I interpreted his comments as meaning that connecting a BR player to a TV of the same brand would make them more compatible or less glitchy. But I had never heard this before.

Amazon has a promotion that gives a free copy of the Snow White BD to those who purchase the Panasonic BD60 or BD80 players. Good through October 26th:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.htm...cId=1000436551

Since the Snow White BD was available for $9.99, it isn't much of a promotion, but I thought I'd mention it. The prices for those players continue to yo-yo and are currently $141.79 for the BD60 and $179.84 for the BD 80.

The Panny BD60 is now $122.33 at Amazon with the free Snow White promotion still valid.

Are we really looking at CES until the next line of players are announced and/or any substanial new releases? It's a little scary to think that it's only about 11 weeks away, but at the same time that coupled with the delay to market is still some time.

I looked into some Monster cables. What exactly is HDMI 1.3? Is that the latest version? Also, why is a 4 ft. cable $100.00?

It is $100 because Monster Cable is a rip-off...plain and simple....

PLEASE, don't buy into their marketing hype...go to monoprice.com and buy yourself a quality HDMI cable for a mere fraction of the cost of a Monster Cable....don't spend a Benjamin when you only need to spend a Hamilton at most!

I'll second what WMAangel said about staying away from Monster cables and using monoprice.com. Like many others here, my cables come from monoprice.

I believe that HDMI 1.3a is the latest version in wide use. But any decent quality HDMI cable should be able to carry it. Cable manufacturers mention the "1.3" stuff to let customers know that their cables are compatible with the newer standard. It doesn't mean that the cables are different from earlier ones, so far as I have heard.

I don't think it's been mentioned yet but there is a firmware upgrade for SONY BDP 250 available since 10/22.

I am entering the market to buy a Blu-Ray player. I know the Oppo pretty much has everything I want, but I may not need quite all the bells and whistles. I have a couple of general questions, then a few more specific ones.

First off - I have a Pioneer DV490-V that's performed flawlessly for the past three or four years; connected via HDMI to a 50" Panasonic Plasma and upscales. Will a Blu-Ray upscale on standard DVD's be better than what I'm getting with my Pioneer?

There are currently no Region B or C Blu-Rays that I'm interested in. Is it possible to unlock Blu-Ray players for DVD playback via codes from a remote control, or is the region encoding a hardware modification? If so, which players are the most recommended that are under $200?

I'm seriously looking at a Panasonic DMP-BD60 as a low-cost alternative to the Oppo. I looked on-line but couldn't find an owner's manual to download to address these questions: Does it remember where you stopped in a movie if the power goes off? Just for one disc, or can it remember multiple discs (like my current Pioneer)? Does it have frame-by-frame advance? Slow motion? Zoom (for viewing background details)? Will the on-screen display show time remaining in the chapter as well as the entire movie?

With day-after-Thanksgiving sales on the horizon, has there ever been any precedent that Oppo's may go on sale?

Many thanks in advance! --Peter

I don't know if it's been mentioned in this thread, but the Sony-CX960 400 BD changers have been released. I'm an absolute apologist for these things, I have three of the DVD models. While they're full of quirks (some would argue much more than that) I think they're awesome.

List price is $800. They're being sold at some Magnolia Best Buys, which is where I'm looking to purchase it due to their very reasonable warranties on DVDs (and these things really need one, mainly for the motor). If anybody knows of any deals or BB reward zone coupons I'm not aware of I'd appreciate it.

In the event anybody actually owns one of these already, a review would be much appreciated. Especially regarding the new and hyped interface.

As a follow-up to my own post regarding the Panasonic BD60; here's a link to the on-line owner's manual:

http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPER...MPBD60-MUL.PDF

Looks like the zoom function only controls screen aspect and resume-play is disabled when tray is ejected (a little unclear if powering down will disable the resume)


Peter

I don't know enough to answer your specific hardware questions. Perhaps someone else can.The only region free BD player that I am aware of is the Momitsu BDP-799,
$259.95:
http://www.hkflix.com/hardware/
I haven't researched it so I know nothing about it. Last I checked, the Oppo BDP-83 wasn't region free; perhaps that has changed. Check AVS forums for more technical information on such things. I've had a link to the operating manual for the BD60 in the first post of this thread since I first listed the player.

The memory function in BD players only works on DVDs and a few BDs that don't use Java (usually older titles). As with a typical DVD player, if you hit stop once before powering off, it remembers the place to resume. Pressing stop twice or opening the tray will erase the resume memory. But none of this works on most BDs because of how the format was designed and it probably isn't amenable to a firmware fix. It is a major flaw in the BD format, IMHO.

The Panny does have frame-by-frame advance and slow motion. It does not do zoom in the way that HD DVD and some DVD players do, so far as I am aware. I don't think it will give time remaining in chapters, but I haven't checked all the various permutations of the display function. It is awkwardly designed on the Panny players, as is the lack of a subtitle button on the remote (I need to program my Harmony to do that, haven't gotten around to it yet.)To the best of my knowledge, Oppo never allows their players to be discounted. They remain at full price even at places like Amazon.

According to the Oppo owner's manual, it will save up to five discs; supposedly DVD or Blu-Ray (those blu-rays that would allow this). A very nice feature that I'm surprised is not standard for just about any DVD or Blu-Ray player today. --Peter

I'm leaning towards getting a Sony BDPS560 (mainly for the built-in WiFi). Does anyone here have any experience with this model? Also, are there any other players with built-in WiFi that you would recommend?

Today's Amazon DotD is a refurb Harmony 890 universal remote for $99.99:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001L1RSO8/...3KQW4KJVWKC766

I bought a refurb 880 last year and it sure was nice to put away the blizzard of remotes to my various HT devices. The 890 is similar to the 880 but adds an rf feature that can control devices hidden in cabinets or behind a wall.

Get the BD440 (I think that's what it is?). Has Netflix and various other streaming capabilities.

But, if you want a fantastic player, get the LG BD390.

Are you talking about the N460? It doesn't have built-in wi-fi.

Surprised no one has mentioned yet that Target is advertising a Memorex brand BD player on sale this week for just $99.99 on the front page of their weekly ad....this is the magic price so many people were speculating we might see a BD player fall to on Black Friday, but I guess it has come a couple weeks early....

Anyone seen one or tried it out? Profile 1.1 or 2.0? Rebranded from some other manufacturer perhaps? When I think of Memorex, I don't exactly think of high quality electronics, but maybe it might work as a cheaper bedroom player for some people....

^The Memorex player at Target is probably the MVBD-2520. It is probably rebranded, but I don't know what the original manufacturer is. The Memorex page on the player is here:
http://www.memorex.com/en/Home-Enter...y-Disc-Player/

It is 2.0 (as are all players nowadays). It does not internally decode DTS-HD MA, so far as I can determine, although it will bitstream it to a capable receiver. No multi-channel analog out at this price point, of course. No support of video streaming, for those interested in that.

There was some discussion of whether a name brand player would drop below $100 during the Black Friday sales, but I am not surprised that sub $100 generic brand players have started to appear, more than three years after the launch of the format. It certainly should help market penetration for Blu-ray Disc; why buy a cheap DVD player when one can get a BD player for a bit more instead? Even the discs themselves are starting to show lower prices in some cases (think just-released Snow White for $9.99). May that trend continue!

Should've got the $99 Insignia a few weeks ago. 2.0, Netflix and plays movie files via USB.

Thanks for your advice everyone. I already bought the BDPS560, though. I was keeping an eye on it last week on Amazon. The price was all over the place, but I managed to get it for $192.00. It should arrive by Friday.

The Momitsu BDP-799 has jumped up in price to $300. Figures as I was going to buy it today.

I happened to get an Panasonic DMP BD60 when I got my last TV, and now my PS3 is getting repaired so I'm using it as a temporary replacement. For some reason it won't play DTS HD MA, even though the box says it can and the specs say it can. I tried it both on bitstream (my receiver can decode it) and PCM, and get absolutely no sound. Anyone else have this issue?

Edit: Well, this is strange. I switched on secondary audio to shove the audio down to lossy, and got sound. Then, when I flipped secondary audio back off, DTS HD MA worked. Don't know what was going on with that.

^Gremlins?

Seeing that blu-rays are nearing the same prices as standard, I think I'll finally break down and get a blu-ray player.

My television is a 40" Samsung LN40A550.

I'm not as concerned with Wi-Fi, Netflix, and a lot of other special features. I just want a player that has outstanding image and sound quality. Especially important to me is a player that does an excellent job of upconverting standard dvds.

I've heard good things about Panasonic's DMP-BD60 picture and sound on blu-rays. Is this machine also good with upconverting? I just have so many standard dvds that it is crucial that it is.

Any suggestions?