does anyone here actually have a standalone Bluray player?

[JackBurton]

Originally posted by: erwos

Originally posted by: JackBurton
I never said it was going to be cheap. I speced out an AWESOME server at <$5000. That's 10TB worth of storage in a RAID6 configuration, with the ability to expand to 20TB (12x1TB). Again, not cheap, but WAY more sophisticated. And as far as the administration piece, not much at all. Set it and forget it.

So, your grand solution would cost five times what the changer would, hold less, and require more work to keep up?

How did you get 5 times? What, 5 times the amount you just pulled out of the air and is supposed to happen sometime in the distant future? These are todays prices. So it's $3500 vs <$5000, with the ability to AT LEAST double the capacity for much cheaper. I'll pay an extra $1500 for a more elegant solution and the ability to expand for cheaper than you could pay for two 1990s contraptions. Not to mention the server can be placed FAR from the head unit making for a cleaner look.

There's always administration time needed - find me the server that's honestly fire and forget, and I could make tons of money selling it to my company.

What administrative time are you talking about? It's a file server, please tell me what I need to do with a static environment such as streaming content to a front end device? The ONLY administrative task you'll need to do on the server end is rip the movie. That's it.

And, again, the front-end portion of this is just as important as the storage. AFAIK, there's just nothing on the same level as WMC's DVD Library for Blu-Rays.

I agree. You just have to be creative to reach your goal with Blu-ray and HD-DVDs. But the end result is the same whether it be DVD, Blu-ray or HD-DVD.

Gotta say, that 1990's technology sounds pretty good in comparison.

Hey, to each his own.

 

[sivart]

I voted both since I have a PS3 and an LG BH200 (I guess this counts as stand-alone, even though it plays HD DVD -- and was cheaper than my 40GB PS3, to boot).

 

[Riverhound777]

I purchased my PS3 primarily to play games and use as a DVD/Blueray when needed, but I seem to be using it to play movies more than I game. I played COD4 all of 30 minutes. GTA4 got a lot of time, but I haven't touched it in over a month. Rock band gets some use when people come over, but that's about it. But I haven't been using my Wii either. I just bought Super Smash Bros and played it for 20 minutes.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Originally posted by: BlahBlahYouToo
when did 2.0 get released? does it come with the updates?
i can check in the XMB somewhere for the version right?

Just try to update the firmware over the internet, if it is the latest version, it will let you know. I am not sure which firmware it was in, but the latest version has it (Blu-Ray Profile 2.0) for sure.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

My PS3 usage is pretty evenly split.

 

[techwanabe]

Whatever I voted before, I have a PS3 coming late this week and cables, for the purpose of watching Bluray movies, upscaling my small library of DVD's and a few games.

 

[jtvang125]

Originally posted by: JackBurton

Originally posted by: erwos

Originally posted by: JackBurton
I never said it was going to be cheap. I speced out an AWESOME server at <$5000. That's 10TB worth of storage in a RAID6 configuration, with the ability to expand to 20TB (12x1TB). Again, not cheap, but WAY more sophisticated. And as far as the administration piece, not much at all. Set it and forget it.

So, your grand solution would cost five times what the changer would, hold less, and require more work to keep up?

How did you get 5 times? What, 5 times the amount you just pulled out of the air and is supposed to happen sometime in the distant future? These are todays prices. So it's $3500 vs <$5000, with the ability to AT LEAST double the capacity for much cheaper. I'll pay an extra $1500 for a more elegant solution and the ability to expand for cheaper than you could pay for two 1990s contraptions. Not to mention the server can be placed FAR from the head unit making for a cleaner look.

There's always administration time needed - find me the server that's honestly fire and forget, and I could make tons of money selling it to my company.

What administrative time are you talking about? It's a file server, please tell me what I need to do with a static environment such as streaming content to a front end device? The ONLY administrative task you'll need to do on the server end is rip the movie. That's it.

And, again, the front-end portion of this is just as important as the storage. AFAIK, there's just nothing on the same level as WMC's DVD Library for Blu-Rays.

I agree. You just have to be creative to reach your goal with Blu-ray and HD-DVDs. But the end result is the same whether it be DVD, Blu-ray or HD-DVD.

Gotta say, that 1990's technology sounds pretty good in comparison.

Hey, to each his own.

Unless the price of hard drives come down substantially that's just not going to be feasible for the average consumer. $400 blu-ray standalone players aren't exactly flying off the shelf at the moment either.

I do agree however that that's going to be pretty much the only route if you want a centralized storage system with a nice, clean UI. I have a htpc with 5.5TB of space running on Vista MC myself. I use the MyMovie plugin and everyone who has seen and used it loves it but when I tell them how much it cost they say I'm crazy.

 

[techwanabe]

Originally posted by: jtvang125
Unless the price of hard drives come down substantially that's just not going to be feasible for the average consumer. $400 blu-ray standalone players aren't exactly flying off the shelf at the moment either.

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't spill $400 for a standard Blu ray "only" player. I did spill $300 for a PS to get a good Blu ray player and a gaming system as a side benifit. That I can go for. As for cost of movies, I think I'm going the Netflix route.

 

[Gooberlx2]

Nope...I need prices to come down.

What I'd really like is a useable media center extender (performace equal to the 360) with a blu-ray drive.

 

[JackBurton]

Originally posted by: jtvang125
Unless the price of hard drives come down substantially that's just not going to be feasible for the average consumer. $400 blu-ray standalone players aren't exactly flying off the shelf at the moment either.

I do agree however that that's going to be pretty much the only route if you want a centralized storage system with a nice, clean UI. I have a htpc with 5.5TB of space running on Vista MC myself. I use the MyMovie plugin and everyone who has seen and used it loves it but when I tell them how much it cost they say I'm crazy.

You should be able to get a 1TB drive for ~$100 soon. But I agree, even then it is still expensive, but I never said it would be cheap. But take into consideration the devices it is competing against. It is competing against Sony's $3500 1990s Blu-ray jukebox. So it's not way out of line as far as pricing goes. And again, if you need to upgrade later on, you've got at least 10TB you could upgrade to for ~$1200 (12 x 1TB drives), instead of buying another $3500 contraption with a maximum of 200 more discs. Not to mention the eye sore of two big goofy looking media changers in your living room.

Another great thing about a disc less environment is that any room in the house can access the movies (data). All you need is a slim head unit and your good to go.

Again, this is not a cheap solution, but it's much better than Sony's antiquated product. Seriously, disc changer? In 2008?

 

[jtvang125]

I've owned one of those sony changers before (400 DVD) and for its intended purpose it does the job. Yes its bulky, outdated and the UI sucks but if you're not techy enough to build your own htpc with a couple terabyte hard drive array its pretty much your only other option. Actually after I sold mine I was considering buying sony's es version of it since it has a R-232 port which can by controlled by MyMovies. This was just to store the DVDs that I didn't feel were worthy enough to rip in order to save space on my array. Of course I felt $400 for a used one was a ripoff too so I kind of dropped the idea. The $3500 price tag for the bluray changer is even more of a ripoff. Aftering personally seeing how they work internally they shouldn't be 3-4 hundred dollars more to build than than a single disc model. But this is sony so there's always going to be a price premium.

 

[KeithTalent]

Primarily for Blu-rays and upconversion on DVDs, but in the past few weeks I've remembered why I used to like consoles, which is for sports games. Addicted to Tiger Woods 08 and MLB 08: The Show now.

Still the majority of the time my PS3 is used for movies/TV DVDs.

KT

 

[olds]

My grandson (9 years old) spent the weekend with us. He brought his PS3 and Game Cube with him. He left the Wii at home. Did I mention that he was spoiled?
He didn't bring the controllers for the PS3, just the guitar for Guitar Hero.
I thought that it would be a good time to check out the Blu Ray playback so I rented a movie. I was able to select HDMI in the PS3 options but it wouldn't let me change the Audio output. My receiver doesn't have HDMI so I use optical for audio.
I figured there was no sense in watching the movie and getting audio through the TV speakers (and I was totally pissed off by this point, it's a pain to use the guitar for a controller) so I said the hell with it and played Guitar Hero.
I had thought of getting a PS3 for Blu Ray but i think I'll get a stand alone player for Blu Ray.
Oh, and a PS3 for Guitar hero. :laugh:

 

[techwanabe]

Originally posted by: Gooberlx2
Nope...I need prices to come down.

It looks like the price of stand alone Bluray players is coming down well below the $399 cut off I've seen in recent weeks. I was at Wally World and they had several stand alone Bluray player for $299 or $278, in that range. I still feel the PS3 at $299 (Sony CC deal) has been a good choice even with the price drops. Those players were Samsung and Sony if I remember correctly.

 

[Gooberlx2]

Originally posted by: techwanabe

Originally posted by: Gooberlx2
Nope...I need prices to come down.

It looks like the price of stand alone Bluray players is coming down well below the $399 cut off I've seen in recent weeks. I was at Wally World and they had several stand alone Bluray player for $299 or $278, in that range. I still feel the PS3 at $299 (Sony CC deal) has been a good choice even with the price drops. Those players were Samsung and Sony if I remember correctly.

I'm curious to see how the LG Netflix/BD player will perform and what the price will be. It also streams Pictures and Music, which is nice.

Unfortunately that won't do anything for the recorded TV on my Vista PC, or my DRMed WMAs I've downloaded through the Zunepass. Sadly, the only solution to the Zune files is a media center extender....since it's really just a remote desktop instance.

 

[imported_grinder]

Originally posted by: erwos
Where's the "own a PS3 as an interim solution until BR-D mega changers arrive" option? I'm eagerly awaiting a < $1k BR-D mega changer solution that's feature competitive with the upcoming BDP-S550. They've already got a 200-disc changer in their HES line, but that's like $3500 and missing a lot of features.

The PS3 is a good BR-D player, not great. As others have mentioned, there are a few annoying limitations (can't bitstream DD+/DTS-HD HR, no IR control, no HDMI-CEC) which keep it from being a really amazing HT option, but you could certainly do worse for the money. IMHO, the only reason the PS3 is such a good option is because Sony isn't subsidizing their BR-D players at the same level as they subsidize the PS3.

Actually it will broadcast those formats you just need to set your PS3 to PCM or linear not Bitstream. The PS3 decodes the formats before the receiver so you wont see the nice light's telling you that you are in Dolby THD or DTS, but if you press one of the buttons on the PS3 control I think it was the triangle one you can see what it is being broadcast in IE Dolby True hd.
I can for one tell you there was a big difference in sound when I played a Dolby True HD BR disc on my PS3 it was awesome difference in sound.

There are a lot of issues with certain new receivers though and the PS3 the new HK's being one of them. Hopefully Sony will have a update to solve this or the Receivers will have a firmware update to fix it. The Denon 1909 works great with the PS3 if not in stand by mode and the Yamahaw 633 works good with it too

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: grinder
Actually it will broadcast those formats you just need to set your PS3 to PCM or linear not Bitstream. The PS3 decodes the formats before the receiver so you wont see the nice lights telling you that you are in Dolby THD or DTS

DD+ and DTS-HD HR are _lossy_ formats. There's no reason I shouldn't be able to let my receiver do the decoding on those, because it may well do a better job than my PS3. I chose my words carefully.

 

[nycdude]

Just got a stand alone Blu-ray player (all have dropped significantly in price) since I game mostly on the PC.

 

[flxnimprtmscl]

Where's the I have a BR drive in my HTPC option?

 

[dainthomas]

I picked up a BDP-S350 for $200. Why would I pay an extra $200 when I hardly have time to game on our Wii as it is? You can find players on sale everywhere for under $200 now, so I don't know why anyone would still buy a PS3 for movies.

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: dainthomas
I picked up a BDP-S350 for $200. Why would I pay an extra $200 when I hardly have time to game on our Wii as it is? You can find players on sale everywhere for under $200 now, so I don't know why anyone would still buy a PS3 for movies.

Amen! IMO, I think the PS3 is close to becoming an official "flop".

 

[sivart]

Mine is this way:

BD Playing = 99% on the BH200 (unless I want to see BD-Live features)

PS3 Gaming = 5%
PS3 Streaming Video (Netflix, Network, etc) = 94%
PS3 BD = 1% (just for BD-Live features I am interested in, so it may be less than 1%)

 

[s44]

Originally posted by: Oyeve

Originally posted by: dainthomas
I picked up a BDP-S350 for $200. Why would I pay an extra $200 when I hardly have time to game on our Wii as it is? You can find players on sale everywhere for under $200 now, so I don't know why anyone would still buy a PS3 for movies.

Amen! IMO, I think the PS3 is close to becoming an official "flop".

If by "flop" you mean "the device that singlehandedly won the format war".

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: s44

Originally posted by: Oyeve

Originally posted by: dainthomas
I picked up a BDP-S350 for $200. Why would I pay an extra $200 when I hardly have time to game on our Wii as it is? You can find players on sale everywhere for under $200 now, so I don't know why anyone would still buy a PS3 for movies.

Amen! IMO, I think the PS3 is close to becoming an official "flop".

If by "flop" you mean "the device that singlehandedly won the format war".

This isn't the place for that. Go elsewhere if you'd like to debate this stuff, gentlemen.

 

[evident]

hi everyone.

i signed up for the playstation visa card, got the MGS4 PS3 for $400 - $150 = $250 ($150 credit will come 4-12 weeks). pretty good for a blu ray player, next gen video game console, although i wont play any games besides the new street fighter, and the MGS game it came with probably. i'm a PC gamer at heart!