Blu Ray player

[Will]

That upscaling screenshot is beautiful. The definition in the hair is great.
I went for the Sony one after all, it had good reviews about being relatively cheap and quality upscaling.

My Girlfriend thought I was mad for ordering a cartoon in BR (Surfs up ofcourse ;) ) but Phlip has proven its worth there.

I shall try other methods, but if needs be, probably worth finding someone with knowledge near Ben's to set it up.

[juansolo]

The PS3 is still pretty much the best all-round Blu-Ray player there is. It's just more future-proof, faster loading and versitile. As for the quality difference, if you're used to progressive scan DVD on quality equipment, no it isn't that huge. However you really do notice it when you go from watching Blu-Rays back to DVD. You don't really notice how much better the image is until you go back and all the horrid little faults DVD had become all the more apparent.

Same goes for HD audio, but less so. It totally demolishes Dolby Digital, but in comparison to DTS for example, which is twice the bitrate, the jump is nowhere near as big if it's discernable at all. Basically DD sounds flat in comparison to DTS. Saying that I think I have a single disk that justifies Lossless PCM on it's own; Within Temptation: Black Symphony. I was utterly floored by the sound from that disk and have NEVER heard anything multi-channel to touch it. Stunning.

As for setup, HD Essentials is well worth the £10 or so it costs. It comes with colour swatches and test cards so you can calibrate your TV correctly. Takes about 30 mins and you're done. As I say though on a decent enough telly, when it's set right high res stuff is properly jaw dropping. But it will be ruthless of poor sources. Sky particularly.

[mikeluke]

There was a recent review on PS3 v basic Blu Ray and the PS3 did not come out very well - not bad but not as good as the Sony BDP-350 - have to say that I do like my BDP-350 - very good indeed

[noodleplugerine]

There was a recent review on PS3 v basic Blu Ray and the PS3 did not come out very well - not bad but not as good as the Sony BDP-350 - have to say that I do like my BDP-350 - very good indeed

Please continue, how did the BDP-350 fare at gaming?

[Will]

^^ This thread is for me Noodle :lol: I don't do games.

Jokes aside, Why would sony make a PS3 as good as a full BDP? Even if they were super nice, and did do that, then surely the PS3 would cost more?

[mikeluke]

http://whathifi.com/Review/Sony-PlayStation3-80GB/

I think that it is 'horses for courses' - if you are a gamer who also likes DVDs then a PS3 is probably good enough; if you are mainly a DVD person then the Blu Ray player is probably the way to go - my kids are still quite young, so they are happy with a Wii!

[JDC]

I once read or heard that bluray doesn't make much difference unless you have a 65"+ screen, what do you guys think to such statements?

I've only seen bluray once from a PS3 on a 32" TV (probably 720p not 1080p) I could see the difference but I wasn't like "wow!!!" I didn't think the difference was worth the extra price, if I saw a 1080p picture maybe my opinion would be different

[Denim n Leather]

@ JDC -- it would.

[juansolo]

I've got a 37" 1080p screen and the difference is noticable. However I set up 50" Panasonic 1080p screen for a friend and that was properly jawdropping. So yes, to a degree, the bigger and better the screen, the more you notice the difference.

[juansolo]

http://whathifi.com/Review/Sony-PlayStation3-80GB/

I think that it is 'horses for courses' - if you are a gamer who also likes DVDs then a PS3 is probably good enough; if you are mainly a DVD person then the Blu Ray player is probably the way to go - my kids are still quite young, so they are happy with a Wii!

I personally take anything What Hi-Fi say with a very large pinch of salt. They seem to review things 'out of the box' when it comes to HC kit rather that spending some time and properly setting it up. That certainly used to be the case with a lot of them to be fair. Also they really do exaggerate these differences sometimes. I don't know whether it's to make the writing more colourful or to appease advertisers (though in this case they're both Sony products so who knows). But there comes a certain point when diminishing returns kick in, and you're very much there when you're comparing the relative differences of the highest quality home video medium currently available.

The performance differences between a Sony domestic BD player and the PS3 are going to be minimal. There will be a cost difference in favour of the player due to the kit that's in a PS3. Likewise there are plus points to the PS3. For example it transcodes everything into LPCM meaning you can get away with an cheap amp that handles that but isn't licensed for Dolby True Audio or DTS-HD as the PS3 takes care of it. Handy for me for example, that uses the processing stage of a cheap Yamaha integrated amp (chipset and processing shared with the higher end models) and run it into a decent power amp. Also, the PS3 has so much grunt and is updated so frequently that it's pretty much future proof.

[blue]

i've got a Panasonic DMP-BD55 blu-ray player, and i'm very happy with it. blu-ray looks and sounds wonderful and it makes my dvd's look the best they ever have.  now, it doesn't look or sound any better than my old HD-DVD player, but that's a whole other debate!

[Gizmo]

I got the BD35 for xmas. Its amazing. Better then the sony as it upscales better and slightly better picture ingeneral although it costs slightly more. I got the multi region one for £195. Its been the best blue ray under £500 for a while. I say that cos in a few mags a pioneer has knocked it off its top spot, but the pioneer costs over £400!!

The  BD55 is only worth getting if you dont have modern connections. Theres no difference in picture quality or sound. Get one!! best thing ive got in ages.

[Will]

Just arrived, I think the colours will need a set up, but the contrast and depth is far better than DVD (I'm upscaling Blades of Glory at the moment). I seem to be especially impressed by the sound, but I don't know if there is sound upscaling :?

Can't wait for my BDs to arrive. Pirates of the C trilogy, Led Zep TSRTS '73, and Surfs up :)

I went for the sony 350, I was tempted by the 550, but couldn't justify it really

[Denim n Leather]

No sound upscaling, as such, unless you have something that can decode Dolby TrueHD or DTS Master Sound ... but the digital output might be much better than your old DVD player ...

[phlip]

No sound upscaling, as such, unless you have something that can decode Dolby TrueHD or DTS Master Sound ... but the digital output might be much better than your old DVD player ...

Thats certainly true on DVD's on BluRays the player will output the Core DD or DTS track used as the basis of the HD Audio stream these almost without fail are at the full bitrate supported by DD and DTS which you rarely get on DVD's due to space limitations.


Oh and the 350 v 550 the only difference is if you want the player to decode HD Audio and send it via PCM or Analogue outs to a non HD supporting AV Amp (The 550 can PCM/decode both the 350 only Dolby TrueHD) . There's no difference in picture quality between the 2.

Enjoy the 350 if you have any set-up questions just ask :D