Next time, special request ko ulit yun Drumbone track ng The Blue Man Group at 0dB!!! 
Huwag ka masyado matakot, the Stella's are rated to handle 1000W and with your 1000W mono amps, I'm sure clipping will be a thing of the past!
Jojo
Salamat sa comments mo. I always value your views highly because firstly, they are based on science, a good ear and a lot of experience. Secondly, you are typically, as you have said, brutally honest.
Di ako natatakot to jack up the volume to reference levels if the only speakers playing are the fronts (pati na center, but wala naman material that uses 3 channels) because of the ratings of these speakers and power amps (up to 1000 watts). I worry about the surrounds because they aren't huge speakers and even if the amps go up to 200 watts per channel RMS, baka kulang pa rin at reference level. The problem is that with some material (not a lot but some) played at very high levels (around -3 db), the surrounds have been acting up. Lately, parang may static. Dati, they bottomed out with Tron:Legacy. This usually happens if the material has an overpowering all-around sound (not just fronts but also surrounds) that is sustained.
By the way, for those who aren't familiar with "reference level", this is that level at which a recording was mixed. For film, there is a strict standard, which is an average of 85 db at the listening position and 105 db peaks, except for the LFE channel which can have 115 db peaks. Reference level is important because human perception of bass (and even treble) varies with volume. At lower volumes, you need to adjust bass upwards in order to "hear" the same amount of bass. Thus, it is only at reference level that you hear the sound with the bass, mid-range and treble in balance, exactly as it was intended by the mixer.
For music, there is no standard. Kanya-kanyang diskarte and that's why some music recordings are very loud, others are soft while others are super-compressed so that everything sounds loud (even softer tracks). This is another major reason why I didn't want to listen to Blue Man Group at 0.0 db because I'm not sure if that disc was mastered with standards similar to film. Malay natin that the mixer's reference standard was at -5.0 db? Ang lakas na kasi sobra when we listened!
If you use a Denon AVR with Audyssey MultEQ, "reference level" is at 0.0 db. Onkyo also uses Audyssey MultEQ but I'm not sure at what reading is their "reference level". If you try to listen at reference level, you will typically very quickly give up. Nakakabingi. Most people listen at -15 db to -20 db. It's only when you have a very good room and system that you can listen at reference level without your ears bleeding.
