The new Oppo "budget" BD player is now on their site

Link Oppo BDP-80

It supports SACD and DVD-A and hass 7.1 analog outputs.

Haven't really studied the specs yet so not sure what the difference with the BDP-83 is.

Differences:

• No ABT2010 video processor
• No dedicated stereo analog output
• Plastic faceplate instead of aluminum
• Glow-in-the-dark remote instead of backlit
• No rear panel IR connection
• No option for RS232 port
• 7.1 analog section uses different DAC than BDP-83

I think that's it. Oh, and it officially goes on sale on Monday (the BDP-80 page isn't linked from their home page yet).

Oh, one more: the DAC's in the BDP-80 can't accept DSD directly. The player has to convert DSD to PCM first. The BDP-83 and BDP-83SE both have DAC's that can handle DSD without conversion to PCM.

From their comparison page Oppo does not recommend the BD80 for large screen home theater. I wonder how the video performance of this player is lacking compared to the BD83 for them to say that? The lack of a separate stereo output (shares the 7.1 connections) isn't a deal breaker for me, I'm currently using the 5.1 outputs of my Oppo DVD player for music and the digital audio for home theater. My current receiver doesn't have HDMI so I plug the HDMI from the DVD to the TV and use the digital audio to the receiver. I'm not sure what the DSD-PCM business means.
Glad to see they now have three choices here, but I'm wondering if the BD-83 will now go away leaving only the BD80 and BD83-deluxe.

It might be more accurate to say that they recommend the BDP-83 over the BDP-80 for large screens - those are the installations are are going to benefit the most from the ABT processor, mainly with DVD. Blu-ray performance isn't likely to vary a lot unless you are using some of the zoom modes (the ABT provides zooming on the BDP-83 and does a really good job of it).

The DAC's in the BDP-80 can't convert DSD to analog. They need PCM. Therefore the BDP-80 will need to convert DSD to PCM to provide an analog output from SACD's. DSD is only used by SACD's, so other formats don't care.

I wouldn't expect the BDP-83 to go anywhere. The SE is sort of a niche product relative to the stock 83.

I still don't see the 80 on their site.

You won't see it linked from the front page until Monday. The page is up (click here) but not linked from anywhere on the site - several people found the link by trial and error. It doesn't officially go on sale until tomorrow.

I own a DV-981HD which does a good job upconverting DVD's to 1080p on my 52" LCD TV. How would the BD83 and BD80 compare with the DV981 playing DVD's? If the BD80 is as good as the DV981 I would probably be happy with it. I've rarely used the zoom feature with DVD's, only time I've needed it was when viewing an old DVD that did not implement the letterbox in a way that worked with an widescreen TV. (IE: letter boxed inside a 4:3 window on the widescreen leaving black bars on the left, right AND top and bottom!) I can't see needing it on a BD unless I wanted to still frame and inspect something. Also how does the BD80 and BD83 compare to the DV981 on CD and DVD audio formats?

I will be able to offer some comments on performance tomorrow, after the player is released. At that time, I will take a stab at some of these questions (although it has been a while since my 981HD was in the den).

Oppo still doesn't have the BD80 link up on their site yet. The page is very easy to find though. I compared the images of the BD80 and BD83 and noticed another difference between the two. The BD80 adds composite and S-video output jacks that the BD83 does not have. Also the BD83 is maybe 1/2" taller than the BD80 (not including feet).

The BDP-83 does have a composite output, just not s-video. The 83 is also taller in part because of the way the drive and display are oriented (they're stacked, unlike all of the other OPPO players that have set the drive and display side-by-side to reduce height).

I'll keep an eye on OPPO's site today, and once I see the BDP-80 on the front page I will post here (already have the post written, just have to copy & paste).

Good morning, everyone. I have a little treat to start off the day. We'll start with a link that is related to the "player of the day:"

BDP-80 Review

I had planned to wait until the BDP-80 was available for sale on OPPO's site, but decided to follow another beta tester's lead and post now. It is likely that the BDP-80 won't be available for sale until close to 9:00AM Pacific time. While we're at it, I'll toss in a couple pictures I took a little while back (click on them for larger versions):



The BDP-80 in that picture has a somewhat different set of silk screens than production players will have. After some debate with beta testers, they have just the Blu-ray logo on the front of the disc tray (DVD and SACD logos were removed from the tray).

Have a good Monday!

Gonk,
Nice write up as usual. Sounds like it would be a good lower cost alternative to the BDP-83 without sacrificing too much in performance.

Definitely. By the way, it is now available for order from OPPO's site.

Gonk,

I don't see a fan on the back of the BDP-80. Does it have a cooling fan?

govguru

Nope. No fan. I mention this in my review, including a suggestion (not anything dictated by OPPO, just the mechanical engineer in me chiming in) to give the top of the player some breathing room since the metal top is going to be providing some of the heat rejection that a fan might provide. There is absolutely no chance of fan noise from the BDP-80.

Great review Gonk. I'm still a bit hazy on just how the BD80 would compare to the DV981HD that I currently own for DVD playback. As I said before, if it's as good as the 981, but falls short of the flagship 983, I would be happy with it.

I didn't compare the BDP-80 directly to the 981HD. The 980H wasn't as good a deinterlacer as the 981HD, but otherwise it compared very well to the 981HD. The BDP-80 seemed to be better at deinterlacing than the 980H, so I would bet that it'd be a close contest when comparing the BDP-80 to the 981HD.

Quite a stack of players you got there. That is a dv981 on top isn't it?

Yes. The 981HD has moved on now, but I was doing some work to the equipment rack in the den a couple months ago and took some time to gather all five players together for a few minutes. Top to bottom, it goes: 981HD, 980H, 983H, BDP-80, and BDP-83.