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: 42% [?]

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: 52% [?]