Yes via phone OPPO gave me the impression that the 971's replacement was in the works and will have SACD added to it. Sounded like a few months before it would be avalible.
As you know my Samsung 841 shot craps and left me w/o the SACD player. Actually the SACD on the Samsung was ok, but I am looking forward to compairing it to the OPPO 970.
If I was not needing the sacd right now I may have waited for the 971's upgraded model that OPPO says will include SACD along with Faroudja chip.
As you know OPPO said that the 970's video will be about the same as my broken samsung 841, and it was a respectable picture off my Sharp dlp projector on a 8ft screen. OPPO did give me the impression that the Audio on the 970 compared to the samsung 841 will be much better.
In that the OPPO 970 was shipped this past Tuesday I hope to give my input to you soon.
My ultimate goal is to have a hd-dvd type player that would also play my SACD's. If anyone hear's about such a beast please let me know. In that the 990 has 1 set of 7.1 channel inputs I need a all on one player for Blu-ray,hd-dvd video hi-res audio sacd etc.