Very true. The height channel may be easier to fit into a lot of rooms than the rear surrounds were (haven't got to go as far with wires and it should work reasonably well even if your listening position is up against the back wall), but it's still not going to work for every user (two extra speakers to buy, two extra amp channels, and a pretty high likelihood that you'll need to do a wall mount for it to be worth your while).

The only "danger" that may exist for Outlaw is that the 997 is too close to launch to get PLIIz added now unless it can be added after-the-fact somehow (as Sanjay was pointing out), but it will need to remain in production for a few years. Outlaw doesn't (and can't) do the 9-12 month production cycles that you get from Onkyo or Denon. By the time the 997's been out for a year or two, folks may expect to see PLIIz - even if they will never be able to use it in their homes. This is always an issue for a processor that needs to stay in the marketplace for several years, and it's not anything that Outlaw hasn't faced before. If the format did start to get popular, though, an outboard PLIIz processor could be an interesting option for a lot of people (not just Outlaw owners). As you say, though, it's still very early.