A couple of major developments...

I'll break them down into seperate thread replies for organizational purposes.

First, I finally got a chance to call Scott back yesterday. He was on the phone, but returned my call later in the afternoon. We discussed the IR issue.

As we've deduced, the IR out is NOT linked to the IR sensor. So there's no using the front panel sensor to 'passthrough' signals to the IR Output port. Can't happen.

What DOES happen, is what we also deduced.

Powered signals fed into the IR Input port are routed rightback out the IR Output port. It is a MONO minijack. This 'relays' the signal to another unit that has an IR input, OR, as GarcianC proved, an IR emitter. The power from the IR emitter originates from the device FEEDING the IR input on the Outlaw.

This is how the term 'passthrough' basically applies to the IR IN/OUT of the Outlaw.

To analogize, think of the IR IN/OUT ports as a 'revolving door' for IR signals on the back side of the unit. Signals can come in, instruct the unit, or leave and pass on to other units. But the Outlaw cannot add signals to the revolving door sequence.

So, to truely do an IR relay, you need a dedicated IR receiver, a connecting block of some sort, a power supply for said connecting block, and either an emitter or a direct mono minijack connection cable to get the signal from the connecting block to the device.

At this point, I had already ordered and received the Xantech block w/ power supply, and if I RMA it and go for a refund, I'm losing $19 in shipping as is. (I'd only be getting $52 back on the actual unit refund) I'll have to suck it up and throw another $60 or so at it and buy a dedicated IR receiver (probbaly a generic one for $35 actually) and complete the IR relay system autonomously from the Outlaw.

Hopefully the efforts of this thread will prevent any confusion for others hoping to understand the IR issues for the 970 and the Outlaw series.

Thanks again, Gonk and GarcianC.

E.