Blu ray player advice

[lucid]

The question is, should that shadow detail be shown, or have they fudged the gamma to give a subjectively 'better' picture, but not actually showing things how it was intended?

That depends on the display and the rest of any items in the signal chain that have an influence on picture.

I'm sure there are players that have profiles, even ones that set them as default that boost sharpness, contrast, colour etc. Doesn't mean that's how it's supposed to be shown.

Well no-one should be using artificial sharpening; and that's not what I'm referring to when I talk about detail.

The point of calibration is to assess what the entire video chain is doing, and how that is affecting the picture. Then it's a question of adjusting the available controls to get the optimum picture quality. That's a very different situation from just "more".

The correct setting for most players and in fact most displays is disabling all the extra processing.

In the absence of some good diagnostic tools then yes, it's a safer bet. It does tend to apply more to displays though than source devices.

 

[lucid]

So on that basis how good/bad is the PS3?

I'd say it's on par with standalone players in the £100-£150 range.

 

[Bigpig]

I found the ps3 an awful player tbh. Noise/control/speed Picture was good but you just cant beat a good stand alone.

 

[psalliss]

I found the ps3 an awful player tbh. Noise/control/speed Picture was good but you just cant beat a good stand alone.

I wouldn't say its aweful but I'm with you on the noise and control element but that said I've got my working via my harmony remote so not too bad

 

[V F]

What I've found to be really bad is when it comes to DVD upscaling. There's lots of wringing, the worst DVD I've seen so far on the PS3 is Big Trouble in Little China. The wringing on the actors/letterbox is nasty. Yet DVD upscales lovely on the Panasonic 330 player.

Setting the upscaling to off the PS3 looks like Youtube stuff from 2002/3. I personally felt either off or on isn't acceptable. It's either so soft and blurry or it's terribly sharp.

 

[MagicBoy]

I use the PS3 for Blu-ray only. Still using a dedicated DVD player as it's multiregion.

 

[psalliss]

Thanks for all the information. I think I will probably get a standalone player and been offered a oppo bdp-93 for £250 which has really good reviews. Has anyone got any experience of them?

 

[mark2410]

for digital only outputs the ps3 should be identical to players no matter how expensive.

where it may fall behind the best players is if your using any analogue outputs (does it even have any?) or if your trying to do anything fancy, like upscaling dvds, stretching the picture etc etc.

 

[lucid]

Thanks for all the information. I think I will probably get a standalone player and been offered a oppo bdp-93 for £250 which has really good reviews. Has anyone got any experience of them?

Oppos are cracking machines. Built like tanks and the company really knows what it's doing when it comes to digital circuitry.

 

[psalliss]

Thanks have read quite a few reviews that are very positive. What do you think of the price is it about right?

 

[lucid]

Price depends on the spec for multi-zone Blu-ray. All Oppo BD players should be multi-region for DVD as standard (note DVD and not Blu-ray). So the 93 should be able to play Region 1 (U.S.) discs as well as Region 2 (U.K.) discs.

As standard, UK machines are Zone B for Blu-ray (UK/Europe). 93s could be be purchased modded for multi-zone Blu-ray. Zone 1 is U.S. Zone 2 is UK/Europe. That may or may not interest you, but it does affect the price.

£250 is about in the middle for pricing. It's upper end for a Zone 2 machine and it's cheap-ish for a BD multi-zone machine.

 

[lucid]

for digital only outputs the ps3 should be identical to players no matter how expensive.

....except it's not. Have a read through the rest of the thread.

where it may fall behind the best players is if your using any analogue outputs (does it even have any?) ...

With the right adapter cable there's component video out; but why bother when HDCP will block any restricted Blu-rays playing at anything better than 480p/576p.... which makes it pretty much useless and a HD Blu-ray player

...or if your trying to do anything fancy, like upscaling dvds, stretching the picture etc etc.

There's plenty of budget Blu-ray players that do just fine upscaling DVD. They don't have the PS3's advantage of an enormous graphics processor either. As for stretching the picture, well if someone wants to mess up the aspect ratio then TVs and projectors can do that just fine

PS3 used to be a bargain when the cheapest standalone BD player was £500. It was still a bargain as prices fell to £300 because you got the additional streaming and gaming facilities. But streaming/scaling BD players aren't £300 any more; they're starting at £50. At £100-£150 there are players that give the PS3 some serious competition in picture terms. They use a standard remote control too rather than the gaming handset or some add-on Bluetooth remote.

The cheaper super slim has helped extend the appeal, but really the PS3 has had its day as far as a no-brainer recommendation for playing Blu-rays. That's life.

 

[psalliss]

The oppo isn't multi for blu ray but to be honest I don't ever play region 1 blu rays so not an issue really and although have quite a few DVDs I rarely if ever play them and just use blu rays on rental now. Sod it may just get the oppo as I dare say even if I don't think it's any better won't lose much if anything if I re sold it

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Just to add.
I've tried half a dozen players at home including my own PS3. Other brands include Panasonic, Sony, Pioneer, Samsung and Oppo.
I did think that there were minor differences in say visual "appearance". For example, I thought the Sony 760 I tried was a little "brighter".
For all of that, in each case, I found that playing around with the settings on my projector tended to result in an image that was to me indistinguishable.

Suggests to me that there's a degree of "loudness wars" being applied by certain manufacturers to create the best impression in comparitive testing.
I can't say I genuinely thought that there was a significant benefit to picture quality of any over other BD players.

For reference, I now use a dirt cheap Pioneer player, but that's mainly because it also outputs SACD via HDMI to my processor.

 

[dowie]

for digital only outputs the ps3 should be identical to players no matter how expensive.

yup... but people still like to apply the typical audiophile myths to all equipment regardless of how retarded the claims might be (see HDMI cable reviews etc..)- its not just a digital source sending over the same 1s and 0s but the more expensive magical black box somehow gives better contrast which you can supposedly see if you have magical eyes and use special testing cards... There is no actual evidence or technical reason for this you've just got to buy into the usual nonsense that people who sell these things like to promote - more expensive black box is better black box... sometimes only special people can see/hear the difference.

Yet again the emperor has no clothes

 

[lucid]

yup... but people still like to apply the typical audiophile myths to all equipment regardless of how retarded the claims might be (see HDMI cable reviews etc..)- its not just a digital source sending over the same 1s and 0s but the more expensive magical black box somehow gives better contrast which you can supposedly see if you have magical eyes and use special testing cards... There is no actual evidence or technical reason for this you've just got to buy into the usual nonsense that people who sell these things like to promote - more expensive black box is better black box... sometimes only special people can see/hear the difference.

Yet again the emperor has no clothes

Well, that was rather an ignorant response.

There's nothing particularly "special" about the test patterns used to assess image quality. The discs are available for anyone to buy and use. Hell, there's even free test patterns to download if you have a Blu-ray burner, so there's really very little excuse not to have a look yourself. The mark 1 standard issue human eyeball is plenty good enough to detect the differences. The results are easy to replicate and consistent time and time again.

The broadcast TV industry and commercial movie production industry all works to a set of reference standards for video performance. Signal levels are specified and colour standards are established for all the SD and HD signal formats. If it didn't then you'd be forever changing the brightness, contrast and colour controls on a TV every time the channel was changed or a different disc played.

 

[dowie]

care to give any technical reasons behind differences in digital sources outputting digital?

We're not talking lost data but rather ridiculous claims that there are differences in contrast etc..?

Any links to properly conducted tests demonstrating these differences? Or do we just have to go on the subjective eyeball of some test card and a dubious claim that the contrast was different in a sighted test of the more expensive player by someone already invested in the usual audiophile nonsense?

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

care to give any technical reasons behind differences in digital sources outputting digital?

We're not talking lost data but rather ridiculous claims that there are differences in contrast etc..?

Any links to properly conducted tests demonstrating these differences? Or do we just have to go on the subjective eyeball of some test card and a dubious claim that the contrast was different in a sighted test of the more expensive player by someone already invested in the usual audiophile nonsense?

It's an interesting question.
Some thoughts:
- We KNOW that for say a DVD disk that quite a lot of processing is applied, e.g. upsampling and similar. As such, the player most certainly is "fiddling" with the data, hopefully for our benefit
- Chances are that BD players are NOT simply passing on data from the disk and that they're also doing "something". Question is, whether that is something we want and/or is desirable. Back to my earlier point, the BD players I tried at home did NOT look the same. For example, the Sony 760 player was "brighter" than my PS3. I genuinely believe that this was an attempt to make the standalone player "stand out"

 

[Devrij]

Only potential issue I could see is inadequate hardware that interrupted the cadence of the video due to not decoding the files fast enough to maintain a perfect framerate. God knows I'm dealing with this issue (software though) with my HTPC playing BD.

 

[lucid]

care to give any technical reasons behind differences in digital sources outputting digital?

We're not talking lost data but rather ridiculous claims that there are differences in contrast etc..?

Any links to properly conducted tests demonstrating these differences? Or do we just have to go on the subjective eyeball of some test card and a dubious claim that the contrast was different in a sighted test of the more expensive player by someone already invested in the usual audiophile nonsense?

Oh Lord. Here we go. You'll be quoting James Randi next.

Just look up PLUGE. It's the basic set up pattern for brightness as used by broadcast TV engineers the world over. Once you've understood that then come back and ask a few questions.