New Blu-ray player Samsung BD-P1200 reviewed by George Serewis.
May 30, 2008
I possess a Daewoo DBP-2000, Sony BDP-S1E, and PS3. In the 3 weeks that I've had this player, it's done a great job on video and audio quality. I'm running it on a 55" Sharp connected through HDMI. I've never had any of the stutters or other audio/video glitches that others have mentioned. I went with this player due to positive reviews and how I feel about the the brand. The BR players are all updatable so it's possible to play the latest movies. However, this player has a VERY out of place failure mode and upgrade procedure. But once you get that 1080p flat screen there's just no other way to watch video. Even with the problem it is worth getting this player for 1080p picures.
I have only had significant problems with one disk that I own and that was "Lord of War". It played the first 3/4 of the movie just fine and then started freezing up every 1-2 minutes making the movie unwatchable. For those who wonder if it will play homemade Blu-Ray DVDs I can report that I have sucessfully created a Blu-Ray DVD with menus on a 25G Single Layer BD-RE (Rewritable) disk using the LG GGW-H20L burner. Other firmware updatres are available but I haven't needed them yet. This player is good as far as disks that work on it but it does not support 48kHz/24-bit HD true sound that few blu-ray disks come with. The sound will pop out of sync with the visual. Before you buy call the manufacturer and ask if they have solved this problem by issuing a firmware (disk to put in the machine to update the harddrive) or not.
Upconversion on this player is mediocre, which is paramount if you have large library of DVDs. I figured instead of spending $50 or so on upconvert DVD player to work with my new TV, I decided to go directly to Blu-Ray, since the Blu-Ray is now standard of HD DVDs. I found that the picture quality is great and the upconversion quality is superb for this player. Overall, I found this player to be competent Blu-ray player and a great upconverting DVD player.
Rating:
Review sent in by George Serewis. Thanks! Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Nick Black from Athens has sent in review of Pioneer BDP-94HD Blu-ray player
May 29, 2008
I purchased this player with the1.2 firmware and it was great. Yes, it did take a very long time to load Rambo - almost 3 full minutes. That is due to the disc predominantly using Java (BD-J) for interactivity. Few days ago I flash updated the firmware to 2.60 in about 19 minutes. See manufacturer's web site for the firmware and carefully follow the instructions. They will even provide you with the disc.
I purchased a 46" HDTV and a Toshiba HD-A20 1080p HD DVD Player player along with this Blu-ray Disc Player. I wanted to see the results of both Blu-Ray and HD DVD before investing in more expensive units. Blue Ray load time isn't long at all. I bought "I am Legend" with Will Smith in Blue Ray format and was blown away by the clarity Blue Ray offers. There needs to be a ethernet port or some other way to access updates online direct to this player, a wireless method possibly? My Toshiba HD DVD player has the CAT-5 ethernet port and it makes updating (not exactly simple) more flexible. Manufacture's website offers the image (ISO) burn to DVDR method for updating, but this seems counter productive at best. One other thing I immediately noticed is how whisper quiet this player is. There is no noticeable fan noise whatsoever. Compare this to the Toshiba HD-XA2 fan, which has a sound resembling the whine of a tiny fighter jet.
The remote often does nothing. Why? I assume something is happening; chapter moves are iffy. ou need to weigh the benefits carefully. If you are moving one chapter forward then you may as well wait - the remote control operation is that flaky. Many movies have tons of extra content not found on regular dvd's. Watching at 1080p is fantastic and any movie lover will be more than happy with this player. There is hard to hear fan noise during dvd playback, which was only audible with the tv turned off. While the movie is playing, I couldn't hear the fan at all. The display on the front is a gray-blue. There are 4 brightness settings (High-Med-Low-Off), which can be accessed with one button on the top right of the remote. Very convenient. With the display turned off, this is a very nice viewing experience. There is also an additional display button on the remote, which tells you the TRT of the disc, which chapter you are watching, time remaining in the chapter, and bit rate.
Rating:
Review sent in by Nick Black. Thanks! Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Panasonic DMP-BD50 Blu-ray player reviewed by Chris Mccraw
May 29, 2008
Design:
This player's design is pure understatement. The simple rectangular component sports a LED display on the bottom half of its face. In the upper right section there are some basic playback controls. On the top of the player are two critical buttons--open/close and power--which can be somewhat irksome if you're planning to stack components.
Remote Control:
The remote for this player is probably the best remote we've seen packaged with a high-definition disc player. It largely resembles the Philips TV remotes--which we're not huge fans of--but this one gets a lot right. At the very top is an illuminated strip of device names and you select which device you want the remote to control by scrolling through them with the Select button. The directional pad is easy to use with the appropriate buttons littered around it. There are convenient rocker buttons to control TV channels and volume. We also like the way the remote felt in our hand; it has some weight to it and feels solid.
Features:
This player can play back both Blu-ray and standard DVD discs as well as standard audio CDs. There's no support for either of the niche high-resolution audio formats. Soundtrack support is adequate for a Blu-ray player but somewhat disappointing when compared to Toshiba's HD DVD players. This player has built-in decoding for standard Dolby Digital and DTS as well as Dolby Digital Plus which is a slightly higher resolution format of Dolby Digital. This player has no support for those highest-resolution next- gen audio formats. The connectivity of this player is nearly comprehensive for a Blu-ray player. The highlight is the HDMI jack which is capable of outputting both high definition video (up to 1080p at either 24 or 60 frames per second) and multichannel high resolution audio.
Performance:
We started off our test looking at Corpse Bride in 1080p on this player. This disc is extremely sharp and any difference in detail between the players should be visible. We found it very difficult to find any significant differences in the image quality between the players. This is even more so the case when watching at a standard viewing distance of around 8 feet for a 50-inch plasma. We took a look at some test patterns on Silicon Image's HQV test suite on Blu-ray in 1080p mode on both players. Like we said before there's really very little difference in Blu-ray performance among all Blu-ray players.
Rating:
Review sent in by Chris Mccraw. Thanks! Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
New Blu-ray player Pioneer BDP-LX80 reviewed by Aristidis Matchick.
May 29, 2008
I bought a Sigmatek BR-1000, Pioneer BDP-LX71, and PS3. In the 2 week that I've had this player, it's done a fine job on video and audio quality. I'm running it on a 45" LG connected through HDMI. I've never had any of the stutters or other audio/video glitches that others have mentioned. I've never had any of the stutters or other audio/video glitches that others have mentioned. The BR players are all updatable so it's possible to play the latest movies. However, this player has a VERY weak failure mode and upgrade procedure. This likely makes this required operation out of reach for most people on this device.
I have only had significant problems with one disk that I own and that was "Lord of War". It played the first 3/4 of the movie just fine and then started freezing up every 1-2 minutes making the movie unwatchable. For those who wonder if it will play homemade Blu-Ray DVDs I can report that I have sucessfully created a Blu-Ray DVD with menus on a 25G Single Layer BD-RE (Rewritable) disk using the LG GGW-H20L burner. Other firmware updatres are available but I haven't needed them yet. This player is good as far as disks that work on it but it does not support 48kHz/24-bit HD true sound that few blu-ray disks come with. The sound will pop out of sync with the visual. Before you buy call the manufacturer and ask if they have solved this problem by issuing a firmware (disk to put in the machine to update the harddrive) or not.
Upconversion on this player is mediocre, which is paramount if you have huge library of DVDs. I figured instead of spending $50 or so on upconvert DVD player to work with my new TV, I decided to go directly to Blu-Ray, since the Blu-Ray is now standard of HD DVDs. The upconversion is wonderful! Best part is I can use optical and take advantage of the new audio codecs. Overall, I found this player to be competent Blu-ray player and a great upconverting DVD player.
Rating:
Review sent in by Aristidis Matchick. Thanks! Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Nick Fedrick from Athens has sent in review of Sharp BD-HP50 Blu-ray player
May 28, 2008
I bought this player with the1.1 firmware and it was great. Yes, it did take a very long time to load Pirates of the Carribean - almost 3 full minutes. That is due to the disc heavily using Java (BD-J) for interactivity. Few days ago I flash updated the firmware to 2.60 in about 10 minutes. See manufacturer's web site for the firmware and carefully follow the instructions. They will even provide you with the disc.
I purchased a 46" HDTV and a Toshiba HD-A20 1080p HD DVD Player player along with this Blu-ray Disc Player. I wanted to see the results of both Blu-Ray and HD DVD before investing in more expensive units. Setting up was quick and straightforward - no problems here. I noticed that this Sony player weighs much less than the Toshiba HD-A20 HD DVD player. There needs to be a ethernet port or some other way to access updates online direct to this player, a wireless method possibly? My Toshiba HD DVD player has the CAT-5 ethernet port and it makes updating (not exactly simple) more flexible. Manufacture's website offers the image (ISO) burn to DVDR method for updating, but this seems not convenient at best. One other thing I immediately noticed is how whisper quiet this player is. There is no noticeable fan noise whatsoever. Compare this to the Toshiba HD-XA2 fan, which has a sound resembling the whine of a tiny fighter jet.
The remote control seems to be totally out of sync with the unit - making the entire thing very sluggish. Mine failed to work after 5 months of ownership. I had it replaced under warranty with a refurbished one and that one does not work either. I have a 60inch 1080p Sony tv and a decent 5.1 home theater-in-a-box sound system.After doing research I bought a (too expensive) "high-speed" monster HDMI cable rated to handle 1080p audio/video. There is slight fan noise during dvd playback, which was only audible with the tv turned off. While the movie is playing, I couldn't hear the fan at all. The display on the front is a gray-blue. There are 4 brightness settings (High-Med-Low-Off), which can be accessed with one button on the top bottom of the remote. Very convenient. With the display turned off, this is a very nice viewing experience. There is also an additional display button on the remote, which tells you the TRT of the disc, which chapter you are watching, time remaining in the chapter, and bit rate.
Rating:
Review sent in by Nick Fedrick. Thanks! Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
