I have the "no audio" problem regularly, and although I can live with it (not much choice without spending a lot more), it's really difficult to appease my wife, who isn't interested in the machinery of the HT system, nor why we should accept the 970 in spite of its flaws. To her, the system is a black box, and she just wants it to work. Does anyone else have this problem, i.e. another user of the system who has no reason to be forgiving of the 970?

For the record, our problem occurs most often when changing channels on the cable box. The 970 will fail to acquire the audio stream from the new channel around 10% of the time. Changing the channel again often fixes the problem, especially if we give the unit a few seconds to lock on to the signal, but my wife has no patience for this and will often give up and switch to another channel before giving the 970 a chance to fix itself.

I don't think it's just a matter of the interaction with external source components, either. I often get no audio when I turn on the 970 to listen to FM radio. It really is pretty frustrating that this unit can't even find a signal that originates within the same box.

Bruce,
I've encountered the same issue switching digital audio sources, but I don't normally use the 970 when watching TV. I've run into some problems with dgital audio signal acquisition and will get no audio like you report. I think this is an issue with the 970's architecture. If I regularly used it for cable/satellite I would probably be looking for something else (my wife wouldn't tolerate it either!)

I primarily use the 970 for analog music listening and watching movies. If you aren't cycling through digital audio sources (channel surfing or simply changing channels on cable/satellite) it works well enough.

If I do upgrade in the future for HT I'll likely purchase a receiver for use as a preamp and perhaps keep the 970 for 2 channel audio use.

Hello Bruce,

Please give Edward in tech support a call today (866-OUTLAWS). Between performing a software update and some potential input configuration changes I am confident we can alleviate these issues for you.

Best,

Scott

I had the same issues with the 970 with the addition of some strange noises when the 970 could not acquire the digital signal. I figured one day, this noise might break something else (tweeters perhaps). I decided to use a Denon 2808 as a preamp. The 970 is now in another room as a 2 channel preamp - no problems at all in this configuration. I had mixed thoughts doing this, as I really liked the 970.

Oddly enough, the 970 started out just fine, then the no audio problem became more frequent.

I will continue to use the 2808 until I something better comes along - preferably from Outlaw. Any pictures yet of the next gen pre/pro? I read over the SN brochure (electronic version) and that unit presents as very cool.

Unfortunately the no audio thing is real. I don't get it real often, certainly not enough to troubleshoot it. I can't reliably reproduce it.
I could go a month without it then get it twice in two weeks.

BUT- Every time it happens I get the look that says, "Why do I need all this crap hooked up to just watch TV?" and sometimes I get the words.

I don't blame outlaw for it, I just live with it. Back when the 970 was new I did some research and I remember finding that it is a flaw in the chip from Cirrus. I think that Outlaw has worked real hard for a software fix for this hardware problem. Certainly if you cant reprodue it you can't fix it.

The sound from the 970 really is first rate. In this day and age there processors and receivers are more like computers than stereo gear. I'm afraid that glitches are here to stay. Windows still blue screens (Actually in Vista last night I got an error window that the description was BlueScreenCrash)

Look at the whole HDMI audio debacle. I haven't heard of one product that is flawless and they all have some sort of audio lock problem.

As a former 970 owner and a current 990 owner, let me throw in my 2 cents.
Both the 970 and the 990 are wonderful pieces of gear.
Outlaw audio may not like me saying this but, I would recommend to anyone to grab a 990 NOW while they last. Don't wait for the new processor. At $699, the 990 is a heck of a steal. That's almost $400 less than what I paid for mine.
If you are waiting for "the next thing" in audio, you will be waiting for many years before content catches up. Not to get any holy-wars started, but just think how long DTS, which I find superior to DD, has been around and see how much content you find. DD 5.1 will be the de-facto standard for a long time. I plan on keeping my 990 for as long as I can and I do have a 7.2 system. If 7.1 source material ever catches on, I'll just look for a source that can do its own decoding and take advantage of the 990's analog inputs.
By the way, when earlier Sunfire Theater Grand processors (and some Classe) had similar problems, they were never really able to fix the problem entirely either.
So, in summary, I would upgrade to the 990 and the price drop alone would justify whatever you do with the 970 (keep it, sell it, gift it).
Just my two cents...

It's funny, actually not...

I got an irate e-mail today about needing to have a conversation about how the TV is hooked up. Through some troubleshooting it seems that the 970 is at fault.

This may be it's last hurrah in our house. It truly happens infrequently, but has VERY bad timing, like usually when I'm not home.

Since I have purchased the 970 we bought a house and had a baby (he is 3 months old and we're sleep deprived). So there is NO money for upgrades. Lucky for me I still have an older processor (Dolby Digital Only) that the outlaw replaced. I'll have to lose either my PS3 or HD-DVD player to get everything connected to my TV.

Good Luck to all.

My advise,
Don't buy a product with issues. It may not be able to be fixed.

I ran into the no audio problem just a few minutes ago again...this is one of the worst 'episodes' I've had in a long time. I haven't used my system in a week, and I sat down to listen to some music (2 channel, analog) via my Oppo. Everything powered up, no sound. No volume control via remote. No volume control via knob on unit. Remote doesn't respond at all, except to power off. I shut off the master power switch, waited a few minutes, powered back on. (That usually solves the problem). No good. Did this 3 more times after powering up and attempting to use the remote. I powered down again and unplugged the 970, found the number for Outlaw support and picked up the phone, plugged it back in, and presto, now it works. This took me about 15 minutes to go through all this and get up and running. Really not acceptable. I'm not sure what I'm going to do, but when this happens it drives me nuts. I really enjoy the sound of my Outlaw gear (when the 970 works) but I'm really thinking about selling it all and moving on.

I suggest getting rid of the wife :-)

Liz,
Been there, done that, and ain't doing it again (too expensive)!!! But I'm not the OP!

As far as the no audio issue, in my case, and I think others as well, it's more of a 'no response' issue. The 970 powers on and you can't make it do anything...either via remote or on the unit itself. It seems like it's a no audio issue since it doesn't output any sound...but realistically it's a problem where the unit simply will not respond to any input until it's powered off (and in my last case, unplugged) and then powered on again. My unit was supposedly shipped with the latest upgrades when I bought it last year, and it still does this. It gets very frustrating. As I said above I'm about ready to sell my Outlaw gear and move on.... Anyone looking for a 7125?