Need Guidance

I am not an audiophile - just someone who likes to see and hear good quality video and audio.

Here is what I currently have:

Outlaw Model 770 Amp
Outlaw Model 950 PreAmp / Processer
OPPO OPDV971H DVD Player
Sony Model KV34HS510 Television
Paradigm Studio Reference 80 Fronts
Paradigm ADP-470 Surrounds
Paradigm Studio CC Center
Paradigm Seismic 12a Subwoofer

At Best Buy today I was tempted with upgrading to Blu-ray High-Def Disc Player (Sony Model #BDP-S300) and a Sony Bravia 46" Model #KDL46S4100 television.

Please be patient with my questions.

1. My current TV is High-Def compatible with an HDMI receptacle. Will Blu-ray be effective with this TV or do I need to upgrade the TV?

2. Best Buy staff discouraged me from getting the PS3 40GB game station because of the audio limitations. If the audio goes through the Outlaw equipment, will this still be a problem.

3. The total price for the upgrades recommended by Best Buy, including getting the HDMI cable they recommend (about $100.00) is approx $2,000.00 pre-tax, no extended warranty dollars. Would you experts think this is worth the money, or would you point me in other directions?

My wife and I are not wealthy so please don't float ideas that cost much more than what we're contemplating. Thanks for your input.

1. Your TV will work fine if it has an HDMI input. No need for an upgrade for that, and as another direct-view tube HDTV owner I am still fond of what the venerable CRT can do as far as raw picture quality. At most, you might need an HDMI switch to allow you to connect both a Blu-ray player and the ol' 971H. Of course, an upgrade to a larger screen might interest you just for the sake of the picture size...

2. I would actually disagree with the Best Buy staff's comments about PS3 vs. S300. The S300 has a multichannel analog output, which certainly gives it an advantage over the PS3 for your system, but it actually has less capabilities for decoding new audio formats.

The S300 offers a nice price for getting into Blu-ray, but it has a few limitations, and audio output is one of them. A recent firmware update allows the S300 to decode TrueHD, but it won't do DTS-HD decoding and can't output the new formats as bitstreams over HDMI. It also is only profile 1.0 and very slow to load discs. The PS3 is faster, can decode DTS-HD (finally), and can be profile 2.0 (don't recall of the profile 2.0 firmware has been released for it yet or not). It can't output the new formats as bitstreams, but that doesn't really hurt you anyway. The ideal for you would be a player that can decode the new formats internally and output via multichannel analog. That will be available soon (next month or so, maybe) in Panasonic's BD50, which will also be profile 2.0, but the MSRP of $700 may be more than you want to spend right now.

If it were my money and I was considering getting into Blu-ray but didn't want to spend more than the S300's price tag, I'd wait until at least the fall. By then, there should be players that are faster than the S300, are profile 1.1 or 2.0, are able to decode all of the formats via multichannel analog outputs, and cost less than the BD50. A player like that will allow you to retain the Model 950 without any penalty.

3. Don't even think about spending $100 in an HDMI cable from Best Buy. Go to someplace like Blue Jeans Cable or MonoPrice and spend a lot less for equal or better quality. As for the rest of your system, I'd be hard pressed to think of anything typically on Best Buy's shelves that would be an audio or video upgrade over what you have. The Paradigm Studio stuff is very, very good. The OPPO 971H is still an excellent player (my dad uses mine). And of course the 950/770 combo is still a great foundation for the rest.

jfro,
to add to gonks posting:
Denon is coming out w/ at least 1 more new entry level BR player plus there will be more in the fall.

HDMI cable: look no further than Oppo. go to products and scroll down.
What you will save in money you can treat the wife to a nice dinner and a movie from home w/ plenty left over.
Have a good weekend

Thanks to you both. I might plunge for the PS3, for the gaming options, but at least now you've given me pause for thought.

The Denon that I've seen mentioned is still comparable in price to Panasonic's BD50 and appears to use the same basic platform as the other Denon's (so no profile 2.0).

The next 6 to 12 months should start to see a much broader array of options for Blu-ray players. The only standalone player released prior to this year that I feel very comfortable recommending is the Panasonic BD30, and even it has some very real audio processing limitations for folks without HDMI v1.3 receivers or processors. We are starting to see a few players that are overcoming the early limitations. By at least the holiday season this year, the sitation should be well improved. OPPO Digital is even working on a Blu-ray player, although they're tight-lipped about features and I doubt it'll see the light of day before Q1 2009.

JFro,

I had the same dilemma and I bought the 40GB PS3 this weekend. I figured it would work fine until a full featured and full spec Blu-ray player is available for a reasonable price. I have it hooked up to my TV through HDMI and the optical out to my 990. Works great.

Bonuses: My nephews want to come over more. Gaming. I can surf the web with it and listen to music etc. It may soon be possible to use it as a mythTV frontend. It's wireless, so it's easy to connect to the network.

I'll probably wait for Oppo to release a full featured Blu-ray player and hopefully by that time, Outlaw with have their next generation pre-pro.

While we don't have a feature set from OPPO yet, I would expect it to have the onboard decoding needed to allow older processors (like the 990 and 950) to have full access to the new audio formats. That means that folks who don't want to upgrade their processor won't need to.

i'll have to agree with Gonk., a 6 month wait will fly by and the next gen. bray players will decode those signals that current bplayers dont. I just recently recieved the Oppo dv983h and altho not blue ray, all i can say is the pic quality is supurb!

Great responses - here are my thoughts thus far, and a correction to an earlier post I made.

The correction: My TV does not have an HDMI input, it's a DVI input. Does this mean I do need to upgrade the TV so I can get an HDMI input? If so, any recommendations in the $1500 range?

I've heard so many good things about the OPPO that I'll wait for OPPO's blu-ray entry before getting a temporary fix. However, I think I'll still get the PS3 - especially if I upgrade the TV.

For a guy like me, it's all very confusing. All of your comments are appreciated, but some are still way over my ability to comprehend and process (such as profile 1.0 or 2.0).

Finally, as difficult as this is, hooking everything up and hoping it's done right seems impossible.

To GONK, and other experts - one of you should initiate an online business wherein the customer tells you their specific equipment, then you reply with specific wiring and set-up instructions. I'm not sure how feasible that is, but I'd be willing to pay for it if the price wasn't too insane.

My HDTV doesn't have HDMI, either - it has DVI, and I've got four different HDMI sources (OPPO 983H, HD cable, BD30, and HD-A2) connected to it. The key is to have that DVI input include HDCP - if it does that, you're all set. If you don't have HDCP, you can only use component input or sources like the 971H that use DVI outputs without adding HDCP.

I've done some poking around to see if I could find anything on the specifics of your Sony's DVI input. Online resources were very sketchy, but I finally found the manual and came across a reference on page 8 to support for HDCP. You should be able to connect HDMI sources to that display without trouble.

If you need an HDMI switch at some point, I've had good luck with my OPPO Digital HM-31 . There are others available from places like MonoPrice and Gefen.
The current state of our hobby is a bit more confusing than it probably ought to be. (I had some interesting conversations this week with a secretary at work who is trying to get a handle on what the analog broadcast cut-off means for her, and it reminded me of just how much more complex everything has become in the last decade or so.)

The issue of " profiles " for Blu-ray is an unfortunate side-effect of Blu-ray being rushed to market to compete with HD-DVD. There are three main levels of compatibility with extra features.

The most basic (profile 1.0) is no longer allowed, unless the player was brought to market before the end of last October. It is the most basic of options, and the players that fall into this category not only lack support for some bonus content (because they don't meet a higher profile rating) but also generally exhibit very slow disc load times (because they were early generation hardware).

Next is profile 1.1, which didn't actually exist in hardware until the Panasonic BD30 came out of nowhere last November, although the PS3 also received a firmware update to support it at about the same time. It requires 256MB of local data storage, a secondary audio decoder (for mixing the main soundtrack with a secondary track such as a commentary track or disc menu sound effects), a secondary video decoder (for PiP), and a virtual file system.

Profile 2.0 takes profile 1.1 and adds internet connectivity and more memory (1GB).

There's also a profile 3.0, but it's just for BD-Audio (sort of like DVD-Audio) and I've seen no talk of software that supports it. I don't know of any reason by a profile 3.0 disc would require a special Blu-ray player to play, but I really haven't seen enough info on profile 3.0 to know for certain either way.

OK.

So, if I got PS3, I'd need to get soemthing like the HM-31. Using a DVI/HDMI cable, I'd hook the OPPO 971H to the HM-31. I'd use an HDMI cable to hook up the PS3 to the HM-31. Then I'd use a 2nd DVI/HDMI cable to connect the HM-31 to the TV. That, in turn, would get me 1080i video.

Is the difference between 1080i and 1080p significant?

Any recommendations on a 1080p TV in the $1500 range?

You've got it, all the way through. HDMI/DVI from the 971H to the switch, HDMI fron the PS3 to the switch, HDMI/DVI from the switch to the TV, and you're all set.
It depends on a lot of factors. Screen size, viewing distance, display type, and even source material will all be significant factors. Personally, I wouldn't pursue a display upgrade solely to have 1080p. If there were other reasons to make an upgrade, that'd be one thing, but just for the sake of the "p" alone I'm not sure it's going to be a great deal. Remember, also, that the 971H's maximum output resolution is 1080i. OPPO didn't start supporting 1080p until the 981HD.
Others are probably better informed on the current TV offerings, but screen size range will certainly be necessary to help with that. My initial guess is that your current CRT would be hard to beat in its size range even though it can't do 1080p, and a larger display that offered 1080p with better performance than the CRT would likely land outside that $1500 price range. I could be wrong, though - like I said, I haven't been keeping a real close eye on the current offerings.

OK - thanks for all your help. It really is appreciated.

In the $1500 HDTV range, the Samsung LCD panels and the Panasonic Plasmas seem to be getting the highest ratings for their respective technologies. Sony's are popular for the name but not always the highest rated. You would probably looking at a screen size somewhere between 37" and 46". Look at some of the reviews online at like CNET or Ecoustics.

You'll end up getting a bigger screen if you buy last year's model instead of a smaller screen featuring all the bells and whistles for the same price. Get the right screen for your room, not just for the price.

also.... you can find DLPs in the 50" range from Samsung that will fall in the $1200-$1500 range.
They are also energy savers.
you will find that on CNET also....
Happy hunting/playing....