Blu-Ray Player?
 

In Buying a blu-ray player.. What should i be looking for?

"PLAYSTATION 3" in white/silver letters on a black background.

You want the ability to upgrade the firmware to support the latest standard, and you get to play games as a bonus.

Save some money and do the sound and image reproduction in your head:

http://www.zelaron.com/gear/dr.jpg

Would a Ps3 have the same image and sound quality as an actual Blu-ray player? And will it have Surround sound capabilities? I have a surround sound system hooked up right now to my HDTV, but i want to get crisp HD pictures with my DVD's too.

You'll need to check on the exact sound capabilities, but the images should be equal or better. It does upscale DVDs.

Ok, but i will get Great HD picture and surround sound with my blu-rays right?

Well yeah... it's a PS3, it's what it does. I'm pretty sure it does surround sound, but I'll have to check (to connect it up to a surround sound system, btw, you'd either need an optical cable from the PS3, or connect the surround sound to the HDTV).

As WW said, you need to be able to update the firmware, and as far as I know, the PS3 is the only Blu-ray player that has that capability built in (at least, I haven't heard of any other players that can do it).

If you don't go for a PS3 (booooo, hiss, shame on you!!) then look for Sony, Sharp, Panasonic or Samsung players.

Have you got a decent HDTV?

Eh, well its a Mitsubishi DLP. According to "The Guy at the Store", 'it runs by a type of projector thingy inside the hdtv, so it doesn't burn-in. Great for gamers' So i got that one, Its pretty big... umm if i remember correctly 72-inch or 64-inch or something like that. It doesn't really have GREAT picture like the ones in the store, but i like it. (this could be due to the fact that i don't have an HDMI cable)

In terms of buying a PS3, i would love to :D. But, scince i am under-age at the moment. I really have no say in what My parents are going to buy. Hopefully thanks to what you have explained to me i will be able to Convince them to get the PS3.

No HDMI=no 1080p

Lenny, my parents have a Sony Blu-Ray player that can do firmware updates through a USB Hub in the back. All you need is a portable USB drive/stick.

But will it be able to upgrade to the next level they publish? Since the PS3 is a multi-purpose device, it already has resources that far-exceed any that will be needed for any Blu-Ray format they ever decide to standardize. The earliest standalone Blu-Ray players, even if you could have updated their firmware wouldn't support the BonusView level due to hardware limitations.

True, this is a good argument. Their player is newer than the latest PS3 revision released, so I'd imagine that the hardware in it is more prepared for the future than others. It's also by Sony which is one thing I made sure of, since they're the creators. However, for older machines you might be right that they won't be able to handle the newer stuff even with an upgrade.