Call Outlaw, and see what they suggest. If the problems continue, maybe they'd be willing to exchange the unit and you can give the 970 another chance. Their customer support is excellent.

That said, I have noticed in my years in this hobby that performance and reliability of good gear is often inversely proportional. The comsumer should certainly have a resonable expectation that the equipment they buy will preform flawlessly right out of the box and for an extended lifetime. And the manufacturer should see to it that it is built accordingly.

But as you go up the ladder performance-wise, I have noticed the care and feeding of your audio/video system goes way up and the gear is often finicky. I look back on the days of the Mapleknoll and Versa Dynamics turntables -- yeah, they sounded great, when they worked -- which was about 50% of the time.

I digress a bit, but let's face it, the average system of members on this board far surpasses the home theater-in-a-box from Circuit City. Friends / family who have heard my system are blown away, but they run screaming when they see all of the equipment and wiring that goes along with it.

Lord knows what they'll think when I finally get an SMS-1.