Not looking good on a return, for a variety of reasons. It's also unclear how honest the seller was, regarding the prior reset(s). In other words, he may have had to undertake multiple re-initializations over time, but I will never know as he is headed back for Minnesota and not communicative at this point.
In any event, what is interesting is that after the receiver was unplugged for two days ( a full 48 hours), and then power applied, the start up process worked normally, going directly from Standby to On, without any cycling.
After two such "normal startups and power downs" (to Standby), on the third try, the cycling started again.
When the receiver was only unplugged for 12 hours, the cycling started up as if nothing had changed.
This suggests to me that the problem is likely capacitor related.
I'm still looking for suggestions as to a good and honest electronic shop in Arizona or New Mexico, if anyone has any thoughts.
Unplugging the receiver after each use or leaving it on 24/7 are not good options.