Hi,

I've installed my 990 and am awaiting a set of speaker cables. In the mean time, I've been playing with the settings via an old pair of head phones. So far, I'm pleased with the 990 and with it's capabilites, although I'm far from exploiting them all.

My question is this: for a surround sound setup, what is the best DVD/CD player option? Will a blu-ray or Toshiba High Def player produce also the best in 5.1 sound? What are the choices and most practical options here, given I also have a 50" plasma and am looking for high definition.

Any and all information appreciated &

thanks,

John

A Blu-ray or HD-DVD player will give you access to one of the new formats and will give you access to CD and standard DVD (except for Sony's BD player, which doesn't play CD's), but you're looking at more money ($400 or more for HD-DVD, closer to $1000 or more for a decent Blu-ray player, or $500 to $600 for a PS3 plus $25 for a remote control that isn't a game controller). For either format, you'd want to get a player with multichannel analog outputs (which rules out the Toshiba HD-A2 and the PS3 but leaves all of the others in play) to get access to the new audio formats.

Another option is to get a good upscaling DVD player now as a DVD and CD transport and wait for the HD format war to move a bit farther forward. Under that approach, good players can be had for $150 to $250. One that is often mentioned online is OPPO (either the $150 970HD or the $230 981HD that I\'m using these days ). Players like this will give you access to DVD-Audio and SACD and will help wring the most possible potential out of your existing DVD library. With LG starting to sell a combo HD-DVD/Blu-ray player (assuming they can get the iHD support to the point that the DVD Forum will let them officially claim HD-DVD support), we can expect our options to improve on the HD front this year. A combo player (or even a combo/universal that included support for DVD-Audio and SACD) would help provide some protection against getting on the wrong side of the current format war.

Gonk, that OPPO 981 is very appealing, especially considering the price, in light of its capacities.

I read the review; thanks for the link. Did you write it?

I did not know that Blu-ray will not play cd's; this is tragic.

This OPPO may do the trick, for now.

Thanks, Gonk!

John

P.s. as a side note, I've been turning off my 990, at night, from the rear, as I do my computer. I've noticed I lose my FM presets. I assume, therefore, that it's alright to leave the rear master switch on, all the time?

Also, there are no filters for the radio section of the unit; correct?

Again, thanks,

John

I purchased a first generation hd dvd player, the hd-a1, in August 2006 for $364 shipped. If cost is an issue, I would tend to agree with Gonk that, waiting a bit for things to shake out between the two formats and combo players, might be the smartest thing to do...but I would compare the cost of any sd upscaling player you might purchase, to what you can get a hd-a1 for now. Some are finding them relatively cheap, at times under $300, and if you are paying $150-$250 for a sd upscaler, why not get an hd-a1 that will play hd dvd's on your plasma? Most people have reported it upscales sd dvd's pretty well, comparable to most sd upscalers in the price range we are talking about, and it will play 2 channel audio CD's better than sd upscalers....comes down to heavy duty design (the exterior was built like a tank), and some high end (for sub $1k players) audio components. The other advantage of a hd-a1, over even the G2 entry level hd-a2, is that it has analog outputs....5.1, not 7.1, but they are still a great advantage. If I were going to lean toward waiting, it would be to get a player that had 7.1 outs, especially important given the 990's lack of hdmi....I think I read one of the new/recent BR players was supposed to have 7.1 outs, but it is a lot more expensive. Don't get me wrong the hd-a1 does come with some widely published warts, slow loading times, occasional playback glitch, sometimes maddening hdcp quirks, possible lack of updates now that toshiba has the G2 players, but it does produce outstanding audio and video playback, and has been a particularly good match with my outlaw 990.

john

I did write the review for the 981HD (I've accumulated a few of them over the last four or five years). Not all Blu-ray players are lacking CD support - the PS3 will play them (necessary for legacy PS support, I believe), as will the Panasonic and Samsung.

It's perfectly fine to leave the master power switch on all the time - that's the intent, actually.

The HD-A1 does apparently do a very good job with scaling regular DVD's, but most comparisons I've read have indicated that it's not actually better than the OPPO 971/981 players - some actually prefer the OPPO to the Toshiba for standard DVD's. Also, the HD-A2 does not have any multichannel analog output (5.1 or otherwise) - you have to go to the XA2 in the second generation players to get multichannel analog output.

Thank you both for your responses.

Forgive my naivety, but, with the digital interconnects, co-axle and optical, why would analog outputs be an issue or a desire, at all?

Also, is there any chance that the XA2 upscales better than the Oppo? Also, does the XA2 have all the audio format features and functions of the Oppo?

thanks,

John

guess "any" was a little too much. In this case "any" meant those I have read about...big difference than all. Modified the post.

The short answer to why the analog outs on a High Definition player are important is that you can't get the full benefits of the new HD audio formats on coax or tosilink cables, not enough bandwidth is the reason most often given for why they won't work over them. You can hear the formats with hdmi connections, but the 990 does not have hdmi. Analogs can be used to send the new formats to your 990. In the case of the toshiba's, you can still get improved audio compared to sd dvds, on the coax/tosilink because of a conversion "trick" done by the player, I think it was labeled something like a "surprise" DTS mode.

Multichannel analog are required for certain formats - specifically DVD-Audio, SACD, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, and DTS HD. DVD-A and SACD are restricted to analog or a few digital connections (the proprietary connections like DenonLINK and industry standards IEEE-1394 and HDMI). DD Plus, TrueHD, and DTS HD take more bandwidth than SPDIF (coaxial/optical) can offer, and thus can only be passed digitally using HDMI (either as multichannel PCM using HDMI v1.1 or as digital bitstreams using HDMI v1.3) Check out my HDMI FAQ for some of the nasty details. For regular DVD and CD activities, you'll want to stay digital.

The XA2 is likely to upscale much like the other Toshiba players. They've already got a good solution in place, and with HD-DVD being the main purpose I doubt they've invested much in making improvements there. The XA2 does not support DVD-Audio or SACD.