Blu-ray recommendation needed

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scottydl

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I'm in the market for a decent Blu-ray player, and once again I turn to my RV brethren (and sistren) for any recommendations on this somewhat-RV-related purchase... even though the player will be in the stick house.  :)

I was drawn toward Insignia (Best Buy's store brand) because they are so cheap, but reviews are sketchy enough that I'm leaning back toward a more established brand.  Samsung, Vizio, Sony, and LG are a few I've researched... but every brand has 7-8 current models at any given time, so the options get a mite overwhelming.

My budget is $70 or less, and luckily there are a many players out there for that price if you shop the right online stores.  I don't mind refurbished or even pre-owned (fancy word for used) as long as it's a well-reviewed brand/model.  Wifi I don't need, but won't turn down.  Same with 3D.  I don't have a 3D HDTV right now, so it wouldn't matter on the player until we buy our next TV.

Anything jump to mind that you own or owned?
 
I was going to suggest a PS3 until I saw the 70$ price range.

One feature I'd recommend though is a USB or memory card reader. It's nice if you want to play media you have on your PC like music, photos or movies.
 
I have read a lot of bad reviews on Insignia (bestBuy) brand products. I own there Blu-ray player that will let you stream Netflix and others and same brand TV. Yes the Blu-ray was hard to get connected to wifi. But once i figured it out no problems. TV has been great.
They are a good value and BestBuy will stand behind them.
Can't go wrong with Vizio as well. I own a 52" LCD and the picture was comparable to Sony and Samsung.
 
I have three Blu ray players. A Philips surround sound unit with a BR player that plays through my 46 inch in the bedroom. I have a PS3 in the living room running through a surround sound unit and viewed on my 32 inch TV and I have a Blu ray player in my 18.4 inch laptop. And I have not noticed any real difference between the three, they are all outstanding players.

How much do you know about Blu ray? I am sorry if any of this is redundant. I am severely disappointed with Blu ray, and I am obviously a video junkie. First of unless you have a 40 inch screen or larger the increased video quality will not be noticed. On my 32" and 18" you really can't tell the difference between Blu ray and an upscaled DVD. On the 46" you can see a difference on some of the discs but not all. And the difference is just not that outstanding. This is because almost every TV under 40" is 720. You have to get over 40" to get 1080.

But my biggest complaint is the discs. They are about $10 more expensive than a normal DVD but I rarely think the $10 was worth the money. This is because we have the same thing going on as we did when CDs first appeared in the early 80s. The companies that produce the Blu rays are not all that committed to producing the finest quality video that they can give you. For example I bought a 5 disc box set of the Dirty Harry movies. They were all dubbed from very lousy prints of each movie. A DVD made from a great print would have been worlds better than a BR made from a lousy print.

So the source material is very important and what they do to it. I have a copy of the Beatles Help DVD, since it is not on Blu ray. There is a bonus material feature on how they restored Help which is amazing. Basically removing every speck of dust and correcting the white balance for the whole movie. It took weeks and cost a fortune. Once you see this documentary you will understand why most of the older BR look like crap. The companies just don't want to spend the money to clean up the old prints. Somehow they think that someone who buys a BR player and discs just won't notice that a movie is made from a crappy print.

And then you have a problem with the resolution of older movies. Most of them were shot with slow film. This means the darker scenes are grainy. Because of the extra resolution of a BR means you get extra resolution of the grain.

Another problem is availability. Amazon has about a half a million DVDs for sale and about 16,000 BRs. In other words very few movie are available on BR.

I have about 150 BR discs in my collection now. I bought very few new BRs. I found that buying them used on Amazon is a whole lot cheaper. Almost every used disc I bought was is perfect playing condition.

Since you are on a budget I would recommend an upscaling DVD. Especially if your TV is under 40 inches.
 
Marc L said:
I was going to suggest a PS3 until I saw the 70$ price range.

I could go $100, I guess $70 is optimistic.  But then again, I've seen some refurbs go for $50 also.  A PS3 (one of the earlier generations that is backwards compatible to play PS2 games) was originally my first choice, but I can't seem to find them under $200 lately.  Gonna have to wait on that one, and just wanted something to "stand in" for awhile... that's what led me to the cheap Insignia models, but I've decided I at least want something that's rated a little more positively.

seilerbird said:
Since you are on a budget I would recommend an upscaling DVD. Especially if your TV is under 40 inches.

Great insight and I appreciate it!  Our biggest HDTV is a 37" Vizio LCD.  In fact, I have an upscaling DVD player now (a super cheap Philips) that's about 2 years old and having issues reading discs lately... so I figured it was time for replacement, and since many BR players have come down in price I'd make the "upgrade" for future use if nothing else.  I don't have any plans in the near future to convert my entire movie/TV collection of DVD's (maybe 150 titles?) to Blu-ray, as I've been perfectly happy with upscaled quality and the BR price difference isn't worth it to me.  Maybe another upscaler at ~$40 is a better option for now.
 
Well Tom, you convinced me (congrats ;)) ... I've been shopping for a good deal on a Blu-ray player for a couple months now, only to realize I don't really need or want one right now.

After some surfing and searching the last hour or so, I found and bought a refurbished Toshiba upscaling player from the Best Buy Outlet Store website for $27.99.  Free shipping too.  8)
 
Very good Scotty - I am glad I could help. I am very depressed about the BR problems. A lot of the problems stem from the fact that after BR was announced Toshiba decided to put out a competing format. That was about as stupid as it gets and it set back the high def video movement about ten years. If BR could have gotten started without HD it would have had a much better market share right now and a lot more discs would be available. There were no upscaling DVD players back then so there was quite a difference between BR and DVDs. But the upscaling DVD players have almost made BR obsolete. You will be surprised when you see how good an upscaled modern movie will look in your player. Most of the time I am watching a movie I cannot tell you just by looking at the screen whether it is a BR or a DVD. Please post your opinion after you have watched a few movies.
 
I've had a cheap Philips upscaling player for about 2 years (and have been very pleased with it), but it's starting to give out now and I was under the false impression that I needed to replace it with a Blu-ray.  I realize now that really isn't the case, so I'm sure that this new-to-me Toshiba upscaling model will work out fine for a couple more years.  Then we'll see where the Blu-ray market is at.
 
To me, physical media is out the window.  I don't collect movies, once I watched it once, I'm done.  So when I want to watch a movie, I grab the remote or mouse, never the car keys.  Between pay-per-view and other online services that are either the same price or cheaper than renting at the video store, I don't know why I'd want to drive to a video store to rent a movie and back to return it.

I'd probably think differently if I was a collector.
 
I agree with Marc, physical media is out the window. I don't own any records, tapes, CDs, magazines or video tapes. I don't have a satellite dish and downloading movies over the Internet is not possible on a 5 gig air card. Video store rentals are too expensive and there aren't enough Red Boxes to make it convenient for me.

So my master plan is to collect (yes I am a collector) my 200 most favorite movies of all time and my 100 most favorite concerts of all time and the when I finally have the collection complete I will rip them all the to three external 3 terabyte hard drives and then store the originals at a relatives house. The cases for my DVD collection takes up way too much room.

If I watch ten movies I will hate one so much I won't get past the first 15 minutes. 8 of them I will enjoy. And one of them I will enjoy so much I will want to see it again. So that is the one that gets added into my collection. Since I don't have a dish, TV reception is usually lousy and renting isn't an option, this gives me a massive library for me to watch.
 
I recently bought a Samsung Blue Ray player ($88)  for the 32" LCD that I am planning on putting in the coach. I returned it for 2 reasons.
1. It did not have a button on the remote to open and close the DVD tray. I had to push the button on the unit to open and close the tray. If you are  mounting it either higher or lower in a cabinet or on a shelf it can be awkward stooping low or reaching high to grasp the unit and push the button.
2. The picture was not all that great. I have since been informed that to get the full effects of the Blue Ray player you should have a HDMI cable.
 
Yep, an HDMI cable is a requirement for Blu ray. But don't go to Walmart to get them. I got two 6 foot HDMI cables off of Amazon for $5 including shipping. Works great. At Walmart they start at $20 apiece. And there is nothing special about them, it is just a wire and two connectors.
 
Sony player with BR and WIFI at CostCo is about $109 and CostCo doubles the warranty on electronics.  You can try it and if you don't like it, return it, no questions.

The streaming options are growing daily.  If you use Amazon and have the prime shipping option, they offer tons of free streaming movies.
 
I'm a bit of a collector - I like to browse the $5 selections at Walmart.  Hint - the titles in the paw-through bin are about the same as the ones in the $5 section of the conventional display.  I'll buy if there's something that looks interesting.

Pay attention to Black Friday sales.  Two years ago I was in CA and decided to brave the early morning crowds at the local Fry's because they were having a deal on a radio I wanted for my car.  I was also looking for a DVD player for the motorhome, not really considering Blu Ray since at that time they were selling for around $300.  It was bedlam, but I got the radio and also an LG Blu-Ray player with upscaling DVD and Internet streaming (which I haven't been able to use yet since I rely on wireless) for $86.

I can see the difference between Blu-Ray and an upscaled DVD, but I have a video background and know what to look for.  Like Seilerbird said, older movies are more dependent on the quality of the print being transferred.  But new releases look spectacular.  There's a distinct difference in the look of Avatar on DVD and Blu Ray, for example.  Star Trek is also spectacular on Blu Ray.  But for the most part, either format is OK for the majority of releases.
 
I can see the difference between a high quality BR and a DVD since I have a video background also. In 1990 I had an SVHS system. The camcorder had quality that was way better than standard VHS, but there never were any commercial releases on SVHS so it died. I just don't feel like it is as exciting a difference as the advertising would lead you to believe. The difference is subtle, not mind blowing like the ads tell us. The that difference is only found on newer movies. Most all of the older movies don't look so good unless they have spent the money to restore them.

I just bought Windtalkers this morning on Blu ray and I am not impressed by the video quality at all. No better than a standard non upscaled DVD. But the audio is stunning.
 
I haven't had pay TV for years, and mostly watch movies and TV shows we already own.  That's fine with me too, as "new" movies rarely do much to impress and I never go to the theater... too much money in someone else's "house" when I'd rather be in my own living room relaxing with my wife.  The occasional $1-2 rental is how we catch up on movies that we want to see, especially considering they are released 3 months after the theater nowadays and they hit the budget shelf after 6 months.  Works for me!

For cables, I highly recommend www.monoprice.com - great prices and quality.  HDMI cables are around $1/foot there, and quite possibly less now.  I haven't bought one in a year or so.
 
I like exploring old movie theaters - if I find a small town with an old movie palace I'll take in a show just to check out the theater.  I've found some real gems that way, like the Palace Theater in Silverton, OR I ran across last month.  An immaculately restored 1930s vintage theater that shows first run films on a bright, sharp screen with first rate sound and acoustics.  And then there's Stu the owner as an added attraction - a quiet, polite individual who happens to be a 60-something balding transexual and a perfect lady in her low cut dress and ruby red heels.

In fact, Silverton itself is worth a stop if you're passing through on I-5.  It's one of the "10 best small towns" with a downtown section full of art shops and restauraunts about 15 miles east of Salem.  The Silver Spur RV park is great.  Friendly staff, wide spaces and good wi-fi in a quiet setting on the outskirts of town.  $36 per night, or $18 per night Passport America.
 
Lou Schneider said:
  And then there's Stu the owner as an added attraction - a quiet, polite individual who happens to be a 60-something balding transexual and a perfect lady in her low cut dress and ruby red heels.

So did you hit on her Lou? ;D
 

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