New Blu-ray player Panasonic DMP-BD10 reviewed by Anne Bainbridge
August 31, 2008
I have a Panasonic DMP-BD10, and PS3. In the 15 days that I've had this player, it's done a terrific job on video and audio quality. I'm playing it on a 49" Hitachi connected through HDMI. I've never had any of the stutters or other audio/video glitches that others have mentioned. This player takes by far the longest of my three players to load movies and simply responding to an eject/open request takes 30 seconds for some reason. The BR players are all updatable so it's possible to play the latest movies. However, this player has a VERY unintuitive failure mode and upgrade procedure. Since Bluray is still in its infancy (so-to-speak) there aren't many options for players.
Other nice features of this player include variety of media: You can play not only standard music CDs (a given) but also MP3 discs. 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. One drawback that keeps this unit from being perfect is no ethernet connectability for firmware upgrading. It is my opinion that this player was released prematurely based on its feature set. This player did a great job on the Bluray compatibility & picture quality and the DVD upconversion quality. This player is good as far as disks that work on it but it does not support 48kHz/24-bit HD true sound that other 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 great, which is very important if you have vast library of DVDs. I figured instead of spending $100 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.
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Review was sent in by Anne Bainbridge. Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Bob Doyle from Nebraska has sent in review of Sony BDP-S5000 Blu-ray player.
August 31, 2008
This player is smaller than the previous model. It's about half as deep as every other Blu-ray players. Coming in at 17 inches wide by 8.75 inches deep by 2.38 inches high.On the far right are a couple playback controls accompanied by LCD screen. There is also a single blue indicator light which tells you if the player is outputting at 24 frames per second.
The player's included remote control has a decent button layout although there are some missteps. The remote has a centrally located directional pad surrounded by useful buttons such as Back and Pop-up Menu. The separate rocker buttons for volume and channel control--for those who want to control their TV. The placement of the playback controls is subpar with fast-forward and rewind buttons located far away from central buttons.
This player is currently a Profile 1.1 Blu-ray player which means it can access picture-in-picture commentary tracks available on some Blu-ray Discs. It is not a Profile 2.0 player so it cannot access the BD-Live features on certain new Blu-ray Discs. This player can be upgraded in future to be compatible with profile 2.0. This player can output both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio in bit stream format which means that people with newer receivers with onboard decoding can still take advantage of DTS-HD Master Audio. The similarly priced Sony PlayStation 3 can decode both formats which means you only need a receiver with HDMI support to take advantage of both formats.
The Largest negatives are the decoding of DTS MA and Dolbey True HD. DTS MA is currently not supported but it is possible it could happen in a future update. On the Dolby True HD side the negative here is that it can only decode it to 2 channel internally. Now if you have a reciever that can decode the bitstreamed audio then none of this really affects you because the receiver fills in the blanks.
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Review was sent in by Bob Doyle. Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Sony BDP-S550 reviewed by Jim Rife
August 31, 2008
I obtained my Sony BDP-S550 from Bestbuy. This is my very first BD player. I was waiting for the format war to end once it did I read a review bestbuy.com on the internet that said you might consider waiting to making the jump to BD until the next generation of players to come out on the market.
This one loads pretty fast. From what I read it is much faster then older previous models. I was upgrading coming from a Panasonic 5 disc up converting DVD player and that thing was slow so I'm very satisfied. The picture isgood and the audio is great too. I don't even have it connected to a amp that does Dolby Tru-HD or DTS-MA. That will be my next purchase.
There is only one thing that I'm disappointed with the player has the Pioneer Theater Sync feature. Which works great with my Sony amp. But for some reason the DVD remote will only control the volume for the TV not the amp. So I still have to use a second remote for volume on my Sony amp. This makes no sense to me.
We watched Blade Runner, Pan's Labyrinth, Dark City, and Mission Impossible III on BD so far. Batman Begins wasjaw dropping from an audio and picture quality issue. My wife said she had no clue that a DVD could look that good.
I also watched 2001 - A Space Odyssey on a SD DVD and that look pretty good too.
The DVD player has a slot in the back for a USB drive and it also has a ethernet port so it can connect to the net for firmware updates and to access bonus features.
The next generation model due out in the fall it will cost more but it decodes all the audio inside the player.
Overall one day in I'm very pleased with the purchase and I'm happy I waited for this model.
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Review was sent in by Jim Rife. Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
Newly released Blu-ray player LG BH200 review sent in by Kristin Moody from Houston.
August 31, 2008
I obtained this player with the1.1 firmware and it was great. Yes, it did take a very long time to load Twister - almost 3 full minutes. That is due to the disc mostly using Java (BD-J) for interactivity. Few days ago I flash updated the firmware to 2.60 in about 12 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. I am very impressed with the clarity sharpness and rich color of the 1080p image. The picture is as good and in some ways better than the Toshiba. 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 backward 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.
This player's plastic remote is reasonably good. It's well designed and compliments HDTV - the remote controls the TV's basic functions too. We have DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 coming out now. The color quality is exceptional and images are very sharp. When playing regular DVD's the images aren't as sharp naturally. There is small 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 left 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.
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Review was sent in by Kristin Moody. Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
New Blu-ray player Pioneer BDP-51FD reviewed by Jim Kieburtz
August 30, 2008
I have a Pioneer BDP-51FD, and PS3. In the 1 week that I've had this player, it's done a terrific job on video and audio quality. I'm playing it on a 49" Sharp connected through HDMI. I've never had any of the stutters or other audio/video glitches that others have mentioned. I can say right off that Panasonic has taken the sting out of the higher price of Blu-Ray players with a good offering of features you won't find in other models. 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. Since Bluray is still in its infancy (so-to-speak) there aren't many options for players.
I HAVE NEVER HAD ANY DISC PLAY OR CONNECTION ISSUES AS HAVE BEEN REPORTED BY OTHER USERS. MY ONLY ADVICE ON THIS IS TO KEEP THE FIRMWARE UPDATED EITHER BY LAN OR BY CALLING SAMSUNG AND REQUESTING A FIRMWARE DISC. 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. One drawback that keeps this unit from being perfect is no ethernet connectability for firmware upgrading. It is my opinion that this player was released prematurely based on its feature set. This player did a great job on the Bluray compatibility & picture quality and the DVD upconversion quality. This player is good as far as disks that work on it but it does not support 48kHz/24-bit HD true sound that most 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 great, which is very important if you have big library of DVDs. I figured instead of spending $100 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 was sent in by Jim Kieburtz. Send in your reviews to Admin@buyblurayplayers.com
