I have to say my SX AO unit worked like a charm right out of the box, but I've only used it on one night. Fingers crossed that it will work this coming weekend. The hot pixel problem pretty much went away with dark calibration of the guider image.
Equipment: QSI540wsg. lodestar, MaximDL.
I found the following page very useful and much easier than the SX manual
http://www.rarcher.net/sxao.html
Geoff