Onkyo, the Japanese company that has been around since the mid-40’s, is finally planning on a Blu-ray player debut! After their failure at the Onkyo DV-HD805 HD-DVD player (They admitted only selling 2,000 units! Absolutely embarrassing!) Onkyo will be releasing a Blu-ray player by the end of the year. No further details were disclosed but they mentioned it will be the perfect match to their high-definition A/V receivers equipped with full HDMI processing of 1080p video and decoding of Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio surround sound formats. Even though no pricing was announced I would not expect their first Blu-ray player to be a cheap one.

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Popularity: 4% [?]

Pioneer announced details, including (European) releasing info, on 4 new Blu-ray players!

• BDP-LX91: LX Line Reference Blu-ray disc player (BD-Live / Profile 2.0)
• BDP-LX08: LX Line ‘Designer’ Blu-ray disc player (BonusView / Profile 1.1)
• BDP-LX71: LX Line Blu-ray disc player (BonusView / Profile 1.1)
• BDP-51FD: Blu-ray disc player (BonusView / Profile 1.1)

Although we already knew of the BDP-LX71, we had no specifics but now we know that the BDP-LX71 will be available in September. The BDP-51FD and the BDP-LX08 will arrive in October; the BDP-LX91 later on in winter.

All four players feature 1080p/24, HDMI-12-Bit Deep Color, KURO Link, 7.1 analog output, and are compatible with DTS-HD Master Audio / Dolby True HD. No pricing is available yet.

Specifications

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Out of the four BD players mentioned, the one we want more details is the BDP-LX91, mainly because it will be Pioneer’s first 2.0 player, so as soon as we get more information we will post it here.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Rumors have surfaced about a new Samsung player arriving in September. I really hate rumors! Specially when they arrive out of the blue and with no back up whatsoever. According to a French forum the Samsung BD-P2500 is a profile 2.0 (BD-Live) player that will have the Silicon Optix (HQV/Reon VX) video processing chip for optimal DVD upconversion, and decoding support for both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. For those of you without HDMI receivers, the player will feature 7.1 analog outs. Priced at 449 Euros, this possible Samsung player will be competing head to head with the Panasonic DMP-BD50.

I really don’t know how true this is since Samsung just released their BD-P2400 which is BD-Live ready and only need a firmware upgrade to bring it up to profile 2.0. As soon as we get more information we will post it.

Source: Blu-ray.com

Popularity: 31% [?]

We’ve had the Panasonic DMP-BD30 for a little while here is the US but our friends from the middle east are just starting to have a taste on the player. The middle east is definitely an emerging market, specially UAE and Dubai (I’ve heard incredible things about this place!). With plenty of disposable income, Arabs are very likely to buy the newer generation Panasonic DMP-BD30 in their country instead of having to bring the player from abroad. This will be the first Panasonic BD player available in the Middle East and also the first to carry profile 1.1. So for you Middle Eastern readers, here is an overview on your potential new toy:

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Design
We were happy to note that DMP-BD30 lacks the extremely annoying flip-down panel of its predecessor, the DMP-BD10A. While a large panel still conceals most of the BD30’s front-panel controls, the disc tray hides behind a separate, smaller panel that automatically flips down when you hit the Open/Close button. We definitely prefer this arrangement to having to manually lower the BD10A’s panel every time we wanted to change a disc. On the right half of the DMP-BD30’s face player is the LED display, which was sized to be easily legible from a seating distance of about 7 feet.

The good: Excellent picture quality on Blu-ray discs; 1080p output at 24 frames per second; DVD upconversion up to 1080p; HDMI 1.3b output; can output Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio in bitstream format; first Blu-ray Profile 1.1 player; SD card slot can play high-def video from AVCHD camcorders.

The bad: No built-in decoding for high-resolution audio formats; no Ethernet jack for firmware upgrades or future interactive content.

The bottom line: The Panasonic DMP-BD30 offers excellent video quality and is Blu-ray Profile 1.1 compliant, but those who want high-resolution audio will need a cutting-edge AV receiver.

You can read the full detailed review of the DMP-BD30 on http://reviews.cnet.com

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Specs

• Chipset- Panasonic UniPhier
• Post-processor- None
• BD profile-Bonus View (1.1)

Video

• Video resolutions-480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
• DVD upconversion-720p, 1080i, 1080p
• Video frame rates-60i, 24p, 60p

Media Compatibility

• BD media- BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-RE
• DVD media-DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-R DL, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+R DL, DVD+RW, DVD-RAM
• CD media-CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW

Playback video Compatibility

• MPEG-2 - Yes
• MPEG-2 HD - Yes
• MPEG-4 - Yes
• MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) - Yes
• VC-1 - Yes
• DivX - No
• DivX HD - No
• DivX Ultra - No
• XviD - No
• XviD HD - No
• JPEG - Yes
• JPEG HD - Yes

Playback audio Compatibility

• Dolby Digital - Yes
• Dolby Digital+ - Yes
• Dolby TrueHD - No
• Dolby TrueHD (bitstream) - Yes
• DTS - Yes
• DTS-HD - Yes
• DTS-HD MA - No
• DTS-HD MA (bitstream) - Yes
• PCM - Yes
• WMA - No
• WMA Pro - No
• MP3 - Yes
• OGG - No
• AAC - No
• AAC+ - No
• SACD - No
• DVD Audio - No

Connections

• HDMI - 1
• HDMI version – 1.3a
• HDMI audio output 7.1
• HDMI CEC - No
• DVI - No
• Composite - 1
• Component – 1
• S-video - 1
• Optical - 1
• Analog - 1
• Analog audio output - 5.1
• Coaxial - 1
• Ethernet - No
• Wireless - No
• Firewire - No
• USB - No

Converters

• Video DAC - 12bit / 148.5MHz
• Audio DAC - 24bit / 192kHz

Remote

• Universal - No
• Programmable - No
• Bluetooth - No
• Infrared - Yes
• Display - No
• Radio frequency - No
• Backlight - No

Other

• Parental lock - No
• Hard drive - No
• SD card reader - 1

Dimensions

• Width (cm) 43.02
• Height (cm) 5.97
• Depth (cm) 32.07
• Weight (kg) 3.31

Download the full User’s manual here!

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In general, the DMP-BD30 is a great quality player and gets the job done! However, keep in mind that the DMPBD50 is right around the conner. It is being released in the US soon so I am guessing it will be hitting your side of the world around the beginning of 2009 if all runs as expected. The Panasonic DMPBD50 is Profile 2.0 (BD-Live) Player with all the latest interactivity technology. If you want to know more about it before taking the plunge into a DMP-DB30 click here! and Here to check out what we’ve covered before!

Popularity: 23% [?]

This is no Hoax! For a very limited time amazon is offering the Samsung BD-P1400 for only $269.68. Is it my perception only or we are starting to see a small price war among several retailers? Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Amazon are just a few names of the retailers offering major discounts for the past 2 weeks. This is great! The consumer is the one to win. The Samsung BD-P1400 particularly is part of the High-Def week at amazon.com, going on only this week (6/2-6/6)! They also have the Die Hard Collection, which has all 4 Die Hard Blu-ray Movies for only $56.99.

Click here to go to Amazon’s Gold Box page! Unfortunately, this is only a preset number of players, so hurry!!

This is a great sign and we hope it will continue for a while to drive Blu-ray prices down so more people will start adopting the new technology!

Popularity: 31% [?]

Finally, after some delays the Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player is available for any one who wants to spend $399.99 on a profile 1.1 player that has an ethernet port for a possible future upgrade to profile 2.0.We do however anticipate the price dropping or at least some promotions after a couple of weeks.

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If you have questions or want more details on this player you can download the owner’s manual here!

You can order your Samsung BD-P1500 from Amazon here!

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Popularity: 26% [?]

If you have a Samsung BD-UP5000, life is not all that bad! Yes, your player won’t be seeing many HD-DVDs anymore but you now can upgrade your player to profile 1.1 with the new firmware v1.3 Samsung released. Even though you bought a Combo player compatible with Blu-ray profile 1.0, you can upgrade it to profile 1.1 (BonusView). The firmware was released 2 days ago and it is available!

This is a list of changes you will get with the new firmware:

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1. Upgrades current BD-UP5000 to profile 1.1
2. Upgrades BD-UP5000 with HD audio bit-stream output function.
3. Updates User interface based on BD profile 1.1
4. Improves playback compatibility in some movies

Click here to get the BD-UP5000 v1.3 firmware!

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Popularity: 30% [?]

Panasonic is releasing the first Blu-ray Recorder outside Japan, in Australia, hitting store’s shelves later June. The Panasonic DMR-BW500 apparently is very similar to the Panasonic DMP-BD30, which is a profile 1.1 player already released here in the US but of course without the recorder addition. The player is selling in Australia for AU$2,299! That is in Australian Dollars… Ouch! Still, didn’t help much… but I guess you have to pay the price of new technology.

On top of being a Full HD, 24p Blu-ray player, this model can record up to six hours and 40 minutes of Full HD content to a 50GB BD disc. More impressively, it has a 500GB hard drive built in, along with twin HD TV tuners, 7-day EPG support, HDMI v1.3, 1080p upconversion with HDMI (for DVD playback) and support for all the latest audio codecs, including Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD. There’s also a USB port and an SD card slot for JPG, MP3 and AVC-HD files. The unit does not have decoders built-in for the new Blu-ray audio standards, but it can deliver the sound in ‘bitstream’ format over HDMI to any of the several new home theater receivers that can decode these.

Panasonic Australia’s Director for Consumer Electronics Group, Paul Reid said, “Panasonic has led the way in home entertainment products and continues to bring innovation to the market with Australia’s first Blu-ray Recorder for the living room. This product is a significant breakthrough for Blu-ray and sets the standard in Full High Definition recording. With a twin High Definition Tuner and 500 GB Hard Disk Drive it is the ideal one-box solution for any home.”

Thomas Bartlett from www.gadgetguy.com.au did a pretty good and thorough review of this new recorder. To sum it up he absolutely loved it! Now, when will we get this type of “toy” in the US? This is crazy and not fair.

The reason we haven’t got Blu-ray recorders in the Uncle Sam’s land probably has to do with our regulatory agencies and pressure from the big Networks such as: NBC, ABC, CBS and all the letters of the alphabet… The networks and their studios like to sell their television series season box sets and of course wouldn’t want you to be able to record it and burn it yourself… Maybe when the FCC (Federal Communications Commission, which regulates broadcastings in the US) allows broadcasts with content protection flags we may start seeing Blu-ray recorders arrive.

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Via: www.gadgetguy.com.au

Popularity: 30% [?]

Best Buy is running a special promotion on the newly released NS-BRDVD Insignia Blu-ray player! This will make it the most affordable Blu-ray player available. Of course there is a catch but it is not that bad. The player costs $349.99 but with the purchase of the Insignia NS-BRDVD player, you’ll receive a special book of coupons inside the box. You can redeem the coupons at your local Best Buy store for $100 in instant savings on Blu-ray movies from Disney, Touchstone and Miramax.

NOTE: They are not redeemable online! See? I said the catch wasn’t bad…It gives the opportunity to new Blu-ray owners to start their new hi-def movie collections. As we mentioned before, this is not the best player ever but it will do the basics… The player has 1080p Full HD output, HDMI, optical and coaxial audio and composite video output but no support for DVI. It also supports MP3 and WMA.

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You can access Best Buy’s promo page here!

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Popularity: 36% [?]

Two weeks ago the Magnavox NB500MG9 started being sold and its low $300 price has definitely made an impact on the market. We all know that it is not the best player out there but aparently people are not exactly looking for the best, they want something affordable that will do the job! That’s the main reason for this player’s success. We have been getting many questions about its features and capabilities but up to now (with the exception of those who bought the player) you could not find much information about the NB500MG9 on the web. Today we were able to download the owner’s manual from Funai and decided to post it here for you!

You can get all the info about this Magnavox NB500MG9 here!

Enjoy! This will help you make an educated purchase…

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Popularity: 46% [?]