I've got the opportunity to buy a new DVD player, I use an old CRT TV and a Infocus IN76 projector. Is it worth buying a cheap up-scaling DVD and waiting a year or two for Blu-ray to develop or a more expensive DVD, something like the Arcam (the Naim DVD is more than I want to spend)? One of the deciding factors for me is the sound quality, as well as the picture quality on the projector. I recently tried a Sony DVD/HDD which was impressive when up-scaled to the projector, but was not as easy to use as a separate DVD and PVR.

Thanks

Chris

Welcome Stackman;

Why don't you consider a Bluray player now? They can all play and upscale DVDs with pretty good results. Bluray players can be picked up for 200 and 300 Pounds. I hope that's not too heavy on your pocket. If you do wait for a year then yes, the prices will fall down on Bluray players but when you are considering budget players I don't think the drop would be significant. Factor in the amount of money you will currently spend on a DVD player and the cost effectiveness of waiting for a year won't seem reasonable. Good luck

Mind you if you have stacks of DVDs and aren't all that interested in being an early adopter of BluRay (which I'm not, I expect like CD and DVD the players will improve vastly and get significantly cheaper in a relatively short space of time), then a good DVD player will be a sound investment.

I'm not sure which Arcam you refer to, as there are a few, but they all have a fantastic reputation for sound quality. However, as you say cheap, I would regard the various Denon machines as being the kings of the budget scene. If sound quality is important I would also look at the Cambridge Audio models, Cambridge also builds some of the most robust pieces of kit in their price-range and I would bet on them being very reliable.

Regards,


Dom

Oppo do a very well specced DVD player at £150.A BR player coming soon too.

Not sure how things are in the UK but I was in a JB Hifi store the other day and they are selling off Toshiba HD-DVD players for AUS$99 for the HD-E1 & $149 for the HD-EP10 (as late as the end of January these were $299 and $399 respectively so I presume they are half decent machines).

This would equate to a very cheap way of buying an upscaling DVD player until the BluRay crowd sort out their players and the prices come down. OK you can't play BluRay but you couldn't on a normal DVD player either.

Cheers
Scott

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quote:

Originally posted by BigH47:
Oppo do a very well specced DVD player at £150.A BR player coming soon too.

An Oppo Blu-Ray player eh? That will be well worth acquiring!

Although the players will no doubt improve in terms of features offered and functionality, I doubt if the PQ will get much better. My humble little Panasonic BD player is also quite excellent at SD DVD replay - at least as good as my trusty old Oppo.

So why delay? Time marches on, so much to watch...

tony, have you ever tried your Panasonic BD with a CD? If so, how did it do?

I confess I'd not tried a CD in it until I read your post.

It's passable I suppose, but not something I would wish to repeat too often!