Article here.
CN: Amazing picture and sound but ... the player originally shipped with a noise reduction circuit turned on which converted film grain into "crawlies". A new version has been shipped with the noise reduction turned off but ... the reviewers didn't feel it made much difference.
When the original BD-P1000 arrived, I excitedly hunkered down in our lab with Sound & Vision Senior Reviews Editor Al Griffin and a dozen of the first Blu-ray titles. As we swapped them out one by one, we grew increasingly concerned. They sounded great on our system, with a refreshingly clean, unstrained openness not typically heard on DVD. But the picture was suspect. Video quality mostly looked high-def — but not always. Close-ups had that remarkable detail we've grown accustomed to on good HDTV broadcasts and HD DVDs, but medium and wide camera shots tended to look soft.
The images also failed to display the eye-popping contrast and range of light that was evident with our HD DVD player. Perhaps most disturbing, though, was that many scenes — sometimes whole discs — randomly exhibited a subtle video noise in portions of the picture.
Of course, the first HD DVD player wasn't all that great from a useability standpoint. At the very least it managed a great picture (even if it took two minutes just to eject a disc).The end result is that the Blu-ray images, disc to disc and even scene to scene, were all over the place quality-wise and generally lacked that solidity that has been the hallmark of HD DVD. ... I just couldn't get past the fact that it still looked like video.
Hence:
And the verdict?I'd be remiss if I didn't comment on the BD-P1000's stunning industrial design. This is really one beautiful player, with a clean, sculpted front panel and a solid feel; build quality is excellent, and the gloss black cover distinctive. You'd be proud to have it sitting out in the open.
Although it wasn't without occassional hiccups, the BD-P1000 also worked well in day-to-day operation — a refreshing change from the slow, glitchy performance of the first HD DVD player. Power-up and disc-boot times were faster by about a third, though still longer than for a standard DVD player. Transport commands executed smoothly, and, unlike with HD DVD, the onscreen indicators for fast-forward and rewind modes were fully functional.
--AlanAs far as we're concerned, the jury's still out. We'll be anxious to test players from Sony, Pioneer, and other manufacturers, as well as future Blu-ray titles, to see if images from the two formats don't converge or, at least, become equally impressive in their own rights. In the meantime, though, it would appear that Round One goes to HD DVD.
