Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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76 of 76 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Player at a Great Price, December 30, 2008
First off, this IS the same player as the BDP-S350 however the remote included is a backlit remote that I believe is included with the BDP-S550 player. This BDP-BX1 also comes with a decent HDMI cable. Based on my research, Sony creates these different models at the request of the Big Box stores (BB, CC, etc...) to prevent shoppers from requesting they price match Costco, sam's Club, etc...
On to the Player:
This unit is profile 2.0 compliant. Blue ray discs load fairly quickly but the slight delay over standard DVD's takes a bit of getting used to. This is an inharent problem on any Blue-Ray player due to the sometimes heavy Java interface used for its menu structures. BD Live will require a USB memory stick to be inserted into the back of the player. I would suggest getting a 1 or 2 GB memory stick and just leave it there (not sure why Sony wouldn't include internal memory?). These memory devices are VERY economical at this point so this is no big deal. Be cautious when purchasing a memory stick though, many may not fit due to it's recession into the case a bit. I've read that the Kingstons work well.
Firmware updates are VERY easy; a "technologically challenged" person will have little or no problems updating the firmware if it becomes necessary.
I use the HDMI interface through my Denon 1909 receiver to my Pioneer plasma and the image quality is breathtaking; although this is expected from any Blue ray player. Standard DVD's play well and the image quality is as expected. It's upscaling ability matches my TV's upscaling abilities so no real improvement in video quality.
The audio quality is superb, though getting true HD audio (True Dolby Digital or DTS-HD) requires an easy change to the default menu setting (Select DD and DTS rather than bitstream if I recall correctly... just google it if having a problem); only do this if your reciever supports the HDMI HD Audio formats. DTS-HD in 7.1 (not too many movies in 7.1 but there are a few)is incredible and put a HUGE smile on my face to see my Denon reciever properly decode both HD-DD and DTS-HD. I notice only a small improvement from the HD audio (5.1) over the standard 5.1 audio and my system is a fairly good 7.1 audio system. The HD audio is NOT a reason to jump to Blue Ray but the image quality is.
The remote layout is acceptable and the backlit function is a nice feature. It lights up in a nice bright blue color rather than the typical boring greenish glow.
All in all I would highly recommend this player to anyone looking to jump into the Blue-Ray realm. If you have a nice TV that support at least 720P you will greatly appreciate Blue-Ray media. If you happen to have a reciever that supports the HD audio formats then you will find the HD audio to be the gravy.
With a good quality HD television, you will find that the upgrade to Blue-Ray from standard DVD is as large a jump as it was from VHS to DVD. Price points are finally making the Blue-Ray plunge a realistic jump for us mainstream folks rather than just the tech junkies.
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23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good unit for the price, December 29, 2008
I received this unit for Christmas from my wife. First thing I thought was she did not get the model I wanted. She is usually what I call electronically challenged. But I hooked it up to give it a try anyway. Easy set up, works well. Down load time is only about 30 seconds. Played and operated very well. Picture and sound was very nice. I am going to keep this unit. Works just fine at a good price. Oh and you get a HDMI cable as well. Over all a good unit and a good price. My wife did well.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Quality Blu-ray Player, March 9, 2009
I originally purchased a Memorex Blu Ray Player (MVBD-2510) since I figured all players were basically the same. Boy, was I wrong. The Memorex did an okay job of playing movies, but the startup time was MISERABLE and the menu system was extremely unresponsive and frustrating. Plus, the firmware update process was atrocious--I wasted seven CD-Rs trying to update it, before getting lucky and finding a way to get the player to accept the disc. Anyway, I finally cut my losses, sold the Memorex, and replaced the player with this one instead. What a difference.
This player boots up in the same amount of time as a typical DVD player--about five seconds from pressing eject to seeing the tray fully opened. It has a simple, intuitive menu system based on the PS3's XMB system. Discs load up fast--the speeds are almost as good as PS3, the undisputed king of fast loading times. Picture and sound quality is, of course, excellent--it's a Sony, you really should expect no less from the inventors of the Blu-ray format :) Really, there's nothing to complain about. Given the small price difference between the Memorex model and this one, I don't know why I waited this long to switch.
The only quibble I can think of is that you can't use a USB flash drive to update the firmware--you need to burn a CD-R. Not a big deal, especially since you can do it via the network if you can run Ethernet from your router/modem to the Blu-ray player, or don't mind spending a few extra bucks for a wireless router in your entertainment center.
Anyway, this is apparently the same thing as a Sony BDP-S350 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player except for slightly less fancy audio decoding, and a backlit remote. I wouldn't sweat the audio decoding thing--if you have a sound system good enough to hear the difference, you'll be able to decode the HD formats in the receiver itself. And the backlit remote is cool. So buy either one and enjoy it. Or, go the extra mile and get a PlayStation 3 80GB if money is no object.
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