Upcoming moOde 9.0.0 (Bookworm)

[TheOldPresbyope]

...
I'm seriously considering giving up on HATs except for transports.  USB and HDMI work well on the pi 4 and 5.  I like the idea of going with an audio solution that doesn't depend on a third party to maintain it.

Yup, me too. There are some genuine advantages to the HATs that I hate to give up, not just technical but also including the compact packaging of my systems and their somewhat lower overall cost. 

I suppose it's wishful thinking that vendors would keep spending money on driver updates but that's life. Even the well-heeled big guns like Apple, Google, et al., (somethings called the FAANG) are quick to drop support for products which are no longer generating new sales. Caveat emptor.

Regards,
Kent