990 better than Lexicon MC1

I just read a review on the Home Theater Forum written by their administrator, Steve Simon. He had just received his 990 and he compared it favorably to his Lexicon MC1. A contributer to the thread then noticed that Mr. Simon's Lexicon was for sale. High praise indeed. For years the pre/pros fom Lexicon and Merridan were considered to be the best available but they were out of the price range of most mortals.

Anyone considering the purchase of the 990 or any other pre/pro may be interested in the thread. I received my 990 yesterday and I am very impressed. I think that the Outlaws will sell as many of these as they can make. I cannot imagine why anyone in the market for a pre/pro would buy anything else.

Well -- to play devil's advocate -- there are some features that the 990 doesn't have that some people might desire.

But it appears that the 990 is a superlative audio performer that may even establish a higher value-per-dollar than the original 950 preamp.

I was the person who noticed that Steven had put his Lexicon up for sale.

I'm still trying hard to resist the urge to move to the 990 from my beloved 950. Fiscal responsibility, you know.

On the other hand, today IS my birthday. If someone would like to give me a 990 for my birthday, I wouldn't refuse it. heh, heh.

Link to the aforementioned thread.

Happy Birthday, Bob!

That's about all you'll get from me.

I gotta be fiscally responsible, too!

this is a bold statement .. but very impressive..save folks $$$$$$ thats a big price diff..

Thanks Owl's. It's especially appropriate getting birthday greetings from you because I was born in Grants Pass!! At Josephine General Hospital.

I looks like it is a small world when two longtime Outlaws (bobblinds and Owls_Warder)have such a close tie.

I am intrigued by the comparison between the 990 and the MC-1. I have not seen much comparison between Logic 7 and PLIIx. The Outlaw certainly has features with which the venerable MC-1 can't compete. Am I missing something, or is the comparison between the Outlaw and the 990, the difference between PLIIx and Logic 7. Or does Outlaw bring something more to the table?

Well, comparing the 990 to the MC-1 is comparing the latest in "budget" surround processors to the top of the line from an older generation. The MC-1 lacks any sort of component video switching and has no multichannel analog audio input, whereas the 990 has three component video inputs, crossconversion of s-video and composite video to component, and of course DVI switching. The MC-1 also has what is considered pretty rudimentary bass management by today's standards (a fixed 80Hz crossover for any speakers set to small), whereas the 990 offers four separate adjustable crossovers for mains, center, surrounds, and surround back. I would presume that the version of Logic 7 included in the final iteration of MC-1 software differs somewhat from the most recent form found in the MC-12, MC-8, and MC-4, so it probably shouldn't be a complete surprise that Steve Simon found PLIIx to compare favorably to (and perhaps even perform better than) the MC-1's Logic 7. I think the real bottom line in comparing the two units is that the 990 sounded good enough to justify replacing the MC-1, because for whatever current bells and whistles the MC-1 may lack, it is still a Lexicon design and represents a very well engineered product.

Minor correction: crossovers could be set at 40, 80 or 120 Hz; with separate settings for fronts, sides, rears, centre and sub. (Yes, the subwoofer's crossover had to be set independently.) Keep in mind that it came out six years ago, so it's a little long in the tooth at this point.

Thanks, Sanjay - I hadn't realized that the MC-1 offered that.

Gentlemen,

Curious if any publications or anyone over on SMR has a comparison between Logic 7 and PLIIx? It appears that Logic 7 has near limitless tweakability, whereas PLIIx has its limits.

If Logic 7 is not a significant improvement for digital processing, then rival units with PLIIx seem to be a better value than the Lex. My only experience with Logic 7 is at a dealer and in a very high end theater, and the demos were impressive. I have yet to get a real comparison of the two together though.

I haven't seen anything comparing the two over at SMR. That site hasn't updated much in recent years - in fact, the newest article is from January 2003. There may be something floating around their forum, of course.

The 'Secrets' website did a comparison of matrix decoders/processors around the time PLII was introduced. Relevant reading because it compares the version of LOGIC7 being discussed in this thread. (Since that time, L7 has been completely re-written to take advantage of the greater processing power of the SHARC DSP engines on the MC-12/8/4 platform.) You can check out the article here (scroll down a ways). Keep in mind that the author adjusted the PLII processor but left the L7 processor at its default settings. Still worth the read. L7's extensive tweakability is handy but I don't think it's something that the casual user will get into. Plus, the adjustments are not really needed for 2-channel movies, where all you want is clean extraction of centre and surround information.

The adjustments are useful primarily for music playback, but only for users who listen to 2-channel music via surround processing. Music production isn't standardized the way movies are, so it's handy to give users some control of the surround processing. While not as tweakable as L7, PLII/IIx has the important adjustments properly covered: the user decides how much centre content and surround content is extracted. What more do you need? What constitutes a "significant improvement" will vary from person to person, since it is purely subjective. One person's idea of 'night and day difference' is another person's subtle change. Plus, some will view the difference as an improvement while others will not. And then there's personal taste: is chocolate a significant improvement over plain vanilla?

Both processes are functionally similar. For Lexicon owners, it wasn't a question of "value" since there was no choice: i.e., this functionality wasn't available elsewhere. Lex processors allowed users to convert 2-channel and 5.1-channel material to 7 outputs for eight years before PLIIx came along with the same capabilities. A good place to compare them would be on one of the newer H/K receivers (AVR-435/635). As someone who has lived with PLII and L7 for the last 4 years, I make regular use of both (really waiting for the promised PLIIx upgrade). There are some audible differences I've noticed over the years. PLII is more stable than L7, so its decoding is less prone to being tripped up. This is really useful with TV/cable audio, which can have all sorts of anomalies. L7's decoding is more agressive then PLII, so the results sound more exciting. This is most noticeable to me when listening to music; switching back to PLII is always a bit of a letdown. So I use PLII for 2-channel movie/TV playback and L7 for music listening. (These observations hold for PLIIx since the processing wasn't improved from PLII, just extended to more output channels.)

If you don't use surround processing for music listening, I don't feel there's much need for proprietary processing from companies like Meridian and Lexicon. PLIIx delivers everything you'd need to process 2-channel and 5.1-channel material. To get a different flavor of surround processing, you'd have to spend significantly more. And there's no guarantee that you'll find the other processing to be better (personal preference again). To that end, I think rivaling units with PLIIx do represent a better value.

I fully agree with Sanjay, saying it is personal preference on deciding which surround processing to be chosen.

Last night I tested the "Super speedway" dvd disc on DTS straight 5.1,DTS Neo:6 and then DTS + PLIIx, at -12dbs.
You know what, my preference priority is exactly the same listed above. Appears to me that DTS straight 5.1 produced the most distingtive sound separation and positioning and the bass was stronger and tighter. DTS Neo:6 came 2nd, as the sound was not as focused and the bass was weaken a bit. The DTS + PLIIx had the weakest bass among these 3 modes.
In my opinion, we would get the best sound quality and bass from the mode that the disc offers. Extra surround processing somehow would degrade the sound quality a bit. NEO:6, L7 and PLIIx are meant for 2-channel source.

Kwok,

Why would switching processing change the amount of bass? I mean, it's not like you changed the bass management between different processing. Right?

Sanjay, I didn't change volume nor any other thing at the configuation manual , but only flipped those surround modes. It appears to me the DTS Neo6 and DTS+PLIIx that change 5.1 to 7.1, do no littel good to SOUND QUALITY other than giving us 2 extra back surround.
My room is not small, but +15 feet wide x +30 feet long. I am using Paradigm studio 100 front, CC450 center, studio 20 as side and atom at the back. I set front L/R to large and others to small with crossover 100 Hz at center and 100 at side and 150 at the back. I still say that applying the surround mode that the source provide would be the best surround mode to choose.

Kwok

Sanjay,

Thanks for the lengthy response. Yours was a very unbiased response. I realize you are well versed and respected in the multi-channel community.

I enjoy multichannel music when it sounds most like 2 channel. By that I mean, you get a fuller ambience but not the feeling music is being reproduced from the sides or behind you. I also like what Mr. Fogg pointed out a while back and I have been experimenting ever since. He noted that utilizing the center chanel speaker improves vocals.

I figured that the ability to tweak Logic 7 would allow you to adjust how "aggressive" the surround speakers performed. Therefore getting past the over aggressive surround of many processed recordings.

Last year I spent averal hours in Dennis Erskine's home theater showroom here in Atlanta. He uses Lexicon equipment. The experience with movies was quite a revelation. Ever since then I have lusted for an MC-12 and multiple subs. He played some music demos which I suppose were good as well, but I was so stupified by the movie demo I really don't remember.

So thanks for helping me get on the right track and getting over my lustful ways....

In North America things usually tend to be priced to exactly what they worth. I will be very, very, very..... surprise if this 990 processor even comes close to the Lexicon MC-1 (taking into account the age of the MC-1) as pretended in this review. Expect the Outlaw 990 to sound exactly like an $1100 processor nothing more.

I asked a rather rhetorical question a week or two ago that may bear repeating here. What does an $1100 processor sound like? Is there a defining metric that we can apply to equate list price to every person's perception of a product's sonic characteristics? Steven Simon's been around the online home theater community for a long while and has used an MC-1 off and on for years now. I happen to trust his opinion. He searched around a fair bit before settling on the MC-1 several years ago, then switched to a Model 950 for a year or so I believe before switching back to the MC-1, and now it appears that he may have found something that can give him the features of a current-generation processor and the sound he has come to expect after using the MC-1. The 990's processing is a couple generations farther along than the MC-1's, which is likely to help for certain cases. The 990 is also an $1100 processor based on the chassis of a $1500 processor with several feature upgrades added. As I've said before, we need to be very careful classifying gear purely by pricetag alone.

I never thought of it like that. You may really be on to something.

gonk: I think that you are onto something here. You show some pretty sound logic.

As I posted on a different thread, just how do we come up with a "valid" metric for what is better?

Price alone is not necessarily a valid comparison, IMO.

Look at what some users and manufacturers say about speaker wire!

One thing you failed to realize is that when buying equipment traditionally you have a lot of overhead to pay for including salesmen’s salaries, rent for the shop you buy from, profit on the equipment that the shop expects to make and many other things. To give you some credit the Outlaw is worth what it is priced, but anything you buy from a second party is worth what it is priced minus everything listed above. Also the curve for pricing on audio gear in respects to performance is by no means a linear, but rather exponential in nature (depends on the buyer how exponential this curve is).

Just so people know, I was being sarcastic in my earlier reply. Pythagore's post is the most ridiculous post I have read in a while. Yeah, America is known for pricing things on target. Bose, Evian, printer ink, coffee, etc. And the pretend review? What does that even mean? Sorry if there was any confusion.

Jed, I total forgot to include things that are just a plain ripoffs like Bose and printer ink. Good call.

THANK GOD Jed . I thought you had lost your mind .

Just so you know, Jed M, I had faith that you were being sarcastic.

Thanks for the show of support Gonk! And E'pin, no worries, I lost my mind a long, long time ago.

Damn burnt my lip on my Starbucks.

Remember to get the more expensive lip balm Obie. Its obviously better.

Then PLIIx, with it's more benign processing, will be the better fit for your tastes than L7. You can adjust the processing to minimize the contributions of the centre and surround speakers. The results should sound similar to 2-speaker playback, only with a more stable soundstage.

BTW, I'm the opposite: I use L7 with music specifically because it doesn't sound like 2-speaker playback. If it did, I wouldn't see much point in using it (I'd just play it back through 2 speakers). That's because a human voice is not a phantom-imaged, comb-filtering, dual-mono sound. It is in fact a point source, coming from a single location. Unfortunately, we're so used to hearing it reproduced at home as a dual-mono source from a pair of speakers that we've come to accept that sound as normal.

One thing to try is slide your balance control all the way over to one speaker and face directly at it. Then play a mono male vocal (AM radio talk shows work well for this). Compare the voice through one speaker vs the same voice as a phantom image through both speakers. You can decide which sounds more like actual voices you've hear in real life.

There is no doubt there is comb filtering in 2 channel playback. The tests Shawn recommended do demonstrate it. And I realize that you prefer the multi-channel reproduction of music.

I find myself coming back to 2 channel reproduction and live with the comb filtering just as you say for much of the music to which I listen. I do listen to different tracks in both PLII and straight 2 channel. Most often, when level matched, I tend towards 2 channel unless there are predominant vocals in the song. I think I get a more precise imaging with 2 channel. But that could be all because of room acoustics.

Ain't it great we have options though?