I almost bought an Oppo up-converting dvd player one month ago, since the Oppo players have received excellent reviews everywhere. We purchased a 40-inch LCD TV, and HD content from our cable provider looks great, but playing DVDs with our 2 year old DVD player just didn't look that good.
I had been determined to sit out the format war until there was a winner, but before paying $200 for an Oppo, decided to look at what there was for HD out there. I was surprised to find the Toshiba HD-A2 on sale at Amazon and a few local electronics stores for $240. It was getting mostly good reviews (a few bad reviews, but not many... 4.5 stars on Amazon). And especially important to me was most people said its up-converting was impressive--just barely below what the best Oppo's with DCDi by Faroudja up-converting could do.
So for $40 more than what I was going to spend on an Oppo, I could get a good up-converting DVD player, that also played HD DVDs. Plus I got five free (albeit lame) HD DVDs through a rebate (if you remember to mail it in on time). Since I subscribe to netflix, I could simply rent HD DVDs and enjoy the HD quality on my HD TV, and not have to worry about whether HD DVD becomes obsolete one day.
So I decided to take the plunge, bought the HD DVD player, got a 3-ft HDMI cable from http://monoprice.com/ for $4 (they are $40-$100 at most stores, which is a rip-off, since the monoprice cables are excellent), and I was set.
And it turns out I couldn't be happier with my decision. My player does a great job of up-converting, and the HD DVD movies (what few ones are actually available) really look supurb. I haven't bought a single HD DVD movie, and I don't intend to. I'm just enjoying HD movies that I rent, and will continue to do so until it makes sense to change to something else if I need to.
Some people are saying that average consumers don't notice the difference between the HD discs and regular DVDs, but I think it depends. Everyone can tell the difference between an old CRT television and a new flat panel television, so a lot of consumers are buying the new HD flat panel televisions, even though they can be $1000+. If you buy a new flat panel HD television, you immediately learn the difference between high definition and standard definition content, because standard definition content looks pretty crappy by comparison on most new flat panel HD televisions. If someone doesn't have a decent up-converting DVD player, I think they will be disappointed watching DVDs on their new $1000+ tv, as I was. So I have to disagree, and say that many people can tell the difference between DVDs and HD discs, and really do want more out of their major new tv purchase. Whether that's getting a good up-converting DVD player, or spending a little more on an HD DVD player, or even more on a blu-ray player, it's their call. But I think that most poeple who have bought a new flat panel HD televisions are looking for a way to make that major purchase be something that looks as impressive watching movies as it does watching HD tv shows.
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I almost bought an Oppo up-converting dvd player one month ago, since the Oppo players have received excellent reviews everywhere. We purchased a 40-inch LCD TV, and HD content from our cable provider looks great, but playing DVDs with our 2 year old DVD player just didn't look that good.
I had been determined to sit out the format war until there was a winner, but before paying $200 for an Oppo, decided to look at what there was for HD out there. I was surprised to find the Toshiba HD-A2 on sale at Amazon and a few local electronics stores for $240. It was getting mostly good reviews (a few bad reviews, but not many ... 4.5 stars on Amazon). And especially important to me was most people said its up-converting was impressive--just barely below what the best Oppo's with DCDi by Faroudja up-converting could do.
So for $40 more than what I was going to spend on an Oppo, I could get a good up-converting DVD player, that also played HD DVDs. Plus I got five free (albeit lame) HD DVDs through a rebate (if you remember to mail it in on time). Since I subscribe to netflix, I could simply rent HD DVDs and enjoy the HD quality on my HD TV, and not have to worry about whether HD DVD becomes obsolete one day.
So I decided to take the plunge, bought the HD DVD player, got a 3-ft HDMI cable from http://monoprice.com/ for $4 (they are $40-$100 at most stores, which is a rip-off, since the monoprice cables are excellent), and I was set.
And it turns out I couldn't be happier with my decision. My player does a great job of up-converting, and the HD DVD movies (what few ones are actually available) really look supurb. I haven't bought a single HD DVD movie, and I don't intend to. I'm just enjoying HD movies that I rent, and will continue to do so until it makes sense to change to something else if I need to.
Some people are saying that average consumers don't notice the difference between the HD discs and regular DVDs, but I think it depends. Everyone can tell the difference between an old CRT television and a new flat panel television, so a lot of consumers are buying the new HD flat panel televisions, even though they can be $1000+. If you buy a new flat panel HD television, you immediately learn the difference between high definition and standard definition content, because standard definition content looks pretty crappy by comparison on most new flat panel HD televisions. If someone doesn't have a decent up-converting DVD player, I think they will be disappointed watching DVDs on their new $1000+ tv, as I was. So I have to disagree, and say that many people can tell the difference between DVDs and HD discs, and really do want more out of their major new tv purchase. Whether that's getting a good up-converting DVD player, or spending a little more on an HD DVD player, or even more on a blu-ray player, it's their call. But I think that most poeple who have bought a new flat panel HD televisions are looking for a way to make that major purchase be something that looks as impressive watching movies as it does watching HD tv shows.