Thanks, John. Still no luck getting SACD without TV, despite futzing around with settings etc. All hdmi control stuff is off in the 885. I'm pretty sure it's not just the 885, because I could use my older hdmi dvd/cd player (actually also a Sony) to play music without the TV, so seems it's something to do with the hdmi handshake on the player. I've tried changing the order of power-up, etc., no change.
Guess it's kinda silly to obsess over this, considering my collection of SACD is like 10 discs, but still, it's turning into kind of a pet peeve/OCD issue now.

So, I've ordered a BDP-S770 to compare with the 570, which will be an interesting experiment anyway. I'll send one or both back... free shipping on both, so I'm only out some return shipping if neither works for this, as I wouldn't be able to justify keeping either one of them. Then maybe I'll hold out for a used Oppo 80 (ideally) or something once the 93 starts shipping for real. Sigh.
Anyway, I don't mean to imply that the 570 is a bad BD player, as I've only spent about 5 minutes with it playing actual BD video content... enough to see (for the first time!

) the TrueHD light come on on my 885. And it does seem to be quiet, I haven't heard any fan noise at all so far. Sure there's the usual whirring as the disc loads or changes track, but during regular play it seems to be dead quiet.