The OPPO 981HD is a pretty nice performer for DVD-Audio and SACD (on par with my Yamaha DVD-S1500 for DVD-A and better for SACD), and the 970HD uses the same platform for audio decoding and D/A conversion. In fact, the analog output of the 970HD is slightly simplified over the 981HD, which OPPO has said can yield a bit better audio quality (although some people who have used both have reported having a real hard time telling a difference). I haven't used a 970HD, so I can't speak to the video performance, but I don't know that I'd call it "limited" - it isn't as powerful as the 981HD, but it's no slouch. If your display will accept 1080p and you want to feed it a 1080p signal, you can get a 981HD for $80 more than the 970HD.