I'm not sure how the Pioneer works -- many DVD-A players lacked any bass management on DVD-A discs (the settings provided only applied to decoding Dolby Digital and DTS soundtracks). If the Pioneer includes enough bass management to know to redirect the .1 to the mains, then you would lose nothing.

I couldn't tell you exactly what the difference is between music and cinema modes. There may be some good info floating around at Dolby's site , but it was hiding from me the other day.

I think the issue you are referring to is the tendency for the 5.1 analog input sticks in "stereo" mode if the input used immediately prior to switching is set to stereo. Switching through a surround-enabled input eliminates the issue. I personally never seem to run into it: using both the 950's remote and my MX-500, I always switched to the DVD input first (which I leave in surround mode) and then changed to the 6 channel input.

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