It will be HDMI v1.3 (otherwise it would have probably been here months ago) with support for all the latest audio formats (DTS-HD Master Audio, Dolby TrueHD, and so on and so forth). As for when, the best information we have comes from the " double down " promotion's announcement a few weeks ago. That would suggest that replacements for both the 990 and 970 are in the pipeline, but that it'll be another month before they are able to get their hands on the final layout and/or chips for the DSP. Considering all that would need to follow after that or be revised to accommodate it, their announcement suggests early spring as the soonest that either processor could enter production. My guess is that it'll be May before we should hope to hear of the first v1.3 processor being ready - and it's impossible to say whether the 990's successor will be the first one or not. I actually wouldn't be surprised if the first one out of the gate was the 970's successor (assuming that there really are multiple processors in the pipeline), as it might require less design work and testing (assuming features like video scaling and audo setup/EQ may be less sophisticated).