Skip to main content

Splashing out

I'm feeling a little bit guilty about splashing out on a Blu-ray player, since I'm still waiting to hear the results of my job evaluation that may mean a cut in salary. Blu-ray discs are still much more expensive than standard DVDs too. However: our two-and-a-half year old Cambridge Audio DVD89 has been playing up, showing shadows on light parts of the picture and what looks like randomly increased contrast (the dark parts of the picture suddenly look too black). I've also been trying to use it as a CD player and, despite favourable reviews of its audio quality, have found it cuts off the first couple of seconds of each track on certain CDs. Obviously that's enough to ruin the "musical experience".

I first had the idea of replacing the player when I saw that there were Blu-ray players from Sony and Panasonic that got glowing reviews - at under £200. Apart from the fact that I'm now sceptical in general of reviews in hi-fi magazines, at least they weren't telling me I had to spend a fortune. I would (in effect) get three players in one (CD, DVD and Blu-ray) for less than the price of the DVD89. The choice was between the Panasonic DMP-BD35 and the Sony BDP-S350. Both were in stock at our local Richer Sounds (for the best prices I'd seen advertised) and I plumped for the Sony - it was slightly cheaper and the remote control was more compatible with our Sony TV.

Although I only have two Blu-ray discs up to now, I'm impressed with BD image quality. The Simpsons Movie looks brilliant. The other one is The Company of Wolves and I suspect I should have plumped for a much cheaper SD disc here - it's a rather grainy film that seems to have had an indifferent transfer. With the continuing price gulf between DVD and Blu-ray, it looks as if care is needed when choosing which format to buy. Incidentally, this player seems to manage CD Audio fine, without any nasties like cutting off the start of tracks.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

New Who

The name at the top of the bookmakers' lists this summer for the next Doctor Who was Peter Capaldi. I was interested to see the list but pooh-poohed this, as it seemed the production team were set on casting only young actors - I think it was even said at one point that only someone in their 20s could keep up with the pace of production. I was delighted to hear back in August that the rumours were, in fact, true. The choice pleased me for two reasons - firstly, as a long-term fan of the programme (except for the awful period in the 1980s when the production went badly astray) I wanted to see a Doctor with the authority that only an older man could have; secondly, I knew Peter back in the 1970s as a fellow fan - we're the same age and I've followed his career since the 1980s. I had met Jon Pertwee a couple of times, during the making of Death to the Daleks and Planet of the spiders , and got to know Peter through the Jon Pertwee fan club (started by an old school friend, ...
1 comment
Read more

Who can do better...?

With the announcement that the new Doctor Who is definitely to start this Easter, I thought it was time to express my hope that Steven Moffat will give us a better programme than Russell T Davies did. Don't get me wrong - I am grateful to RTD for reviving the programme after a long hiatus, and letting us see brilliant stories like The empty child/The Doctor dances, Human nature/The family of blood, Blink and Silence in the library/Forest of the dead. It's no coincidence that none of these were written by RTD - he just isn't a very good writer and, with his light entertainment propensities threatening to kill the show in the same way as the appalling 80s version, his departure in January was long overdue. The "Christmas Specials" in particular seemed to be pandering shamelessly to the lowest common denominator. Do we really need to have it hammered home that it's Christmas with references to the season or snow every few minutes? In The runaway bride we ha...
1 comment
Read more

Buckets of blood

Sadly, I think a lack of imagination has meant a serious drop in standards and attitudes in "horror" films. I do love old horror/fantasy films (Terence Fisher's expression was “adult fairy tales”) but want to be uplifted – film should be an emotional experience, but not one that makes you want to slash your wrists. I don't think it's a coincidence that many of the films covered and praised in podcast s and on line ( Night of the Demon, The Devil Rides Out, The Wicker Man etc) are retrospective, and more than thirty years old. Just to establish where I'm coming from, can I say that I really liked Witchfinder General, Hellraiser and Candyman , all of which were gruesome films. One of my favourite horror films is Brian DePalma's Carrie , because it's psychological horror. What distinguishes all of these from lesser films is character and plot. I actually read a review of Carrie on IMDB where the (amateur) reviewer rubbished it because there wasn...
Post a Comment
Read more