[LABillzFan]

Okay, Fez...it's the holidays. I've waited to buy my Blu Ray so it's Profile 2.0 (or what I guess they now call BD-Live) compliant, and now I'm seeing if anyone has a Blu Ray player that they've purchased and are happy with.

This Panasonic seems to have the right price, and good reviews.

Anyone have experience and input on other players?

[UConn James]

Dunno, but I wouldn't get it from CC. (Sorry, Pooj).

[Fezmid]

Yeah -- the Panny BD35K is the one I'll be getting for Xmas... Reluctantly... :worthy: From everything I've read, it's the best one out there and is "only" $225 at Amazon (although Sears had it on sale a couple of weeks ago for $150 -- but the deal expired after only a few hours in the middle of the night).

No direct experience with it myself though (but I'm pretty sure it's sitting in the Amazon box in the front room -- parents shipped a gift from Amazon and the box is just about the right size.... :lol: )

[LABillzFan]

Fezmid, on Dec 2 2008, 07:29 PM, said:

Yeah -- the Panny BD35K is the one I'll be getting for Xmas... Reluctantly... :beer: From everything I've read, it's the best one out there and is "only" $225 at Amazon (although Sears had it on sale a couple of weeks ago for $150 -- but the deal expired after only a few hours in the middle of the night).

No direct experience with it myself though (but I'm pretty sure it's sitting in the Amazon box in the front room -- parents shipped a gift from Amazon and the box is just about the right size.... <_< )

I saw one on Amazon for $221, but the reseller had terrible ratings. I think I'm just going to grab it at Best Buy for $250. I still need to get an internet drop to my entertainment center, but I'll put up a small review once it's in. I caught Die Hard 4 the other night, and was thinking how great that will look on Blu Ray.

[Fezmid]

LABillzFan, on Dec 3 2008, 09:32 AM, said:

I saw one on Amazon for $221, but the reseller had terrible ratings. I think I'm just going to grab it at Best Buy for $250. I still need to get an internet drop to my entertainment center, but I'll put up a small review once it's in. I caught Die Hard 4 the other night, and was thinking how great that will look on Blu Ray.

It's $228.26 from Amazon right now. Saves tax, if you're not in NY. :beer:

Or Best Buy works too -- help support a Minnesota company <_<

[chknwing334]

Does it have analog outs? My reciever does not have hdmi inputs and I want to be able to take advantage of the new surround formats.

[Fezmid]

chknwing334, on Dec 3 2008, 10:41 AM, said:

Does it have analog outs? My reciever does not have hdmi inputs and I want to be able to take advantage of the new surround formats.

Nope. Not sure what models do, either. The HD-A1 did... As did the HD-XA2. Screw you, Sony! <_<

[LABillzFan]

Fezmid, on Dec 3 2008, 08:40 AM, said:

It's $228.26 from Amazon right now. Saves tax, if you're not in NY. :beer:

Or Best Buy works too -- help support a Minnesota company <_<

I just ordered it off Amazon. It was initially offered there by a poorly rated company, so I stayed away. Now the offer is direct from Amazon, which is worth it. Thanks for the heads up.

[Helmet_hair]

LG has a Blue-Ray that will also stream netflix

[Fezmid]

Helmet_hair, on Dec 12 2008, 07:36 AM, said:

LG has a Blue-Ray that will also stream netflix

The 360 does that natively now, and I expect that we'll see that functionality in more nad more devices going forward - very smart on Netflix' part.

I still wouldn't buy the LG player at this point and would stick with the Panny - it gets far better reviews - but it might be a good option for people who prefer to watch Netflix more than BD.

[Dante]

I don't know a lot about Blue Ray players. We just got a new 52" lcd from Best Buy and they had a deal where you could get this Blue Ray player for $100. Even though I have no tech knowledge of Blue Ray I know what I see. We watched "The Transporter" Blue Ray disc and I just could not believe how beautiful it was. I don't know how I can watch a normal dvd anymore I'm so spoiled. I picked up "Batman Begins" and "28 Weeks Later" yesterday and were gonna check those out this weekend.

[Fezmid]

Dante, on Dec 12 2008, 06:06 PM, said:

I don't know a lot about Blue Ray players. We just got a new 52" lcd from Best Buy and they had a deal where you could get this Blue Ray player for $100. Even though I have no tech knowledge of Blue Ray I know what I see. We watched "The Transporter" Blue Ray disc and I just could not believe how beautiful it was. I don't know how I can watch a normal dvd anymore I'm so spoiled. I picked up "Batman Begins" and "28 Weeks Later" yesterday and were gonna check those out this weekend.

Upconverted DVDs look really good too, and not all BD movies look that great (they all COULD, but sometimes the studios don't spend much time on the title and it looks average at best). That player does upconvert (not the best at it, but better than nothing), so you should pop in a DVD just to check it out.

Batman Begins looks and sounds AMAZING (I"ve only seen the HD DVD version, but the BD version is exactly the same from reviews).

[Dante]

Fezmid, on Dec 13 2008, 09:42 AM, said:

Upconverted DVDs look really good too, and not all BD movies look that great (they all COULD, but sometimes the studios don't spend much time on the title and it looks average at best). That player does upconvert (not the best at it, but better than nothing), so you should pop in a DVD just to check it out.

Batman Begins looks and sounds AMAZING (I"ve only seen the HD DVD version, but the BD version is exactly the same from reviews).

Sorry Fezmid, not Batman Begins but Dark Knight. Watched it last night. The city shots were amazing!! btw I've noticed a lot of older flicks in Blue Ray version now. Movies like Alien, The Thing, Lost Boys and so on. How do they look? Since they were filmed before Blue Ray tech was out.

[Fezmid]

Dante, on Dec 13 2008, 10:53 AM, said:

Sorry Fezmid, not Batman Begins but Dark Knight. Watched it last night. The city shots were amazing!! btw I've noticed a lot of older flicks in Blue Ray version now. Movies like Alien, The Thing, Lost Boys and so on. How do they look? Since they were filmed before Blue Ray tech was out.

Film has a much higher resolution than any DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-Ray disk, so they look great (assuming that the studio put good effort into the conversion). In fact, one of the best PQ movies (from what I've read) is the 1938 version of Robin Hood!

A good review site is:
http://www.highdefdigest.com

http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/877/advent...inhood1938.html

[Dante]

Fezmid, on Dec 13 2008, 12:47 PM, said:

Film has a much higher resolution than any DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-Ray disk, so they look great (assuming that the studio put good effort into the conversion). In fact, one of the best PQ movies (from what I've read) is the 1938 version of Robin Hood!

A good review site is:
http://www.highdefdigest.com

http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/877/advent...inhood1938.html

Thanks Fezmid. Thanks for links as well. I got this sound system coming from NewEgg. Under $400 delivered! Pretty solid reviews for the price.

[Helmet_hair]

Fezmid, on Dec 12 2008, 03:07 PM, said:

The 360 does that natively now, and I expect that we'll see that functionality in more nad more devices going forward - very smart on Netflix' part.

yeah, you see that LG just announced they will be putting the ability to stream video netflix built into there TV sets.

[UConn James]

Got this Sony BluRay player at Sam's Club last night. Equivalent to the BDP-S350, only Sam's gets them to use a different model # and includes an HDMI cable.

Using it with this 40" Sony, for reference, along with an older Sony receiver with red/white hookup. Yes, I realize that these were bought at a big bulk-quantity store... but the price was right and for our 'not the best, not the worst' purposes, it looks and sounds good enough(!). I'm not a complete snob "technophile."

Popped in a LOST disc (I'm up to S2 on my re-watching before the new season starts) and the pixelation on the start-up screen that was there from my older DVD player was replaced with a great picture. The upconverting makes a heck of a difference in PQ. Haven't tried a BD yet.

[LABillzFan]

Fezmid, on Dec 2 2008, 07:29 PM, said:

Yeah -- the Panny BD35K is the one I'll be getting for Xmas... Reluctantly... :oops: From everything I've read, it's the best one out there and is "only" $225 at Amazon (although Sears had it on sale a couple of weeks ago for $150 -- but the deal expired after only a few hours in the middle of the night).

No direct experience with it myself though (but I'm pretty sure it's sitting in the Amazon box in the front room -- parents shipped a gift from Amazon and the box is just about the right size.... :wallbash: )

Not sure if you've had a chance to put your BD35K to work, but we've watched about a half dozen flicks, and so far it's hard to complain about anything. The load time is nominal, and the picture is simply better than anything I've seen to date. Some flicks just look inherently better than others. (We recently watched the two "Chronicles of Narnia" flicks, and they have amazing picture quality.)

If there is one thing throwing me off it's that some discs (not all) are displayed with bars at the top and bottom. My TV is 16:9, so I don't quite understand why it won't fill the screen. I've played around with the settings on both the TV and the BD player, and nothing seems to fill the screen properly.

Still, very, very happy with the player. Internet drop to the entertainment center comes Wednesday, so I'm looking forward to taking BD Live out for a spin this weekend. Will keep you posted.

[UConn James]

LABillzFan, on Jan 12 2009, 04:48 PM, said:

Not sure if you've had a chance to put your BD35K to work, but we've watched about a half dozen flicks, and so far it's hard to complain about anything. The load time is nominal, and the picture is simply better than anything I've seen to date. Some flicks just look inherently better than others. (We recently watched the two "Chronicles of Narnia" flicks, and they have amazing picture quality.)

If there is one thing throwing me off it's that some discs (not all) are displayed with bars at the top and bottom. My TV is 16:9, so I don't quite understand why it won't fill the screen. I've played around with the settings on both the TV and the BD player, and nothing seems to fill the screen properly.

Still, very, very happy with the player. Internet drop to the entertainment center comes Wednesday, so I'm looking forward to taking BD Live out for a spin this weekend. Will keep you posted.

Some movies are filmed in different aspect rations than the 16:9. ie Hunt for Red October.

---

There was an update for my Sony. Connected the ethernet port to the router, punched a few buttons and it downloaded and installed new firmware. Easy peasy.

Very happy thus far. The initial load takes ohh... ~30 seconds(?) but that's no biggie.

[Fezmid]

LABillzFan, on Jan 12 2009, 03:48 PM, said:

If there is one thing throwing me off it's that some discs (not all) are displayed with bars at the top and bottom. My TV is 16:9, so I don't quite understand why it won't fill the screen. I've played around with the settings on both the TV and the BD player, and nothing seems to fill the screen properly.

You're seriously asking this question....? You work in the biz! :wallbash:

As was stated, there are different aspect ratios. Here's a link that may help explain it:

http://www.hometheat...home/wsfaq.html

The only movie I've seen is WALL-E. Looked very good, although I didn't like the major delays everytime I selected a menu option. ;)

I've been holding off on watching other films until I get a new projector in mytheater, hopefully in the next week or so. :oops: