Recommend me a decent versatile blu-ray player

[Paul the 6th]

Doing a bit of christmas shopping online and thinking of getting my parents a blu-ray player as they seem to enjoy their films & stuff...

The moneysavingexpert article on blu-ray players hasn't been updated since 5th january this year. Ideally the player should be multi-region and also able to play compressed formats like .mkv and divx amongst others.

I know these have been around for a while but on the ebuyer site there are products listed as "DVD player 1080p HMDI" and then others actually listed as "Blu-Ray DVD player 1080p etc..." the ones without the tag 'blu-ray' are around £25-£40 where as ones with blu-ray are nearer £80 all the way upto hundreds of pounds..

Any help on this would be gratefully appreciated

The ones without "Blu-Ray" are HDMI up-scaling DVD players, meaning that they will output at 1080p but still only at the quality of what is put in there, If you want a Blu-Ray player you need to buy one that is labeled as a Blu-Ray player.

Just a quick scount on eBuyer and found this:
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/192818
A followup on google provides the region removing codes (although they may or may-not work for the Blu-Ray part):
http://www.justanswer.com/questions/...amsung-bdp1580

[Paul the 6th]

cheers collis - found this one on ebuyer for £120 - http://www.froogle.prcdirect.co.uk/b...dc5300/product but then found it on prcdirect.co.uk with 6 movies thrown in (albeit mainly crap ones) for under £100... Only catch is the hdmi cable's are sold seperately.

cnet reviews pointed out that the load times are a major consideration with most of the samsung players loading films in under a minute (quickest was 42 seconds - around 8 seconds quicker than a ps3 )..

My dad is a bit of a samsung fanboy as it is (tv, HDD recorder and laptops amongst other gadgets) so a samsung Blu-Ray will prolly serve them well (he's gonna have to re-buy CSI and Spooks on Blu-ray now!)

[tigersaw]

I got a samsung blu ray thrown in with a surround sound at richer sounds, I think it was / is £79. Actually very good, does all you mentioned, memory stick slot on the front. Dunno about multi region though, never needed to find out.

i paid £80 quid for my phillips blu ray in argos, has done me fine since, has coaxial and hdmi outputs, ethernet, usb, brilliant thing for the price

Ps3
more than just a blu-ray player

Originally Posted by Paul the 6th

Only catch is the hdmi cable's are sold seperately.

Don't pay lots for a HDMI cable - certainly under a tenner.

[Paul the 6th]

Originally Posted by Owenski

Ps3
more than just a blu-ray player

I know, but my old man is 62 in january - can't see him mashing up awpers in free for all mode on COD5 - or - complete gran turismo 5 on the hardest setting

thanks for the tip off amnesia, prcdirect are cross selling hmdi cables under the main bluray product info at around £19 for 1.5m for 'platinum' or 'cheesium' or something... Will search out a cheaper bargain

UNOBTANIUM HDMI CABLES...

all a rip off...

cheap as you like (ish) will do fine..

[L3nny]

Christmas Shopping!!!!! You do realise it's October?

Don't believe the lies about getting an expensive HDMI cable giving better picture quality, just get the cheapest one you can find on Ebay which are under £2.

One thing some DVD players offer is internet connection, some Blu Rays have interactive special features on them. Although with all special features they are usually crap.