The Emotiva site says they are shipping in November and the pre-order list is back up. Saw a post on their forum that the first units will be stateside by mid-November. I tend to agree with suffolk112000. With no info at all on the status of the 997 and Christmas coming up fast, my strong desire to wait for the 997 is being tested by the firm date for the Emo and the anecdotal reports on the "issues" with the Trinov implementaitons on other platforms. Any info from Outlaws on 997 status?

The only thing I can guess regarding the 997 is that the news from beta testing must be pretty bad. I can see no other reason for the Outlaw folks to not at least provide some sort of status information.
I was planning to get the 997, but I am having a hard time justifying why I should wait any longer with competitive products already released to the market and no information to help me understand if the 997 is coming out anytime soon.
For anyone from Outlaw who might be reading this, please remember that the people on these forums are mostly your loyal customers ... it's time for an update.

The reason that you are not hearing anything from us is that we have nothing new to report.

For the record, we have communicated our initial findings on the 997 hardware and firmware back to the factory. However, we cannot go any further until Sherwood Newcastle completes their own software for the 972 receiver and that final unit enters general release.

As you have might have read on other forums, there are reports on a handful of 972's out there. However, none of them contains completed software, especially involving Trinnov room correction.

We have been told that Newcastle is getting close to a final release. Until that occurs, we remain "on-hold" to continue our own testing. (Since the 997 is a processor it is different in some respects from the 972 and each of those differences must be vetted in a variety of set-ups.)

We understand everyone’s frustration. However, in this case, further progress on completing the 997 is in the hands of Inkel,(Newcastle’s factory.) You can be assured that when we have more to report on a reliable production date, we will communicate that to everyone in a timely manner.

Peter

Thanks for the update, Peter.

Even saying that there's nothing new to report is better than remaining silent. The way that Sherwood Newcastle has been handling this with their R-972 has been disastrous, from a PR perspective. Most people could understand delays due to firmware refinement, before finally putting them out for sale. But, for the receivers to still be far from complete is a puzzling decision. Especially when the one feature that sets this receiver apart from all the others doesn't seem to be working correctly yet.

Most of us are willing to wait for the 997, even if we are more than a little impatient. But, the wait will only be worth it if the product works as intended. The anticipation for improvements that the Trinnov feature add is really high, Sherwood isn't helping itself (and Outlaw, due to the connection between the two products), buy not being able to get it to work correctly.

Please keep us updated, even if it's just to say that you're still working on it or waiting for Inkel. Either is better than just letting us guess as to the progress, since some of the speculation could be damaging.

Scott

Let me echo that sentiment. Thanks so much for the status report. Much appreciated. It is good to feel that we are "in the loop." Will keep hoping for the best!

Mike

Thanks for the update, Peter. I dare say that you guys are as impatient as any of us are to have more substantial news to report.

Peter, let me add my thanks for the update. Even though you have nothing new to report, this "update" is very useful.
Cheers
Pete

I agree that "Nothing new to report" is much better than dead air.

It's interesting that 972 owners have their hands on product when (if I'm understanding PeterT correctly) the firmware isn't in a production state of finish/polish/functionality. That kind of faux pas can cripple a brand.

Ritz, you raise an interesting point. It is odd that production hardware was released into distribution channels without final firmware.

Yes, the people over at AVS are going to have a field day with those comments.

Thank you Peter for the update. It is actually nice to know that the poor results are due to an unfinished product. If that's the best there is to offer, it would be depressing to have waited this long.