Best BluRay Offers
Written: Mar 12 '07 (Updated Mar 12 '07)
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Pros: Relatively fast load times, 7 channel analog, good upconversion
Cons: No DTS-Master Audio, no bass management, lacks 1080/24p support, no SACD support, expensive
The Bottom Line: If you need 7.1 analog output this is the player for you.
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| simplemoney's Full Review: Panasonic DMP-BD10 Blu-Ray Player |
When you have an 1080p projector (see review here ) you want as many 1080p sources as you can get. Television can provide some nice 1080i sources, but I'm still amazed at how little high-def content is on television - unless you want to watch Discovery HD 24 hours a day. So I decided to get a high-def player and I chose the Panasonic BD10 (note to the HD-DVD fans: Don't get mad at me for choosing BluRay, because my HD-DVD XA2 review is coming!).
Why the Panasonic BD10
Pioneer offers an excellent BluRay player under their Elite series, and Sony's $999 BDP-S1 is also a nice player. Then there's the $499 PS3 option. Each of these products would make for an EXCELLENT choice in the BluRay format, but only three months ago I upgraded my wonderful NAD T753 Read Review with the NAD 773. The NAD 773 gave me full 7 channel sound, but NAD is a conservative company and until HDMI gets all the kinks worked out there is no HDMI support. That eliminates ALL the other BluRay players because none of them offer more than a set of 5.1 analog outputs, where as the Panasonic BD10 offers a complete set of 7.1 analog outputs.
I wish I could say my choice was more complicated than that, but it wasn't. You can now find the Panasonic for under a $1,000. I got mine at the Critical Listener - and they double box it for shipping.
Setup
If you're using HDMI only, it couldn't be easier to setup the BD10. All the setting defaults are set for HDMI output, so simply plug the BD10 into your A/V receiver with an HDMI cable and you're ready to go. Sadly they do not supply a HDMI cable, so make sure you have one.
My setup was a bit more complicated, but the BD10 has an excellent and simple to use menu system. Finding the menu system requires you open the remotes top flip cover - which took me a suprisingly long time to figure out. Once in the setup menu just set Audio output for HDMI to off.
Universal Player ???
The Panasonic BD10 is almost a universal player - but lack of SACD support is its only missing attribute. Since I own zero SACD's, it's not a big deal to me, but I would have liked SACD support if only to listen to Pink Floyd's DSOTM on SACD - which is sadly not available on DVD-Audio. And the BD10 does play DVD-Audio, but if you use the optical or coaxial audio output you will only get 2 channel stereo downconverted from the DVD-A disc. To get multi-channel audio fromd DVD-A you must use either the HDMI ouput or the analog outputs. Do not confuse DVD-A with movie DVD's - because this unit will definitely send full 5.1 audio via the optical and coaxial outputs.
I watched Eight Below (which comes in the box) and the video quality was very good - not pristine. There were some artifacts in the blue sky and a little bit of white crush. According to one website Eight Below was rated five stars for picture quality, so I was disappointed in the BluRay format. Then I got Corpse Bride and Stranger Than Fiction on BluRay and my anxiety disappeared. The picture quality was nothing short of fantastic - with just a bit of jitter.
Jitter - what's that?
Unfortunately the Panasonic is missing something I dearly wanted - 1080/24p output. Since every movie is encoded in 1080/24p you'd think every player would output 1080/24p. Sadly very few do (the Pioneer Elite does). The Panasonic does output 1080/60p - but to get to 60p you need to triple the frame output (24 x 3 = 72) and then drop a frame on every 3rd sequence. This is often called 3:2 pulldown - and by doing so you may see a jitter effect during scenes that pan a landscape or the top of a city(read: not smooth). The Panasonic BD10 exhibits a slight jitter effect - but most people won't notice it.
Unfortunately I'm one of those people who do notice it, and I also have a projector capable of receiving a 1080/24p source - so the ommission of this option in a $1000 player is a little annoying.
Audio Quality
Uncompressed audio via the analog outputs is fantastic, but you are going to need a powerful amplifier because the output via analog is significantly lower than via optical (about 12 db lower - and that's A LOT). The Panasonic will internally decode pretty much anything, except for DTS-HD, Dolby Plus and DTS-Master Audio. The good news is Panasonic has promised a firmware update in April that will give us everything BUT DTS-Master Audio (Fox's Planet of the Apes is a soundtrack with DTS-Master Audio but does not have an uncompressed audio track - reducing my current option to plain-old DTS).
Some owners have been confused thinking the DTS-HD is Master Audio, but it is not. Don't buy this player assuming you're getting DTS-Master Audio support in the future - it's not going to happen.
The BD10 has no bass management for CD audio. So if you play a CD and have a subwoofer, the subwoofer won't be used. To fix this, connect an optical/coaxial cable to your A/V receiver from the BD10's optical/coaxial output, and then switch to that output when listening to CD's.
Conclusion
I wish all movies had uncompressed soundtracks - Crank's 6.1 soundtrack was incredible (the BD10 split the audio signal into two mono rear channels for 7.1 use) - and with more 6.1 and 7.1 movies on the way I'm happy I got a player with 7.1 outputs.
But if you don't need 7.1 (or have an HDMI equipped A/V receiver) I'd go with the Pioneer Elite player, due to its 1080/24p and 1080/60p output capabilities. It will have you covered in the future in case you get a new LCD or Plasma with 1080/24p support.
I'm not trading my Panasonic in yet - but it's not the perfect player.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 925
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