Random black and snowy interruptions in video on 2013 mac mini

I have been doing my fair share of downloading the last few days and My mac mini just seems to be acting a little weird. What i'm not sure of is weather or not this is an issue related to my new (and amazing) Marantz receiver which i've been using for the better part of a month now.

So far ive noticed it twice tonight in a matter of an hour. I have a LED sony tv connected to my receiver and then connecting into my mac mini. On the tv screen I have always gotten a little "flash" of a black screen after the initial picture startup on the tv. I remember my old pioneer used to do something similar so i've thought nothing much about that, but now in the matter of an hour, my tv went black a few times after the receiver has been on. The screen will go black and then you get probably 1/4 second of digital snow, and then back to the desktop screen.

I've always read about the random black screen issues that the mac mini from 2011 has been suffering from..... but heres my real delima...... Since i just bought a $1,200 dollar receiver and my return policy is inching closer, im wondering if i should assume its my receiver? I am a little freaked out about doing a restore of my mac mini to see if that solves the problem.

I also went into the computers audio settings last night and changed the sound output for 5.1 surround, where as it had been on stereo prior to that. I guess in retrospect it probably has something to do with that change I just made last night but i dont seem to remember noticing it after i changed it.

So, if anyone knows what i'm talking about, maybe you could fill me in on weather i'm freaking out about a simple system glitch or if this sounds more like hardware related problem. I would like to know either way.

Anyone with good advice or similar circumstances?