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: 38% [?]

We all know that price has been one of the reasons for the slow adoption of the Blu-ray format. The first step is purchasing a player and once you already have a Blu-ray player you want to start building up your movie collection. However, movies are also more expensive then DVDs and to help you with that problem every once in a while Amazon runs some very good promotions. They have done a “Buy 2 get 3″ and now they are offering a “Summer 50% Blowout”. This limited time promo is making many Blu-ray discs cheaper or the same price as DVDs. They have a total of 117 titles with pretty good discounts, the discs are going from $14.45 to $23.95. If you are still unsure whether or not you should replace your DVD collection with new Blu-rays, this promo will assist you making up your mind on some titles… Keep in mind that this promo is available through June 9, so there is not much time to think!

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This is the complete list of the titles on sale in alphabetical order:

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Popularity: 8% [?]

MagnaVox started selling a 1.1 profile Blu-ray player for 298 bucks, which has been spotted at Wal-Mart. This is definitely the cheapest option out there…Is this what many people have been waiting for to take the plunge and invest on a Blu-ray player? Maybe… MagnaVox is a second tier brand from Phillips but this player has been manufactured by the Japanese Funai, which also makes a few products for Hitachi, Mitsubishi, Sharp, Denon and others. Also hitting the market is the Sylvania NB500SL9, which can be pre-ordered at amazon.com at an affordable price of $349.99. This Sylvania player is also manufactured by Funai and basically the same as the MagnaVox NB500MG9, only different brand. If you are looking for a “entry level” stand-alone player, these two are a great affordable option but think twice if you are looking for more performance, you are still better off with a Playstation3!

Specs

- Profile 1.1 BonusView Picture-in-Picture
- Video Output Resolutions: 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p (1080p/24 and 1080p/60)
- DVD Upconversion to 720p, 1080i, 1080p
- Support for HD Audio Formats: (bitstream output, no internal decoding)
- HDMI Ver. 1.3
- Weight 9.5 pounds

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Here is a diagram of the MagnaVox Blu-ray Player:

Popularity: 100% [?]

Samsung BD-P1400 is currently available with a list price of $500, but selling for less than $300 online. If you are looking for an affordable blu-ray player, the Samsung BD-P1400 is a great choice. On the contrary of what you may think and in spite of the the low price point, this is not a piece of garbage. The player clearly doesn’t have all the most current available technology but it delivers on what it has. It has excellent support for high-resolution audio soundtracks, 1080p output at 24 frames per second, and an Ethernet port for upgrading the firmware. We can vouch for solid image quality on Blu-ray discs.

As mentioned before the BD-P1400 does not have the latest and greatest. It only supports Blu-ray Profile 1.0, which means it will NOT play some special features such as Bonus View (PiP) and BD-Live. But overall, the BD-P1400 represents something buyers have been longing for: an affordable, standalone Blu-ray player without a deal-breaking flaw.

The good: Great image quality on Blu-ray movies; terrifc soundtrack support with onboard decoding for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD High Resolution and bitstream output for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio; relatively low price compared to other standalone Blu-ray players

The bad: Only Blu-ray Profile 1.0 compliant, so it will not play some bonus features on some newer discs; below-average performance with 1080p output at 24 frames per second; some annoying small operational issues.

The bottom line: The Samsung BD-P1400 delivers a mostly capable Blu-ray player at an affordable price.

Compatibility

• Playback Media- BD-ROM/DVD-ROM/DVD-R/DVD-RW/Audio CD/CD-R/CD-RW
• Playback Formats- VC-1/MPEG2/H.264/HD JPEG/MP3

Specs

• DVD Upconversion of 1080p
• Dolby Digital Decoder
• DTS Decoder
• Dolby Digital Plus Decoder
• 1.0 Profile
• HDMI CEC
• Composite Video Outputs
• Component Video Outputs
• S-Video Outputs
• 1.3 HDMI Outputs
• Optical Digital Audio Outputs
• Coaxial Digital Audio Outputs
• Analog Audio Outputs
• Network (for SW Upgrades only)

Popularity: 9% [?]