Gonk, I couldn't agree more with your statement: "If you have a TV with a good scaler, you may be best off giving it a digital 480i or 480p signal to work with, but if the scaler's a bargain-basement chip stuck in there out of bare necessity then a PLAYER with a good scaler may serve you better." Note that I capitalized PLAYER in there.

All I want to add to this is that chances are you'll find a "bargain-basement chip" in a moderately priced AV RECEIVER, which has it in there to satisfy the feature-hungry market segment, by this substantisating my initial point.

Feeding your 1080P TV with a digital signal processed by a better DVD player, like the Oppo DV 981-HD, is a different story. I strongly doubt you'll find the Faroudja chip and software Oppo has in any moderately priced AV receiver.

One more reason Outlaw caught my attention to begin with. It has all that matters and no gizmos, all on top of superb sound quality at a very attractive price point.