After Rotel knew about my post here, they responded to me
pretty quickly. Yesterday I got a different model remote
control RR939, which works pretty good now. At least I am
pleased to find out that they care about their customers.
So my suggestion is let them know your problems!

I would give a 4 for their customer support!

I must say that after reading reviews it's amazing how you find that others have the same problems as you have. I also had the same experience with the remote that EDWARD had. My remote went dead, and after contacting Rotel they said that they were waiting for a shipment of remotes. My dealer was nice enough to swap me one. And yes, you have to point the remote right at the unit in order for it work right. On to the sound quality. Let me first say, I get irritated when I read reviews from people that only know the equipment they have and automatically give it 5 stars, and have no basis for comparison. As a pre-amp the unit is good, don't compare this to the Acurus ACT3, B&K REF 20, or Denon AVP-8000, or EAD's TheatureMaster (I have heard them all), but it's excllent for it's price range. THe ProLogic setup is easy, with ON-Screen, test tones, and level setting for each speaker, including delay for rear surrounds. The analog prologic decoding is very very good, not as good as say a lexicon DC1, it is among the very best in it's price range. The tuner is ok nothing special. THe 5.1 channel input for external decoders is nice, but why didn't they include an output also? The manual is wrong and lacks basic information. One quirk I hate is that the unit has a tone and bass boost buttons for using the bass and treble settings. These buttons don't stay on if re-power on the unit, and you can't turn them on from the remote!! So I have to get up everytime and turn them all. OVerall, in it's price range, it's and excellent VALUE among the best. IT's pre-amp stage is GOOD! However, don't compare it to the high end model's I've mentioned.

Joe

I have had this unit for about 7 months now and have similar observations to the other reviews.
First, the sound is nice for a unit of this price range. I have not had the chance to use it in surround or DD yet as I have not had the scratch to get the surround speakers. From a music standpoint it is nice.

Second, the remote. It is the biggest piece of crap I have ever seen. How can they sell a unit this expensive with a piece of junk like this when my old VCR bought for $150 has a way better remote. Range, angle, layout all suck. Yes, I will take some of the blame for the layout as I seen it when I bought it, but when I got it home, out of the box and tried using it from my couch, I have to lean forward to get it in range and angle so it will work.

Thrid, non presistent functions. Could not think of anything else to call it as the tone controls have to be reset everytime the unit is powered up. Why could you not commit this to memory, tone on/off, for each input like you do the surround mode. Same goes for the 5.1 input as mentioned by someone else.

Forth, power failures. I don't know if anybody else has this issue, but it is really starting to piss me off. We get power failures at our house every couple of months, only for a second or so (more like a brownout I guess), and whenever we do ALL of the presents in the system are lost. Right back to factory defaults. ARRGH! I have to reset EVERYTHING when this happens. All the radio stations, surround modes (heaven help me when I have to reset the delays), EVERYTHING. My wife came home one day and the pre amp reset sometime during the day. She turned the stereo on and got really muffled sound (surround out of 2 speakers). Real horrible stuff and she freaked as she though something had busted. The only way to set the surroiund mode (that I found) was by that god awfull remote. My wife had no idea that the unit had reset until see played with the unit and realized all the radio stations were gone. I have a five year old Yamaha CD player that has almost 100 disks programmed into it and it has never reset, even when it has been unpluged for 3 days (cost of this unit was 1/4 what the pre amp alone costs)!

How can a unit costing this much money not have something like presistent memory? I don't think I should have to spend a few hundred dollars more on a UPS, just to keep presets. When I bought my parents a discountinued entry level Yamaha surround reciever costing 1/10 my setup (pre amp + amp) and it remembers everything if the power fails.

I am really considering getting rid of this unit and unless my dealer will work with me to make things right, I probably won't buy Rotel again.

Music ****
Remote *
Preset Memory - not worth rating!

The three overall becuase I like the sound and in the end that is weighted more than the other scores.

Ok, I have had the unit for 1 1/2 years now, and you can see some of my other comments/reviews below. Excellent Observations by Shawn below, I share the same thoughts. I have my system plugged into my UPS, so it helps from loseing memory unless I have to unplug the ups for some reason. I was wanting to upgrade to DD and maybe DTS, with either buying the RSP-985 if it ever comes out, or something else(I've looked at the high end stuff like Lexicon/EAD etc). However, I'm getting married and don't have a whole lot of money to spent right now, so I came up upon someone on the net selling the RDA-975 Rotel Dolby Digital decoder for $300, that was made to attach to the RTC-970 or RSP-980. So, I bought the RDA-975 and attached to the RTC-970 via the DB-25 (it's a computer serial cable) cable nice and neat. The kicker is that when I want to listen to DD I have to manually press the 5.1 input button on the unit, and yes the tone and bass controls are defeated on the RTC-970 except for the speaker level controls for each speaker. Well, I thought Dolby Pro sounded great on this pre-amp, well let me tell you, forget it because Dolby Digital is so far superior it isn't funny. Much more information is sent to the rear surrounds and sound localization is much more precise. I don't have a subwoofer but the RDA-975 will send the Low Frequency effects to my fronts. The ergonomics of the unit, and the remote is bad, but we have to come back to the sound quality, and it's dam good. P.S. I was going to buy the Technics SCH-500 DD/DTS adapter, but when I compared DD on the Rotel and Technics, The rotel was hands down better, maybe it's Zoran and Burr Brown DSP, DA converters in the RDA-975, whatever it is, it sounded better.

I have owned the 970 for about a year now and in simple words, it is not an outstanding preamp. Probably due to some of the same problems mentioned by others: the most unpleasant remote one can use, extremely badly written manual with some functions which were forgotten from the manual!!!!!!!, a 5.1 input which can only be activate from the front panel and if the unit is on mute, the mute can only be un-mute from the remote control. But what gets me the most is the CHEAP, extremely slow push button volume control.
The following is for Rotel. I would have never consider an other one of your product because I was looking for a Tuner/Preamp and on your web site there was nothing to replace the RTC-970 other then the RSP. It was only after I surfed the web that I came across a web site witch presented me with the RTC-965. Exactly the same as the new Rotel receiver with AC-3 and DTS model RSX965, here we have the Tuner/Preamp version. I called my local Rotel dealer and asked about this new 965 and what would you know, they had just received one. WOW, this unit is quite affordable at $1300.00 CND.

So far the unit works flawlessly and I should make a decision within a few days. I quite think I will buy the 965. Anyone for a RTC-970 in Canada?

Regards
Bernard Durand
Ottawa Canada

I received the unit at a good price and had high expectation because I loved my 908BX amplifier and I had always heard very good things about Rotels other products.
I will join the team with the annoying remote, the horrible instructions, and unfortunately, the medicore sound. I standard two channel mode their isn't much depth, but it is somewhat warm. The audio with videos are better.
I was also angered by the fact that to go Digital I would have to purchase an $800 device with cableing. This, didn't make much sense.
I am reviewing the RSP-985 with DTS, THX, and Dolby Digital to replace the 970. I have heard very good things about the unit, yet the price, $1,800 makes me want to look for other products. Any suggestions?
By the way, the cure to the remote situation is to get the Philips touch screen universal.

Sound Quality

Remote, Reliability, Ergonomics

I bought this unit as part of a package deal with the matching Rotel Dolby AC-3 Decoder and THX Amp. I am very happy with the amp and the processor but the tuner is a big disappointment. There is an inexcusable amount of bleed over from the tuner section into the other functions when not in 5.1 mode. With the volume turned up and the input set to CD or Video or any of the other inputs you can hear the FM broadcast bleeding through. When you adjust the volume you hear an annoying clicking through the speakers as the volume slowly increases. Also, the presets are just itching to erase themselves at the first sign of power loss. I can't count how many times I've had to reset the input and output levels for all the different input sources. If you switch from a DVD to another source with the remote and then want to switch back to a DVD you have to get up and go to the receiver and press the 5.1 button with each change. That's what I call poor ergonomics. You also cannot change the surround mode or adjust the output balances without the remote. This was not a cheap unit at $900 and other units that cost much less don't have these kinds of problems. Overall the unit was a big disappointment but it does sound good when you get the settings set and you don't try to turn it up too loud.

Steve, very good points. I have purchased a DVD player and listen to them in Dolby Prologic. Dolby Prologic on this unit sounds excellent. I think some consideration does need to be given to the remote control, however, I agree it shouldn't be over emphasized. My next step is to get either an outboard decoder, or a new pre-amp. I'm probably going for a new pre-amp processor with DD/DTS processing all in one unit. I'm dieing to look at the new Rotel RSP-985. The RTC970 does sound very good as a preamp,and with it's upgradeability via the DB25 port, this unit was slightly ahead of it's time. That said, since I haven't had any trouble (knock on wood) besides the remote so far, I have to change my opinion of this unit to 4 stars.

Joe....I hope you had a good laugh: I am. You're right some newer HT units do have both input and output for 5.1. The RTC 970 is out of production, and was not designed as well as many newer pre/pro units, but for the time it was produced and at the price, it was and still is a very good preamp. My point that you found so funny was that it is not necessary to have both an in and an out in DB25, or more than 1 DB 25 in, if you wish to expand. Most decoders you attach to the 970 will have both which will allow you to expand further by daisy chaining the 970 to Dolby Digital decoder and the Dolby Digital decoder to a DTS decoder and so on.
I do not wish to get into a contest as to who has fancier equipment, and what can one do with theirs that another can't do. That is not the point of this forum. I only try to offer an objective review of a product which I've auditioned.
As for the remote, admittedly I did not have it long enough to experience any of the glitches you and others speak of. I also do not place much emphasis on the importance of each of my components having a great remote. I still prefer to go to the unit itself and tweak each unit manually. Unfortunately too many units rely on the remote to do functions inaccessible from the unit itself. I suggest everyone should get a good learning remote, like the Marantz and program all their components info into it. I do not like to see a good component downgraded for a lack of performance by something like a remote. Afterall the main emphasis of any audio manufacturer should be on the sound quality, not the frivolous features of a remote control.
To keep the rating to where it should be for this unit I have given it 4 stars this time, to give it a 4.5 rating, which it rightly deserves.

Sound Quality

Remote

As a previous owner of the RSP-970, i knew what i went into with this preamp. It sounds great, by playing ordinary Stereo it is worthy of the price alone. Use a DVD Player with a good built-in DD/DTS Decoder and you get excellent 5.1 sound, or even better, with the Rotel Decoders for DD and DTS the sound is even greater!!
I CAN understand all the fuss about the remote, it sucks bigtime, once mine didn´t work, i tore it apart and found out that the buttons seem to get stuck sometimes... But it works, and the sound is unbeatable at this pricerange.

It is not the BEST Surround Preamp i have ever heard, but for the price i payed, it IS the best, and to me ordinary stereo is still very important...
The tuner is great, though, sucks inn all stations, very good, way better than most seperate tuners.

All in all a very fine product for the price, though the remote sucks a bit

Similar Products Used:

Pioneer Receiver, Rotel RSP-970, Technics AC-500, Pioneer DV-626