has better video scaling and the 980 has 7.1 analog out for SACD (vs 5.1 on the 981) Hooked up this way, the DVD player is decoding the channels and the Outlaw is passing them through correct? Is it worth buying another $200 worth of cables to hook it up this way? Does it sound that much better? I don't own any SACDs (yet.. but from what I've read DVD-A/SACD is awesome) so I don't know. As far as video, Do I even need the Oppo to scale or will the Panny do it? I've heard nothing but good things about both Outlaw and Oppo.. thanks in advance

Welcome to the saloon, and to 990 ownership!

As for your OPPO thoughts, I've got reviews of both the 981HD and the 980H , as I beta tested both players. THe 980H is a better option for DVD-A and SACD, if you think you'll get into those formats (mostly meaning SACD, as DVD-A is dead in the water at this point from a software standpoint), but the 981HD can offer better video performance. The Panasonic will scale video on its own, but the benefit of a good upscaling player is that it can offer a better video scaling section than many TV's employ - either way, you are producing an HD resolution image from a source that is basically 480i, so you can't get "true" high def, but a good upscaling player can get remarkably close.

I just read your review and also a thread on avs forums. The consensus there is the 980 video scaling is "sharper" the 981 is "softer and more film like (whatever that means). I think I'd like sharper, especially with Plasma. What do you think?

..also, is there a real noticeable difference using the 7.1 analog outs with SACD..and if there is, is this because the decoder in the DVD player is better than than the Outlaw? I'm just wrestling with the cost of SEVEN MORE decent cables.

"Softer" refers to the fact that the 981HD smooths out the image more, a by-product of the Faroudja chip. My experience with these players is mainly on a 32" display, which reduces the magnitude of the differences quite a bit.

As for SACD, the difference between 5.1 and 7.1 is something that I'm just starting to investigate (my beta sample didn't support 7.1 output of SACD). Keep in mind, though, that the 990 isn't a factor in this case - it isn't doing anything but bass management for SACD, because SACD is only delivered via multichannel analog (which isn't an input that can then have surround processing applied to it). The differences between the 981HD and 980H for DVD-A and SACD are subtle, but the 980H does have a bit of an edge because it uses a better DAC and simpler signal path than the 981HD.

Hey Gonk,

Thanks for all the first hand info. I've learned a lot here and I don't even have the 990 yet. Can't wait, mine should be here Tues, the amps after. Counting the minutes...

I'm going to go with the 980. For $169 it can't be beat. Looking forward to playing with the SACD. I bought enough interconnects to hook it up that way.

I have an old Denon 1500 CD player. Can't wait to hook it up digital out through the 990 and compare it to the Oppo for regular music CDs. Its all good. Thanks again

Glad to help, sluggo - I thnk you'll enjoy the 980H and the 990 once they both arrive and you get 'em hooked up.

Good Morning Gonk,

Just a fast question regarding SACD and the OPPO 980. Can you pass SACD from the player to a processor such as an Onkyo 805 with a HDMI connection or only through the analog outputs.

Thanks, LTK

The 980H will pass SACD via HDMI as either PCM (for HDMI v1.1 receivers) or raw DSD (for HDMI v1.2 or v1.3 receivers that will accept and decode DSD).