Todays blu ray players vs ps3 slim

tyrone burton

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I just wanted to know if there are any blu ray players that can beat the ps3 or is it still better, I'm asking this because I may or may not be missing out on better players.
 
Better in what way ?

When it was released the PS3 was and still is an Excellent Blu ray player , as good as the rest.

Because of the cell processor and its software it is also excellent at upscaling DVD's or SD content.

In terms of what else it can do ( file based playback and so on ) it has been beaten for a long time by the networking and file playback features of a lot of other players , its still relatively noisy as well compared to other players.

There is also the issue of no HD audio with 3D content , if 3D with HD audio is important to you.

But if you main concern is 2D BD playback and the noise doesnt bother you , there are no players out there that can beat it , and thats not going to change anytime soon.
 
no, not anymore, the PS3 slim can now do HD audio with 3D.

i disagree with the ps3 being 'excellent' at upscaling and DVD content, its quite average in that dept in my experience compared to other decks.

its a great unit for its price, but you can achieve better options now, but i do love the ps3, and hard to beat if you already have it, but if you want no compromise, look at oppo or other mid-high range decks
 
no, not anymore, the PS3 slim can now do HD audio with 3D.

So it can ! Since update 3.70 , I completely missed that one !
 
Few, the ps3 really doesn't have any faults then. One of you mentioned that the ps3s DVD upscaling wasn't that great, what's wrong with it?
 
i am afraid its hard to describe to someone unless you have seen it, its doing nothing wrong particularly, it just isnt doing it as well as some other units...lets put it this way, if you were someone who had a huge DVD library and wanted to focus on maximizing your playback of that, i suspect a ps3 wouldnt be on your list, whereas an oppo definitely would, the ps3 doesnt have a decent dvd upscaling engine imho, compared to the renowned oppo units.

however, if you are about 1080p blu ray playback, the margins are far less and if a ps3 fits the bill for you, you wont be short changed at all, criterion cant be wrong can they, when they choose it as their reference player - but i suspect that was because at one time, less so now - virtually everyone was running blu ray via ps3 and criterion probably wanted to be using kit which was broadly adopted.

dont get me wrong, until oppo the only unit i was extolling the virtues of, and used myself, was the ps3. its probably the best option if you have less than £400 to spend on a separate deck
 
Hmm, so ps3 is best at bd playback but ps3 is ok at DVD upscaling, sounds similar to the way the ps3 upscaled ps1 games it doesn't do it very well, infect making them worse even with the newly added updates
 
Few, the ps3 really doesn't have any faults then. One of you mentioned that the ps3s DVD upscaling wasn't that great, what's wrong with it?

There are Third party chipset manufacturers like Anchor Bay ( Oppo 83 and many others ) and Marvell ( Oppo 93/95 and many others ) as well as the proprietary chipsets available from most of the big manufacturers , like Panasonics Uniphier chipset and so on.

All of them do the job differently , the job being trying to add content to SD material that is not there.

As such , results are a matter of taste , there is no "Better" , only what you prefer.

The PS3 has an Edge adaptive routine run by a powerful processor that few standalones can match. Many prefer it over others on the market.

Theres nothing inherently wrong with it , as with all scalers , its just different , if you have been playing DVD's on it for any amount of time , moving to one of the others is likely to take some getting used to.

See the SD playback section from AVforums review here.
http://www.avforums.com/reviews/Sony-Playstation-3-Slim-Blu-ray-Disc-Player-Review_92/Review.html

Lastly, scaling. This is where the PS3 really makes an impression. The console's DVD playback software uses an edge-adaptive scaling process. This lends scaled SD video a very different appearance to the vast majority of DVD players and video processors, which are using non-adaptive (linear) resizing methods. These scalers essentially walk a fine line between over-emphasising certain details (causing aliasing and ringing), and not paying enough attention to them (causing things to look blurry). Edge-adaptive scaling essentially allows the best of both: edges are smoothed, and you can no longer see the remains of individual pixel edges to the same extent, but areas of detail remain present.

This process works wonders with synthetic content like hand-drawn art (see the above example). For photorealistic content, whether or not you like the look of it is really down to you. Ultimately, I felt that it gave things a slightly processed appearance, but this is probably just because I'm so used to most other scalers. And, let's face it – scaling a low-res source up to HD, regardless of how its done, won't really show you the film exactly the way it's supposed to look, anyway.
 
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Wow, thanks for the link andy, that link was quite surprising, apart from it having a problem with 1080i content the ps3 is quite a strong contender with both sd and hd, good to know I'm not missing out on much.
 
Since that review they have probably fixed the 1080i content thing.

They fixed the HD audio ( Which I might add they said was not possible at one time ) with 3D thing and I totally missed that one. The console is updating all the time , and it has the processing power and the resources to handle most things.
 
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It's usually only tv programmes on disc that that are only 1080i isn't it, well I'll be buying a series of doctor who soon on blu ray so I'll try it as soon as I get it, as you said it may have been fixed or will be fixed.
 
It's usually only tv programmes on disc that that are only 1080i isn't it, well I'll be buying a series of doctor who soon on blu ray so I'll try it as soon as I get it, as you said it may have been fixed or will be fixed.

Music concerts and some films are 1080i too. As are a lot of the extra's on titles that are otherwise 1080p. Using the PS3 with a Pioneer TV that didn't have HDMI I found even with the latest updates I couldn't play 1080i on my setup. Got to the point where it seemed to be affecting so many titles (especially British ones) I ended up buying a second TV and a standalone Blu-ray player for another room in the house so I could watch them.
 
I've just found a movie of mine on blu ray called season of the witch, which is also 1080i, suprising
 
AFAIK, firmware version 4.00 fixed the 1080i problems with the ps3.

I also like the scaling of the PS3, I find it excellent. I have tried an Oppo 93, but on my 40 inch screen, I didn't think it looked any better, just slightly different: both are excellent. Presumeably, on a bigger screen the Oppo would shine more (40 inches isn't big anymore!)

The following shows an interesting comparison between PS3 and standalone Sony blu-ray player upscaling. Although with real-world content the differences are not as obvious. I had a bdp-s380 and PS3 together for a while, I did prefer the PS3 . Obviously, others may have a different opinion. Try before you buy!!

I almost forget! I tried a Toshiba bdx1200 player for a while, and on my 40inch screen blu-ray looked the same. DVD upscaling, (again IMHO!), was definitely superior on the PS3.
 
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Wow, quite a substantial difference there. There seems to be more of the image being shown on the ps3 than the bd player too.
 
I couldn't be happier with mine. I also play a few games ;)
 
Yeah, so do I , nothing wrong with that I say. It's odd really because being that the ps3 is from Sony, you'd think that Sonys newer bd players would completely overtake ps3 as if to improve their technology. Maybe they know that theirs no need because a lot of people by a ps3 to merely watch movies ,and their updating it all the time anyway.
 
don't forget that for each setup, it will bring different levels of performance gain, the oppo can do source direct, so of you had a decent outboard VP, then that would likely tick your box more, same can be said for choice of colourspace output, the oppo you can decide, this could me important if something in your chain requires a certain output

also the dual output may be useful, if you wish to run vid and audio separately, and maybe also dont have a 3d AVR - you may also require certain audio formats that the ps3 doesnt do such as SACD and DVDA

you could summarise rather sweepingly, that the ps3 is superb in a small, standard domestic setup, and the oppo would lead with a pj or larger screen, in a more complex setup, where the wider range of options can be more beneficial, that then enables us, neatly to say rather than one being specifically better than the other, its more of a case of one being a shrewder purchase dependant on ones rig!
 
Well movies are created in ycbpbpr and the ps3 has that option, so that for me would be all that I use for both DVD and blu ray.
 
Wait a minute, sorry about that I didn't understand what you were talking about there, yes the oppo might have more hdmi inputs were as the ps3 only has one, and did you mean more Color options for a projector?
 
A couple of questions - first, if I am looking to play HD content (720p or 1080p) would the PS3 give as good PQ as Oppo, S790 etc. (allowing for nip and tuck differences)?
Second - how noisy is a PS3?
Thanks.
 

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