Arcam DV79 or Oppo??

[gcparris]

Hi all, I am just about to buy a new Hi-Def plasma. I currently have an Arcam DV88 with component and RGB outputs but NOT progressive scan or HDMI output.
I was thinking of complementing the Hi-Def plasma with a decent DVD player, more specifically I was thinking of upgrading to the Arcam DV79 as it has HDMI output.

After reading a few threads in this section I heard about the Oppo hi-def DVD player supporting 720 and 1080 output resolutions. The Arcam only supports 480 and 576 by the looks of it.

My question is: instead of me spending £999 to get the DV79 would I be better off (video/picture wise) getting a hi-def scaling DVD player like the Oppo (or something else??) and keeping the Arcam DV88 for CD's?

Thanks,
Gareth.

[John Dawson]

Whilst I can hardly give you unbiased advice (!) I can comment that putting a scaler inside a DVD player does not mean it will give you a better picture than allowing the display to do all the scaling in one operation. Unless the player scales directly to the native pixel rate of the display in both H and V directions (typically 1368 or 1024 x 768 for an HD ready plasma) then the display's scaling will also be operative and you will get concatanated (or stacked) scalers. This is generally not a good thing.

Even if the DVD can scale to the exact resolution required there is no guarantee that it will outperform the display's scaler. I would expect this to be especially true of lower cost DVD players where the budget for such luxuries is likely to be limited.

Hope this helps!

John Dawson (Arcam)

[gandley]

Pioneer 989avi. No more chroma issues, passes interlaced via HDMI "DIRECT", plays SACD if you need it (doubtfull but you never know) and it costs £799 inc free QED HDMI cable.
Also dosent use the faroudja chipset so no MBE issues.

It has had quite a few nice updates over the 868i. Theres no need to pay more than £799 this late in the game. (think denon 3910 can be had for the same price as well)

DV79 is nice, but is silly money (unless you can get a used one)

[PJTX100]

I'd see what your DV88 looks like before parting with any cash...PJ

[wolfgang]

I suspect when comparing video using a good plasma screen both the Arcam and Oppo will appear virtually the same to you. If you do notice some differences it will be only when playing music CDs via quality loudspeakers/amp/receiver set up which I am sure you already have since you are considering players like this.

[Nic Rhodes]

The 79 is the best sub £1k player I have found.

[multiply]

Nice review of the Oppo:
http://www.dvdanswers.com/index.php?...c=18&n=1&burl=

(Well done, Dave!)

Gary

[Jack the lad]

I have had a Denon 3910, Pioneer 868 and now am the very proud owner of a Arcam DV79. I am absolutely gobsmacked by the Arcams performence

I only wished I'd listens to John Dawson's advice a year ago

[LFC4ever]

I have two DVD 88 plus's and also just got the Oppo. I connected the Oppo to a Loewe A32 this afternoon and also have the 88 connected via component.I can't get the Oppo to display at anything above 480 ( Loewe just goes blank ) so have put a call in to the Loewe helpdesk. I would say that given the limited viewing so far the Oppo even at this resolution is marginally better than ( my 18 month old) 88, but I'd be prepared to bet it's not as good as the 79.......whether the price justifies this I don't know !
Audio from DVD is pretty good on the Oppo but I've not tried it onCD as I use a seperate entry level naim system.Have to say I love the Arcam though !

[gcparris]

Thanks all for the advice, ideally I would like to get the Arcam DV88 modded to Progressive Scan or even SDI if it was possible but I don't think this is possible any more due to it's age.

I am going to see how the DVD 88 performs first anyway via component.

Anyone know if the Arcam component(3RCA) or RGB(SCART) output would be better into the plasma DSub(Component) input?

[Nic Rhodes]

SDI is possible I think, PJ Hifi will tell you, they are very good at Arcams. I saw one of their mods the other day, best I have ever seen, really classy mod.

[scouse258]

my kit is as shown below - i have upgraded from an 88+ to a 79 and..... cant tell the difference on either my plasma or projector

i had an denon AX1 before this and again - not much difference (other than it took the ax1 ages to read the disc)

i dunno - perhaps the simple answer is to match equipment better - which i may not have done

i have a scaler and dont see much difference there either if i am perfectly honest so i may get a infocus 7210 to see if that helps

i hope HDTV will improve my life - but i wonder!