Magnepan 3.6's for L/R, waiting on Maggie CC4 release for center (took out the Def Tech CC as it was just too different in timbre and am using a phantom center at the moment). Still have the DT surrounds, which didn't seem like too much of a mismatch using the Denon, but the surrounds get so much more action with the 990 that I can't stand listening to crystal in front with mud from the sides. I'm going to have to accelerate the purchase of MC1's to replace them, which I wasn't planning to do until after I move in April due to wall mounting considerations.

So with the speaker situation clouding the surround evaluation, the only meaningful comparison I can make is for stereo and the concise review is "awesome". I wasn't expecting much more from the 990 vs. the Denon in stereo but the difference is readily apparent, for both SACD/analog in bypass mode and for CD/optical in upsample mode. I guess that says that for SACD the Denon digital path must have been mucking up the signal, as the 990 in bypass isn't doing anything much to it, except maybe simple amplification.

For surround, even though I can't do a meaningful comparison of sound quality, the 990 is certainly sending more content to the surrounds than was the Denon (both in DD 5.1 mode), even though both were calibrated for equal SPL level using the Denon and 990 manual calibration modes.