It's been quite some time since I thought the 997 could arrive before the BDP-83. After all, the BDP-83 started beta testing near the end of last year (although it was a long-running beta test conducted in parallel with the firmware development, as beta testers didn't have the full feature set operating until around the time the EAP started).

The last rumors on AVS put the 972 hitting the street soon (late April to mid May). Outlaw may be waiting to say anything until they have word about initial shipments - or for their partner (Sherwood) to have a chance to say something publicly. It'd probably be in poor taste to steal their thunder about a product announcement like that.