Panasonic intros fourth generation Blu-ray players

Wow, so now almost a year after the format war has ended Panasonic will do the amazing and bring out a player that hooks up to the internet. They are so cutting edge (said with much sarcasm). I think I remember another format doing that freaking three years ago. Not only that but they are selling at bargain pricing of only $400. I cant wait!

I like Panasonic (nice quality) but come on. They wont get my money till they get realistic in pricing.

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[Post edited by wolvinator on Sep 19, 2008]

And they won't get my money until we stop having days where the stock market falls over 400 points in a day and half the banks are either declaring bankruptcy or trying to sell themselves.

Hmm, the 35 sounds like an attractive peice for the money.

Agreed KungFu!

What are they thinking. Most people barely have enough money to make ends meet. A school system close by to me just fired all 250 custodians and hired some small company to clean their schools. That's just one example of how our economy is in the Sh***er.

You guys have an interesting point of view. What if the recession hits America really hard. My question is will that kill Blu-Ray? and it Sales?

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[Post edited by ReaggieP on Sep 19, 2008]

If the economy got a lot worse then kiss Blu Ray goodbye. But we wouldn't be worried too much about movies at that point anyway.

Unless its a must have movie during such a crisis.

Wow - these two great new BD Panasonic players are now $100 less than the prices shown in the original news story (from Sept) - just $299 and $399 respectively - Panasonic's website listings

And Cnet now has a recent review of the BD35K model ($299) - VIEW HERE.

First standalone Blu-ray player to nab Editors' Choice
"The Panasonic DMP-BD35 deserves such distinction. It's a Profile 2.0-compliant Blu-ray player, delivers excellent video quality, and has a $300 list price. That's less than the PS3 and a great value for home theater fans who just want to watch Blu-ray. The Panasonic DMP-BD35 represents the best value in standalone Blu-ray players, with excellent image quality, a comprehensive feature set, and a price that's significantly lower than the PS3."

- Great Deal at Amazon - only $262 & Free Shipping! (no sales tax unless you live in New York).

Looks like I may buy another BD player this Christmas (to go along with my PS3).

-JOE- (Love Hendrix!)

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Hmm, the 35 sounds like an attractive peice for the money.

Why on gods green earth would you purchase this over a PS3?

I am a BIG Panasonic fan, my 42inch LCD is a Panasonic. My mother still has my 32 inch Panasonic from 1995 in her bedroom and it works just great. And if I wanted to spend the $ on a expensive Blu Ray player I would have picked Panasonic. But here we go again, trying integrate the PC with our movie watching experience. Look I own a PC and I am actually looking into a couple laptops to replace my desk top. I like to think that I am an electronics junky, but do we really need this technology now? But I know, as americans, we like to sit on our asses and not move for anything. I like to call our society the velcro society. You might say what the hell does that mean? Well when the velcro athletic shoe was invented, that started the pure unadultarated laziness in the good old US of A. Like for example the invention of the GPS mainstream. Why can't you simply get yourself a Rand McNally and map out your route before you hit the open road? No you have to talk to a box to find out where to go. So now we have begun to tie in our PC's with everything we do, our TV's, telephones, shopping, bill paying etc. etc. etc............

WOW what a rant, but what a lazy society we have become!!!

screw the ps3. some people want an actual SA player.

not im not sayign to get that one, but im saying no everyone wants to game. with shitty online service. lol

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Why on gods green earth would you purchase this over a PS3?

Because it's made by Sony and it sucks!

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screw the ps3. some people want an actual SA player.

Then as Hendrix pointed out..this would be the one to get. The only diff. between this and the 55 (which retails for $100 more) is that the 55 has analog outputs. EVERYTHING else is the same. I'm thinking about picking one up (35) myself. Somebody on here said they saw it for $250. Once again as Hendrix mentioned, these two units are being highly regarded as the BEST STANDALONE'S available right now.

edit.
Regarding price. It is best to think of these players as equal too, or even better than the bd50, which we all know is a killer machine. I believe THAT player cost $600-$700. This is a no brainer..would you rather have a player that is regarded as the best, or a Funai clone (sorry ed.) that may only be what..like $10-$20 bucks cheaper compared to the 35?

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[Post edited by bladerunner1 on Nov 13, 2008]

Kuco, you kill me. If you only could hear my friends and family rave about how much better the PS3 is over stand alone BD players. And by the way Eddie you can officially add me to the clone wars. I bought the Maggy for the in-laws from Wal*mart for $215.. I am so tempted to open the box and run it through the paces but I'll wait until the weekend.

Hey Spoony,

I tried the PS3 out for a while. I didn't like it. I found the video playback levels too much like a computer. The PS3 is a computer, anyways I didn't like the the opaqueness of the image that was displayed. For video games it looked good, but movies is a completely different ball game. Contrast, and brightness did not look natural. At least in my eyes. I am not critizing the the PS3 for most. Gary U said the same thing as well. I noticed the same effect when watching movies through the xbox 360. These devices cannot acheive the same reference balance or gain that standalones can hit. When I compared the PS3 to the Magnasonic, the Sony always had this grey tone inflection in standby mode, or a blank shot that overcast over the whole screen. I'm surprised Skyhawk has never complained of this but whatever. He has a similar set up to what I have, and when you are on a projo it is annoying as hell. It's almost like a grey film looking through a clear window. This is my reason for not buying a PS3 as a Blu-Ray player. Also big upsets are the power consumption, Heat dissapation, IR Remote support, and it is made by Sony.

The Panasonic is an attractive brand and can hold their own. Also the LG BD300 is also very tempting. Don't get me wrong but the Maggy is good, but you can always get better! I can always use a Blu-Ray deck in the livingroom!

ReaggieP, I don't know what model PS3 you are viewing on (or your TV), but I'm not getting -the look- in the image that you've described above with my original 60GB model - your news is strange to my ears. Can't vouch for Skyhawk. The PS3 considered one of the best BD players (and not just for the CELL chip's quick response time), and is THE -reference- player for Cnet, and The Criterion Collection, among others.

Panasonic has always been right there with the PS3 when it comes to quality, and they have their own added proprietary special image "filters" to make the image as clean as possible. And now with the lower prices, well, their models are looking quite attractive right now. The Funai clones are very good I'm sure, but for just a little more money you can acquire a "Cadillac" brand of BD quality - PANASONIC.

-JOE- (Love Hendrix!)

you know, i'm getting bored with all this discussion about this or that player. i mean, when was the last time anyone cared to dicker about the best dvd player? i think we can all agree on the following principles:

1) shun profile 1.0 players.

2) if internet connectivity is not important to you (i.e. you only want profile 1.1), then buy one of the funai clones (magnavox, sylvania, insignia--the big tank one, not the one that looks like a samsung).

3) if you want a profile 2.0 player to be "future proof", then panasonic, sony (including the PS3), sharp, and LG are all good bets. avoid samsungs, as they have been known to cause more grief than any other blu-ray players.

Joe, I wrote out a whole explanation just moments ago, but can't be bothered to do it again. mylaptop wifi is f'd... Cheap ass Dell laptops! Anyways, I have tried numerous tests, and have also borrowed video calibration equip from work, and came up with similar results. I'm using a 2000 series Panasonic 1080p projo. I don't get the results with the XA2, or the Maggy. I got those results with both the 40gig PS3 and XBOX 360. It's gotta be a computer issue. My HTPC does a similar thing, but now I have crammed the shit out of the gain output and it is better, but not great. Computers in general for whatever reason can produce great resolution but cannot balance certain variables that standalones can do.

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It's gotta be a computer issue.

more like a "personal issue" as in you despise sony.

i have one of these and as the "experts", and myself agree, it is dang near perfect.

this is the first time during blu-ray's life cycle that i have even considered a standalone. the panasonic dmp-bd35 has everything i am looking for, and it hit the right price point. but the ps3 still stays in the theater room, no matter what the panny can do.

No personal feelings about Sony in this decision. It's big, ugly, non compatible with my remote, Not clear enough for my liking, and will most doubtly melt in my cabinet. Really is anyone here that doesn't like the PS3 not allowed to have an opinion? We are on the planet earth, arn't we?

sure reaggie..you're always entitled to your opinion. as we are entitled to respond to your opinion. maybe the sony just doesn't jive with your system..and that is perfectly fine. but it jives with mine, and i love the thing. and "yes", i also use it as a game machine.

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[Post edited by bladerunner1 on Nov 14, 2008]

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I've never seen any of the PQ issues that ReaggieP reports with the PS3. I don't recall any of the enthusiasts over at AVSForum reporting this issue either over the past years (and many of them also owned the XA2 and were duel format).

Considering that the standalone Toshiba HD DVD players are actually "computers", I doubt it's a "computer" issue. My Toshiba A2 is crappy Celeron, contains RAM and ROM where the operating system is stored. The first Toshiba generation was Linux, but I think they wen't with Windows CE on the second generation...

BTW, by coincidence I picked up some HD DVDs from Zellers today... many titles mixed up in some throw-away bins for $6. I got Sleepy Hollow, Heartbreak Kid, and Arctic Tale. It was a little hard seeing many titles in there that I already own and paid $34.99 for!

I'm seconds away from ordering the Panasonic DMP-BD35 and it is set to replace my PS3 as main playback system.

Main concerns I have always had with the PS3:

- Power consumption
- Bluetooth remote (That is not backlit)
- No HD audio bitstream *

* This is a REALLY big one for me and I really don't understand why they don't allow it. The PS3 has all the technology to do it so why not? Any insiders know why?

The PS3 does NOT bitstream HD audio?? What the...I thought it did.

So this means if you want your receiver to do the decoding you can't with the PS3? I'm assuming it will sound better if the receiver decodes the audio correct? Depending on the receiver of course.

I don't think it will ever support bitstream output (to pass HD audio to a receiver for processing) due to the version of the HDMI chipset used. The chipset version did not change in the new 40gb or 80gb model.

However it can decode them internally and pass them out as 7.1 PCM, which is pretty much the same thing sort of. It does this currently for Dolby TrueHD, but does NOT support the same for DTS MA. In theory it could be added via a firmware upgrade and is probably a requested feature by PS3 owners. I don't know because I don't own one. If I have made a mistake please do correct me, but this is how I understood it to work. In the mean time...

Buy one for this

The PS3 has had decoding abilities for DTS-MA HD a few upgrades ago. As far as whether decoding is better on the receiver or not, I would guess that decoding is decoding. In other words, it's an application of the licensed decoding algorithm (a mathematically based formula). 2 + 2 = 4, no matter which device you choose to do the math...

Keep in mind, one disadvantage of decoding audio codecs on your receiver is that you cannot mix audio streams for Pip and other multi-stream audio effects with HD audio. Using your player (PS3 or Blu-ray player) for decoding will give you the capability to mix both HD and non-HD audio streams in different formats by decoding them, then remixing them as L-PCM. The PS3 is technically "bit streaming", however the only codec it bitstreams is multi-channel L-PCM which is a binary stream and still requires digital-to-analog conversion (DAC). The DAC part is done in players when you use players with the analog out RCA connections for audio.

Considering L-PCM is a higher bandwidth bitstream than DTS HD MA (when decoded), I have no idea why you would require a special HDMI connection when one can do the former already.

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However it can decode them internally and pass them out as 7.1 PCM, which is pretty much the same thing sort of. It does this currently for Dolby TrueHD, but does NOT support the same for DTS MA.

Correct, except it also converts DTS-HD MA to PCM.

However, in my own tests my Onkyo 805 did a much better job in direct comparison.

The Panasonic DMP-BD35 is now on the way and I'll try to have a review up when I get a chance to put it trough the paces. Looks like it could be one of the best stand-alone players right now.

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As far as whether decoding is better on the receiver or not, I would guess that decoding is decoding. In other words, it's an application of the licensed decoding algorithm (a mathematically based formula). 2 + 2 = 4, no matter which device you choose to do the math...

So your saying that a $30 CD player has just as good sound as a $300 player? All Blu-ray players has the same picture quality? They are just decoding VC-1 or H264?

I'm not buying that logic.

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[Post edited by Henning on Nov 18, 2008]

Not to take sides but I agree with Henning on this one. I know for a fact the not all DVD players, Bluray players, CD players, etc decode audio the same. Otherwise it wouldn't matter which product you use to output the audio, they would all sound the same which is not the case.

Heck the Yamaha 6180 I was looking at has Burr Brown audio DAC's that it promotes as a selling point. If they all decoded audio the same then why would that matter?

Just like video, not all audio DAC's are created equally. Just ask someone that uses high end equipment or go to any electronics stores that deals with high end equipment and they will tell you.

Personally, I can't wait for Henning's comparison review of the audio between the PS3 and the Panasonic. I've always wondered if you get better sound (as I'm sure you do even if it's a minor difference) with other bluray players and I'm curious about the video as well.

I have seen the older version of the Panasonic BD35 (the BD30) on sale a few times for under $200 so I may end up snatching one of those, unless the BD35 goes down to a nice price on Boxing Day.

For all the things I like about the PS3 I really dislike not being able to use a universal remote on it.

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[Post edited by Falcon01 on Nov 18, 2008]

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So your saying that a $30 CD player has just as good sound as a $300 player? All Blu-ray players has the same picture quality? They are just decoding VC-1 or H264?

Pssst Henning, a CD player plays CDs that already have decoded tracks on them (uncompressed PCM). I hope you're kidding and realize that the quality difference between a $30 CD player and a $300 CD player has nothing to do with decoding of compressed digital to uncompressed digital and everything to do with digital to audio conversion (DAC chipset and implementation).

And I'm certain you also know the difference between lossless compressed audio and lossy video. But really, in both cases the fun happens after decoding. It's what we pay for! (Deinterlacing, motion detection, color control, equalization, noise suppression/removal, etc. etc. etc.)

Since digital to audio conversion is where the hard stuff happens, people should also realize that quality may be lower if the blu-ray player they use the analog outs for has lower quality DACs than the receiver they have it attached to.

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Heck the Yamaha 6180 I was looking at has Burr Brown audio DAC's that it promotes as a selling point. If they all decoded audio the same then why would that matter?

Falcon, the discussion was about the differences between where a compressed lossless audio stream would be decoded into an uncompressed lossless audio stream - a Blu-ray player or the receiver). It has nothing to do with all the hard and interesting stuff (including DAC) that happens after the decoding is accomplished, since that's going to happen on the receiver regardless, unless of course you're using the multi-channel analog outs on a Blu-ray player.

It really comes down to if the PS3 (or any other player) touches the sound before sending it as PCM over HDMI. As you said it can mix two sources into one (when in Picture-in-Picture mode) so in that case it clearly modifies the sound.

I have also read in some reviews that better bass management is expected when you use bitstream compared to letting the player decode it. Not sure why. However, this was what I experienced when testing the Onkyo 805. When the Onkyo did the decoding the the sound appeared slightly more clear and precise while the PCM from the PS3 was slightly more muddy. Now, it was a subtle difference - again the PS3 was not bad at all but there was a difference.