Customer Reviews

Sony BDVE300 5.1-Channel High-Definition Blu-ray Disc Player/DVD Disc Home theater System (Black)

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I bought the BDVE300 to go with a Sony 52Z5100 HDTV that I also bought from Amazon. I bought it mainly because I wanted to match the two items for both esthetic and practical reasons. The black speakers match the TV perfectly. I can also control both with one controller and easily run the TV sound through the HTS.
I am not an audiophile. So I didn't try to compare technical specs. This review is strictly subjective (in part to counter the one above) and is based on what I have heard while using the system with the TV.

The room in which the TV is located in is a 20 X 20 den/family room with a connecting dining area and kitchen. The entire area is open. It has wooden floors with a single oval area rug in front of the fireplace and TV.

I found the sound to be exceptionally clear and clean, without distortion or unevenness. I can tell a definite difference between the TV speakers and the BDV300 speakers. The BDV300 sound seems more spacious. It fills the room without blowing you away. The sound has more fullness to it than the TV speakers.
I have not tried it at full volume. I have never felt the need to do so. I have watched two musical DVDs, a Mary Chapin Carpenter concert and the 10th anniversary recording of Les Miserables. In both cases the music sounded beautiful and clear. You could hear all of nuances of the voices and the words of the songs were distinct and clear.

If you want strong bass that shakes the room, I am not sure this is the system for you. The bass is there but it is blended in with the other sounds. I am sure I can adjust it for greater effect. However, I am currently running the system at default values.

As for the lack of an S-air wireless cartridge, as mentioned by the reviewer above. It is true you have to buy it separately. However, everything I read about the system stated this plainly up front. If you need this feature it is available as an option. In researching this system I found this individual posted the same opinion on every web site he could find. I don't think his opinion was a fair assessment of the system's capabilities.
I found the set up to be rather easy. The instructions show various options on installing it alone with the TV or with a cable/SAT box or with an external DVD, etc. With the external mic it took about one minute to calibrate and maybe 15 mins. to connect the wires.

Be aware that Sony uses a proprietary plug on the DVD/Radio/Amp end of the system. The speaker end is a simple pinch type terminal. There is a FM & AM receiver as part of the system. I have not tried them yet. The DVD/CD/Blue ray player worked fine.

The bottom line is: The BDVE300 does everything Sony says it does. If you are looking for something to enhance your TV experience and play CDs with good clear sound, this system will do it well. For the price, I think it is an excellent value. I found no "gotchas" or "I can't believe they did this". So I gave it a rating of 5. I am very pleased with my purchase.

John

Here is my honest review about this product....I got it free with my Sony 52" W5100 TV purchase from Amazon.

Pros:
-->It is a complete package....it has a blu ray player, Ipod docking station, and the regular 5.1 channel sound system.
--> It comes with a sound calibration unit. What this basically does is you set all your speakers around you where you want them installed and then set the calibration unit at the place where you sit to watch your TV, like your couch....and then the calibration unit will tell you if your speakers are optimally arranged and will help you finalize the exact position of your speakers around you to give you optimal effect. This feature was really helpful...
--> It upscales image to 1080p
--> It has the same XMB system that sony features. This makes life very easy...trust me...also it syncs with your Sony TV and you can use 1 remote for both systems
--> It has internet capability....and very easy to use as well...just connect a Ethernet cable to it and you can browse HD content over the web using your remote as a keypad.
--> Ipod docking station is very helpful since we have 2 ipods, 2 iphones...all our music is on them, so you can connect them directly to your HT system and listen to music.
--> 1000 W of total power output gives you really good sound...unless you plan to start a recording studio or something....this system will be perfect for good sound


Cons:
--> Most irritable is the speaker cable length.....my rear speakers barely reach behind my sofa if i run the wires around the walls....in other systems, even though the cables may be short, you can still buy a longer 16gauge cable and run it around. In this system, the ends that go into the blu ray player are soldered into a plastic connector. So unless i am willing to mess around with re-soldering which is a pain.....i have to extend my existing speaker wires by crimping extensions to the other end that goes into the speaker...instead of replacing the entire speaker wire.....that is most irritating
--> It only has a HDMI in port....so you cannot use it as a receiver and it will not decode the audio for you....you have to either use optical/digital cable or component cable for audio....
--> The first product i got turned out defective...it just stopped working the next day and my rented blu ray DVD from block buster got stuck inside.....but Amazon just replaced the whole system and even re-reimbursed me for the DVD cost that i have to pay block buster....Amazon is the best.....

-->

Well i bought this system on black friday in walmart and i got it for a decent price. To hook it up it took me around 30 to 40 minutes. It came with a cd that guided you throughly very well. All the cable connections are color coded making it easier for those who never had a theater system. Even though the system sounded good, i still expected more from a Sony brand. The level sound only goes up to 32, and sometimes i found myself at 25 because i couldn't hear right. The system was fairly fast, the menu interface similar to that of a ps3 and played really fast. The blu-rays look great and sounds the best out of all the other. You want a full experience out of this get an hdmi cable since it lacks one and the audio outputs because it also lacks that too. I ended up returning it because the connector to the ipod dock had a malfunction and it would not play the ipod. Overall this is a great system for those that never had one. But if you're looking for better sound and a better experience look toward the other brands such as Panasonic, Lg, and Samsung. =) hope this helped. I have the Panasonic SC-BT200 1000W 7.1 Channel Blu-ray. Look into that, it is cheaper and comes with cooler assets and better sound.

I received the system yesterday. It took only minutes to hook up and run through the easy setup. The system automagically balanced the sound based on my room and placement of the speakers. We were so impressed that we had to watch several movies just to hear it. It feels great, sounds clear and very balanced. The passive subwoofer puts out enough pow for us. The floor vibrates under our feet and I have it sitting in a cabinet. It's just right for our ears. Not overpowering. The night mode is great when one of us is watching while the other is asleep. I have several devices pumped through it, including a TiVo and XBox 360. Unless you are an audiophile and want to spend thousands, this system fits the bill perfectly. The S-Air wireless permitting rear and side surround (7.1) without wiring is great. You can also purchase wireless speakers to put elsewhere in your home for ~$80/each. I have no complaints. I'm very picky when it comes to how my movies sound and I am thrilled with my choice. Fantastic!

I bought this home theater for my boyfriend for Christmas and he loves it! I hooked the whole thing up within a couple of hours, and it only took that long because I had to run the wires under a rug and build speaker stands in the process. Overall, set up was very easy. The sound is great and I personally love that it has an adapter for my iPhone (in airplane mode). In and of itself, the system is a great upgrade from the poor sound quality of his flat screen Bravia TV. He was really surprised and delighted.

The only disappointment was that I didn't realize when it bought it that in order to use the S-Air function, you actually need TWO things - an S-Air receiver ($90)and an S-Air transmitter ($50). I initially thought only the transmitter was needed and bought it, but the receiver is also needed to connect to the rear speakers. Spending an additional $150 beyond the cost of the system wasn't an option for me, so I'm returning the transmitter. That is more my fault for not understanding, but Sony doesn't exactly do a great job communicating what all is needed either.

We purchased this system from Amazon and it arrived with no damage. I set up the system first in my "Desert Man Cave", just to try it out. Everything worked just fine. So when my wife was setting up all the decorations for Christmas, I went ahead and installed the system on our Sony 46 inch LCD. I had previously bought the S-Air wireless rear speakers, as my wife would not tolerate the wires running to the rear speakers...

I first started playing the cd/dvd for Christmas Music and was completely blown away. The sounds, to us anyway, were just terrific and crisp. We are not tech geeks, but rather just ordinary people. The whole system was very easy to set up and understand...

We watched our first Blu Ray Movie and I have to tell you that the sounds are just terrific and we did crank up the volume alot. Just amazing sounds out of this little system...

Still learning all the aspects of the remote, but only use that for the blu ray/dvd/cd systems. Have Direct tv and that remote turns on the whole system...

If you use the blu ray, then you have to manually switch the tv back to HDMI 1, and thats no big thing. We highly recommend this Sony Home Theater System...

Advanced Senior Citizens here...

Very happy with my purchase. It was easy to install - although the out of the box speaker cables are very short - especially if you're putting the unit in a entertainment center.

My gripes would include no current support for online services like Netflix - even though the box is capable of it; care of the fact it's BD Live capable (and higher end models supposedly do it) - and the other is the included 'iPod dock' - the TPM-20. You have to spend another $70-$100 to get the version approved for use with the iPhone - the TPM-50.

I'm not an A/V expert, nor have I ever claimed to be. I do however, have years of experience working with consumer electronics and enjoy learning and utilizing the newest technologies.

This was my first Blu-Ray or home theater system. For the price, I do not think you could possibly find a better set up. Again, I'm no expert, however the system sounds good and works well. I had fairly low expectations, I didn't expect rich sound or accurate surround quality, I am very pleased with this purchase. After weeks of research and flip flopping between other products, I couldn't be more pleased. This product, for it's category (low end, Blu-ray HTIB) is a solid 5 stars. I think in the entire world of Blu-ray and HTIB products, it would be closer to 4 stars, but that's putting the item in the running with products that cost many multipliers more.

The two biggest Pros and Cons of this system are the same item: set up. Physical set up was a snap. A trained (or untrained, like myself) monkey could set it up. Everything is color coded and very intuitive. Buy yourself a cheap optical audio cable so you can feed your TV/cable/satellite/game console sound back into the system. The part of the set up that I didn't like was the user menu. I am very comfortable with consumer electronics. I rarely read the manuals. The menus are so unintuitive that it's not even funny. Out of the box and set up, the system works good. In order to get it to work great, took some effort. A HUGE gripe of mine is that the default setting for the HDMI to TV is 480p, NOT 1080p. It took some serious digging in the manual and menus to change. There are also three separate places to change the sound setting. One of them is a simple button on the remote, one of them are two rather unexplained buttons on the remote and the other is a menu item only accessible via front panel display prompts that the user guide poorly explains how to access. Anyway, even if you are comfortable with these types of products, be prepared for a longer than usual learning curve.

On the good side, again, this system is great. The picture is fast with no issues of mosiacs, artifacts, etc. The sound is deep and rich. I, in my humble opinion, think it sounds just as good as any other, more expensive system, I've heard. Again, I'm no expert, but my ears love it. It interfaces well with my TV. The remote was easy to program and the two (even though different brands) work well together. My regular DVDs are upconverted to a more than acceptable level. As far total speaker power goes, I'm more than happy. I put in Lord of the Rings and during the loud action scenes, we got some serious rumbling that I'm sure my neighbors won't appreciate. It felt like we were actually in a movie theater.

Pros:
Easy physical set up
Great sound
Powerful sound
Quick loading time
Quality
Price
Easy calibration

Cons:
Poor menus
Short (but not unacceptable) speaker wire length
Out of box settings
Cannot connect to the internet for services like Netflix

All in all, I'd highly recommend this product for anyone looking for a reasonable home theater system. Be aware that the menus are a pain. I think for the money, you just can't do better. I think even for more money, a lot more, you'd be hard pressed. I'm more than satisfied with the entire set up. Now that I'm used to the menus, it's tolerable, although still rather confusing the way they did it.

It has all the features (Blu-Ray, DVD, CD, Radio, etc) and amazing sound with its 5.1 speakers for having in your house a very nice HD entertainment.

I purchased the BDVE300 through Amazon about 2 months ago after considering several other models and types of blu-ray players. What ultimately sold me on this model was the price, set up ease, functionality (i-pod/ internet hook-ups), and compatability w/ Sony Bravia TV.

I would agree with most of the other reviews that it is a good system for what it's supposed to do. If you're looking for an entry level blu-ray w/ surround sound capability I would certainly recommend this product.

I found the speaker length to be adequate and haven't experienced any issue's w/ playing regular DVD's or Blu-rays that some of the other reviewers have mentioned.