New DVD - Should I wait for HD?

[jinjer]

Hi Guys,

This is my first post to this forum - so be gentle!

I have just bought the new Panasonic TH42PX60 (arrives next Tuesday)

I currently have an AV solution, but it's a little old.

My current DVD player is the Marantz DV3100 (must be about 3-4 years old now).

I have 4 questions for y'all...

1. What player would complement this, seamingly, astonishing display? Price bands would be helpful.
2. Should I just buy a player for around £100 to 'tide me over' with an eye on spending 'proper' money on an HD player when they're available? Current player doesn't even have progressive scan.
3. I have seen players that profess to have an HDMI output. Given that I only have non-HD DVDs at the moment is there any benefit to this?
4. What is the connector of choice for DVD -> plasma?

Many thanks in advance,

Chris

[KraGorn]

IMHO it's way too early to buy an HD player, there are still too many unknowns, not least which (if either) format will 'win' .. ultimately I expect dual-format machines will be the way to go, I don't know any of those have been announced yet.

[kjt2004]

I agree its too early to determine which will win the battle and id rather wait until it all sorts itself out

1) Obvious choices are
Toshiba SD350E, Philips DV5900, Samsung 850/950 All around £100 or less
Oppo971, Denon £200 or less and a few others i cant remember

2) Dont forget The display itself is progressive so there is an argument that the player doesnt need to be, you may find that youre player at the moment does a good job, try it and see(must have at least Component output though i would say

3)Connections in order of preference are
Digital(HDMI/DVI) - remember DVI doesnt pass audio
Component
RGB scart

And on a final note of those players mentioned all have theyre faults some more than others and some are better depending on type of connection.

ie
Oppo - excellent with DVI output


regards

[avjon]

I personally would wait for HD/Blray to become established to see what format wins out - dual format culd be the way eventually, look at universal dvd players for multichannel sound (sacd/dvda) for example. If you are thinking of spending a significant amount of money thten wait and see what happens over the next 6 months - Christmas is not that far away!

[sjackson]

it's been a question I have been debating for a while.

Chances are that the HD dvd player family may not play SD DVD's as good as a good SD dvd player would, so I'm taking the plunge and buying a good SD DVD player now.

I have over 100 DVD's that I'm not going to go and pay £20 each to get on HD DVD/Blue Ray. Between now and whenever I actually buy a HD DVD/Blue Ray, I'll probibly have about another 20/30 SD DVD's that I'll want to watch over and over again.

For me, right now there is no contest. Going to wait a year, maybe two, see what format wins the battle, by then the HD DVD/Blue Ray titles will be cheaper, and make a decision.

[jinjer]

So, a player with HDMI output would be preferable it seems.

Now, what's all this stuff about upscaling I keep hearing about?

[KraGorn]

Upscaling is the process by which standard defintion (SD) material is resized ('scaled') to high defintion (HD) resolution.

SD PAL is 720x576 while HD is 1280x720 or 1920x1080.

This is performed by a 'scaler' which, put simply, creates pixels out of thin air to fill in the gaps .. in other words it tries to guess the colour of the pixels needed to expand the resolution, and how well or poorly it does that determine the quality of the final result.

Note that this is of course not creating a true HD image since the SD source has fewer pixels, it is therefore an artifically larger imager with no extra picture information, unlike a true HD source which has a full 1280x720 iamge size.

Why is it necessary? Because digital displays like LCD TVs, plasmas, DLP projectors etc. had a fixed-resolution panel and in order to display a full-size image therefore any input oimage has to be scaled to fit. All such displays have a built-in scaler to do this, however their quality as compared to the scaler in an 'upscaling' DVD player may be inferior so a caling player will give you a better image .. alternatively a decdicated scaler often will do even better.

Note, HDMI is not required for HD resolution per se, which can be obtained via the older DVI interface and even Component, though there are licensing restrictions that means you don't often get a player capable of upscaling to analog.

[Turb007]

Originally Posted by sjackson

I have over 100 DVD's that I'm not going to go and pay £20 each to get on HD DVD/Blue Ray. Between now and whenever I actually buy a HD DVD/Blue Ray, I'll probibly have about another 20/30 SD DVD's that I'll want to watch over and over again

I second that ..I was an early adopter of DVD when it first came out and spent well into the thousands building a collection of 200 + dvd's that I could'nt get tuppence hapepenny for now on ebay.

I will be HD when i get either a dual format player or one format wins and I can get 3 for £20 at the likes of virgin / HMV

hence why i'm in the market for a pioneer 989 upwards

[Italo Tettoni]

Originally Posted by jinjer

Hi Guys,

This is my first post to this forum - so be gentle!

I have just bought the new Panasonic TH42PX60 (arrives next Tuesday)

I currently have an AV solution, but it's a little old.

My current DVD player is the Marantz DV3100 (must be about 3-4 years old now).

I have 4 questions for y'all...

1. What player would complement this, seamingly, astonishing display? Price bands would be helpful.
2. Should I just buy a player for around £100 to 'tide me over' with an eye on spending 'proper' money on an HD player when they're available? Current player doesn't even have progressive scan.
3. I have seen players that profess to have an HDMI output. Given that I only have non-HD DVDs at the moment is there any benefit to this?
4. What is the connector of choice for DVD -> plasma?

Many thanks in advance,

Chris

1. At the mid level price range the most affordable and best engineered DVD player is the Marantz DV6600. DVD-A/SACD and an HDMI connection that actually 'is' better than Component.

2. Why are you even considering HD-DVD/Blue Ray? Have you heard/read about the draconians copyright restrictions being imposed on both the hardware/software side? Read on and educate yourself:

http://www.blu-raydisc.com/top/About...cle-14856.html

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/..._hdcp_support/

http://www.ps3today.com/Blogs/News/hqs/blr_261.aspx

http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/12349

http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/21/f...allow-copying/

3. Yes of course, it is the best possible connection. No degradation or conversion of the signal and you can use the player's upsampling to match your set's pixel matrix.

4. Depends on the DVD player and Plasma set. The theoretical best is HDMI.

[ash005]

i got my first dvd player about 9 or 10 years ago now

a us toshiba sd 3107 cost £700ish (no uk dvd players around at that time)

i remeber all the dvd format war back then

sony has so far lost out with betamax and also lost out with their mmcd thing



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvd


third time lucky for sony?


ash.

[pwood]

Wait and see how your old player looks with your new set. As for upscaling HDMI
players avoid the cheap £100 models as most have to many issues.
Just because a player has HDMI does not automatically make it better.
Sony have a new model due out to replace the ns92v which may be a good one to check out.

This discussion interests me too.

I have just bought a Pioneer 436XDE and was considering upgrading my 5 yr old DVD player at the same time; an Alba 103 multi-region, which I bought for approx. £120. It only has 2 scart connectors and these connectors are a bit faulty now, I think.

I don't want to spend a fortune on a new DVD player if I'll need to replace it within a year or two but if the HD war rages for a little while longer, I might be willing to part with up to £500 for one now.

Which DVD player (needs to be multi-region, as I have many region 1+3 discs) would you guys recommend, to compliment the Pioneer!

Many Thanks for your help, guys!

have just read a thread about the Pioneer 575. Does anyone know it? I have looked online (keeping in mind my muti-region requirements) and I found this:

http://www.hyperfi.co.uk/default.asp...V-575A_Ex_Demo

What do you think?

[Phill1978]

isnt there a bigger key benenfit to HDMI in that it remains digital all the way to the source (which in tern is still digital) so no conversion proccess to lose image clarity ?
a dvd via scart/component will convert to analogue then travel down a lossy cable and then into a lossy interface at display then needed to be coded back asa digital interpretation the analogue signal. three/four steps of image degredation avoided by using HDMI and with upscaling removes the need for the panle to step out of its native res.

try running a 1024 x 768 LCD Monitor at 800 x 600 and no matter if dvi or vga it looks badly blured.

if i were you id buy a upscaling 720p/1080i dvd with HDMI at £120-150, providing the player has a good transport you shouldnt lose hardly any data if any as its all digital.

[KraGorn]

In theory yes, digital is better than analog but there are many factors which conspire to make it not always so, or a Component feed is such high quality as to be near enough indistinguishable, especially as the size of the display reduces since pixel imperfections become less apparent.

Also, per se, scaling doesn't need a digital interface, though due to DRM cr@p and license restrictions it often has to use it in practice.