990 7.1 Direct in BYPASS

I have had a 990 and an Oppo BDP-83 and have been waiting to see what the phantom Outlaw 9xx replacement would be. I had thought about upgrading the 83 to the 83SE or recently getting the new BDP-95. I need the 990 to do full bass management for other sources (cable box, media player, and a VCR maybe once a year), but the only way to run the 990's 7.1 direct in BYPASS is to have all speakers set to large all around. This disables bass management for other sources. I figured with the extra A/D/A conversion and digital processing in the 990 with speakers set to small, I would probably lose the advantage that the 83E or the new BDP-95 would give me over the BDP-83.

I wondered if anyone knows if there is a way to program any programmable remote control with all the commands needed to switch the 990 between large speakers all around (no bass management) and small speakers all around (full bass management) -- to make it less painful. Then I would even think about getting a BDP-95 and setting it up to do the bass management and keeping the 990 for a while.

Using a macro with the Harmony One you could set the 990 to several different conditions but it would take some expertise and a bit of time.

I'm pretty sure you'd need to access the 990's settings menu to consistently switch between 7.1 direct and whatever other decoding you'd use for the sources. The 990 cycles through the available decoder settings making it difficult to consistently land on the desired setting. I've not been successful programing my Harmony One to access the settings menu on the 990 but I'm certainly interested if someone has been able to do so.

Alternately, if you have a 5.1 or 6.1 system I believe an Outlaw ICBM (occasionally available in the used market) can handle bass management in the situation you describe. Leave the 990 in 7.1 direct and put the ICBM in between the 990 and your amp/subwoofer. The ICBM manual is available on the Outlaw website so you can check it out to see if it would work for you. I'm using an ICBM in a stereo system as a high/low pass filter for my monitors (good to 60Hz) and a subwoofer (below 60Hz) and it works great. Lastly, Outlaw announced the ICBM-2 some time ago but it has yet to be released.

I no longer use my Harmony One with my 990 but... when you set up the remote with the logitech software you can tell the remote which pieces of the processors remote function to duplicate. I selected all when I set up my devices and the Harmony has screens for every command I can perform in my 990, Onkyo 886, OPPO BDP-83, iPod, Directv receiver and my TV. It is a little cumbersome but the screens are there. Based on that I think you can tell the Harmony to do anything the remote will do.

Thanks for the replies. It sounds like since even a programmable remote will not know which state the 990 is actually in at a given time, even if one can program all the keystrokes into a macro that are required to switch it from all large to all small speakers and the other way around, all those keystrokes are relative to where it was -- unless one is very lucky and it works out to be exactly the same either way.

That is not correct.
I have programmed my URC MX850 so I can switch from 7.1 to optical to coaxial at the touch of a button.
This is really good for comparing different decoding.
All I did was set up macros with different names.
Like for 7.1 it is the "movie" button on the remote.
For optical it is "Oppo" and for coaxial it is "DVD".
Very simple to do.

Thanks butchgo, but just to be completely sure, I am asking specifically about when switching between a source like coax for DVDs to 7.1 direct that I can also switch the speaker setup from all small (so the 990 internal crossovers are used) to all large (so the Oppo's internal crossovers are used). And doing this without have to go manually in the 990's setup menu, which I know how to do, but don't want to do every time I switch between certain sources.

I've been using the Oppo with 3 different inputs into the 990 all along (7.1 direct, coax, and stereo-analog).

Again, thanks for reply and patience.

In regards to the 990 7.1 Direct questions. I was able to make the nessary macros to change the 990 base management speaker setting from small to large using a one touch command. I then set the OPPO BDP-95 base management system to handle all the elements that the outlaw 990 was performing. I experimented and simply used the delay, distance and speaker outputs that were previously measured on the 990 calibration.( I will go back later and use a SPL meter and take the measurements directly off the BDP-95) Question: In this 7.1 direct mode with all speakers being set for large what should the Outlaw 990 base setting for the sub be set at,LFE or L/R+Sub or off and what should the crossover,distances and channel outputs be set at on the Outlaw 990 now that the OPPO BDP-95 is performing all the duty. My speakers are Fosgate MC220 80hz THX.
Question 2:When I go from 7.1 input back to video 1 coax for my directv or use DVD coax input on 990 will I have protection for my Fosgate MC-220 and my SD-180 surrounds which are also 80hz crossover or will I have to swith the speaker setting back first.If I leave the 7.1 direct sub setting on the 990 to L/R sub or LFE than dont I defeat the purpose of using the OPPO BDP-95 base management feature.I also have the macro ability to simply reverse the large speaker setting on the 990 macro back before viewing directv or regular Prologic, DTS but if I forget to switch back could I not damage the speakers. I have been using your 990 to OPPO settings with the +10 on the BDP-95 up to now. Trying to get improved performance by using the new base management system in BDP-95. GONK what do you think aswell

I have found that you can change the speakers from small to large with a macro command but this does not properly do what you are trying to achieve. What you want to achieve is to have the total base management system controlled by the OPPO crossover. OPPO will control speaker size, speaker output,gain and delay.The 990 will simply be passing the 7.1 ouput of the OPPO to the 990 outputs then to your amplifers. To do this you would have to setup 3 sets of macros the other 2 being changing channel gain and channel delay to zero on the 990. This would then be totally bypassing the 990 crossover.I have not figured that out yet. One other method is make the OPPO and the 990 pass the 7.1 signal signal to a stand alone active crossover at the outputs of the 990. This way all 990 sources and OPPO seem same crossover, who knows if the active sounds better than the digital.

Sorry I did not reply to your answer to my old question. Life has been busy. My understanding is that when all speakers are set to large the digital bass management is disabled, so crossovers and delays are disabled. Channel levels are analog, so as long as the Oppo levels are set to flat, I would think the same channel levels one uses for everything else in the 990 should be fine for the Oppo. If you had some independent level setting for the Oppo alone like a calibration disc, I would guess you could do minor tweaks to the 990 levels with the Oppo channel settings. So I don't think a third macro is necessary, but two are.

I did ask Outlaw support and then verified myself that when you switch the 990 from all small to all large and then back to small it does remember the crossover and delay settings.

I would have asked a follow-up question which I think you answered, you do not yet have a second macro that switches the 990 back to small.

One problem I thought of after asking my original question, is that without looking at the 990's on-screen menu, you won't know which state the 990 is in unless you remember it or set it one way or another when shutting it off. My recollection is that even though each individual setting toggles back and forth small/large, the macro to switch one way would not be identical to the one to switch back.

To answer your other question, I believe you want the sub set to LFE. L/R+sub will sum the L+R plus the Oppo sub output and send it all to the sub. Since the Oppo is already set up to do bass management you want only its sub output to go to the sub.

They could have addressed this by having a simple BYPASS mode for the 7.1 inputs like they have for all other inputs.

This is what I have found regardless of what Outlaw told you.
Leaving the delay and gains on the 990 at anything but zero changes the sound. When the OPPO is doing everything and the 990 is simply passing the 7.1 OPPO output to to the amps there is clearly an improvement in sound. The sound has better low level information.The sound is also simply cleaner. Playing my other sources with these settings DIRECTV,Coaxl,analog and fiber optic dont sound right. Sound is thin a hollow. Is this because the 990 is playing everything full range.If the sub setting is set to LFE with the speakers full range than am I correct in there will be no sound coming off the sub at all for any of these sources.If this is correct then my speakers have no protection from low frequency damaging signal. Is this correct. Im still not getting it.

I read your post again. I got it now. Set crossover/delay on OPPO,leave gains at zero on OPPO.Use gains on 990 set speakers to large sub on LFE then create another macro to revert back to small when playing all othe digital sources.Is that right?
I will create a new MACRO by sunday for reverting back to small. You are right that you will have to remeber what you are on shutting down 990.

Yes, that is what I meant.

What universal remote are you using?

Harmon Kardon Take Control TC1000. Thank You Again.