It looks the BD-S350 is now available in Canada for $399:
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...gon=&langid=EN

The old BD-S300 went down to $299.95:
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...gon=&langid=EN

Profile 1.1 (2.0 possibly at a later date - when the BD 300 arrives?)
Can play ANY Region BD
Can play ANY Region DVD
Can play PAL DVDs
Can play BOTH BD and HD
Can Bitstream ALL audio
Can internall decode ALL audio (except DTS MA)

I now own 2. Love them to death.

Upcoming LG BD300 player, which should be in stores end of September/first of October, will be priced at $400. Not a bad deal for these features, including movie-streaming with Netflix:

Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio decoding
USB Media Plus - MP3, JPEG, etc.
BD-Live and BonusView
Full 1080p output including DVD upconverting
Netflix current content: 12,000 movies and TV shows streaming

http://gizmodo.com/5045001/lg-sets-p...reasonable-400

Amazing price for a player that looks to match the S550 and Panasonic 50 spec wise but include Netflix streaming and $100 cheaper.

Hopefully that means a 2.0 update for the LG 200.

Is this the thread to put notices of firmware updates?

Firmware 2.3 for the BD30 is available now: http://panasonic.jp/support/global/c...ica/index.html

Apparently it fixes the issue of recent Paramount BDs not playing with 24Hz, as well as adding support for displays that can accept 24Hz but couldn't complete the handshake.

I think firmware news should go in here.

I'm still on 1.6 on my Panny. I'll stay put until I run into a problem. They are definitely one of, if not the best company for firmware upgrades. Sony is pretty solid too.

The LG is very tempting. There are rumors that the Sony 550 will debut at $399.

I was thinking about picking up the LG BH200. Is the 300 a combo player like the 200 or just a Blu-ray only? I am assuming BD only since that there is no H in the name but just wanted to make sure before I pulled the trigger.

It plays only BD.

Just bought my first Blu-ray player the Sony BD-S350 along with a Samsung 61" 1080P Television over labor day weekend from bestbuy, anyone know if i was suppose to receive any free Blu-ray discs with my purchase, i asked the guy at bestbuy he said he didn't think so then i talked with a co worker of mine and he said i should have received 3 movies, anybody know anything about this, appreciate any feedback.

Yes. There is a white box that contain Invincible, 50 First Dates and Night at the Museum (if the store still has it). It has a picture (IIRC) of 2 dogs on it that says "1080p!"

From Blu-ray.com:

The folks over at AVSForum have spotted the Oppo BDP S83 Blu-ray Disc player, the first such player from the now famous DVD Player manufacturer. Well known for their line of upscalling DVD Players, the company spent much of the format war pushing their players as a "alternative" to a high definition player.

Now fully convinced that Blu-ray is the future, Oppo is offering this BD-Live player with 7.1 analog outs and promise support for all audio codecs when it launches. No other information is known at this time.

"Spotted" i.e. in stores?

Looks like at CEDIA. No date yet.

Grubert added to the blu-ray.com post that the Oppo will have SACD and use VRS video processing by ABT, same as their flagship 983 model. If that's the case, I believe Oppo has moved to #1 on my list.

PLEASE let it have a region hack! I can't really justify buying a fourth BD player like the LG BH200 just for the hack, but I would love to own an Oppo BD player so region free ability would seal the deal.

Pro-B

Fuck and I just bought the Pioneer 51FD last week.

Return it?

The Oppo has some great features...but man, that player looks ugly. Looks like my old DVD players from 1999.

It's HUGE! But I'm sure Oppo will deliver.

Everyone in this thread is going to have 10 Blu-ray players by the end of the year.

Great looking player and if it has the region hack on dvds as all Oppos do, I'm willing to spend up to 800 for this bad boy.

Good news as Oppo says it will be priced between $500-$700 and be available "soon".

Of interest to me, was the mention in an AVS thread (don't remember which one) that the coming Oppo was to have full speaker adjustments for the analog output. Hope that is true. That has been a major failing of all players under $1000 released or announced, thus far. One of those head scratching things: why bother with analog outs if they can't be used properly?

I would absolutely pay $500-$700 if it could be made region free like the other Oppos. Can't wait!