Hi Strider53,
No, I don't have experience with recent Marantz, however I'm sure other Marantz owners will help you out.
Speaking generally, you should be fine using a Marantz AV receiver as a preamp with your Outlaw power amp. I mean, an engineer really has to be a bonehead to screw up a preamp section of an AV receiver. There are areas of potential inaccuracy in the analogue phono input--if the receiver has phono inputs--with sloppy design, but that would be most unusual. In the old days, cheap receivers often had fairly noisy phono preamp sections; more expensive models often had much quieter phono preamp sections (moving-magnet and moving-coil) but unless you play a lot of vinyl, that's irrelevant.
I think you'll be thrilled with the sound quality of your new Epic 80 and 180 center with the Outlaw amp.
Regards,
Alan
