Do BD players vary streaming quality at a given internet speed?

[rarredoa]

I have Time-Warner Cable as my internet provider. I am getting approximately 3 Mbps connection speeds. Should this be enough to get HD picture & 5.1 sound for things like netflix and hulu?

The bigger question is, are there different blu-ray players/PS3 that are capable of delivering the high def experience at lower internet speeds than others? I used to get 5.1 AND HD picture on my PS3 60 GB (broken) using netflix, but I don't even get an HD picture with my panasonic BD player while playing 2-channel sound.

[HDTV1080P]

As long as other family members are not using the Internet at the same time 3Mbps sometimes is ok for 720P quality streaming (between 2.25Mbps and 4.5Mbps is recommended for 720P quality streaming on VUDU). If you want to use 1080P quality streaming then VUDU HDX requires a minimum of 4.5Mbps. Between 4.5Mbps to 9Mbps is recommended on VUDU for HDX 1080P streaming. Movies that use 3D and 7.1 Dolby Digital Plus should have 9Mbps streaming speed for the best experience.

As the quality of streaming improves greater internet speeds will be needed. When and if lossless audio tracks are offered in the future at least another 5Mbps might be needed for VUDU and other streaming providers.

http://support.vudu.com/?supportPage=answers/list

Some newer Blu-ray players like the OPPO BDP-103/105 support 1080P Netflix streaming with 5.1 Dolby Digital compared to older Blu-ray players that offer 720P quality with 2.0 Dolby Digital. Also the new Blu-ray players like the OPPO BDP-103/105 support VUDU 3-D with 7.1 Dolby Digital Plus compared to the old ones that only used 2D with 5.1 Dolby Digital Plus.

Also VUDU on some smart TV’s is better since the native HDX 1080P/24 signal is displayed at multiplies of the original frame rate instead of being converted to 60HZs. 100% of all existing Blu-ray players that offer the VUDU application convert HDX 1080P/24 movies to 60Hz using 3:2 pulldown.

[Semp1]

Players like the 103 that use the Qdeo chip should have better quality if the chip is implemented during stream. I don't know if it is. Ill compare. Personally I don't use it for that though but would like to know. Ill call OPPO and ask, now I'm curious.

[von_Levi]

Originally Posted by HDTV1080P

As the quality of streaming improves greater internet speeds will be needed. When and if lossless audio tracks are offered in the future at least another 5Mbps might be needed for VUDU and other streaming providers.

Right.

Rating the quality of streaming by whether it is 720p vs 1080p reminds me a lot of the megapixel war with digital cameras.

What really matters is the bitrate, which will likely remain low for the foreseeable future because ISP's charge so much for fast data plans.

[HDTV1080P]

Originally Posted by von_Levi

Right.

Rating the quality of streaming by whether it is 720p vs 1080p reminds me a lot of the megapixel war with digital cameras.

What really matters is the bitrate, which will likely remain low for the foreseeable future because ISP's charge so much for fast data plans.

Yes the 1080P on Blu-ray is better quality since the bit rate is much higher when compared to VUDU. This is very noticeable on 50 inch and larger screens if the consumer seats close enough to the screen. Now for the average consumer they cannot see the difference between 1080P HDX VUDU movies and Blu-ray do to smaller screens and seating too far away to see the difference.

When more Internet providers start offering 1000Mbps (1Gbps) internet plans then 300Mbps download plans from Verizon and other internet providers will start to fall in price. The slowest consumer link right now is the standalone Blu-ray players that only offer 100Mbps Ethernet jacks instead of 1000Mbps Ethernet jacks like the PS3 offers.

I would be interested in VUDU if they started to offer Blu-ray disc images for download or for streaming. In future years with a network upgrade VUDU in theory would be able to offer 7.1 DTS-HD Master audio with 1080P 3-D with streaming at around 65Mbps. By then consumers will be enjoying Quad HD (4K) movies on an optical disc in theory. Optical discs have more bandwidth compared to streaming and if optical disc technology keeps improving than they will always be better than streaming. At a certain point streaming quality and speed might be so good in 5-10 years that optical discs might no longer offer the best quality if research and development is stopped for optical disc technology. Optical discs are still ideal for long term 50 to 100+ years of data storage and they are immune to naturally occurring or man made EMP’s.

[nwdcrob]

Yes, the video/audio quality of Netflix Instant Streaming movies is substantially better on the Oppo 103 than the PS3.

[HDTV1080P]

Originally Posted by nwdcrob

Yes, the video/audio quality of Netflix Instant Streaming movies is substantially better on the Oppo 103 than the PS3.

The improved video quality is most likely true for Netflix 480P and 720P material since the OPPO has better upscaling, however the native 1080P Netflix material should be exactly the same on the PS3 and OPPO BDP-103. Also the 2.0-5.1 Dolby Digital sound quality will be exactly the same on the PS3 and OPPO when digital audio outputs are being used. The OPPO BDP-103/105 just has better analog audio outputs for legacy receivers without HDMI inputs.

[von_Levi]

Originally Posted by HDTV1080P

When more Internet providers start offering 1000Mbps (1Gbps) internet plans then 300Mbps download plans from Verizon and other internet providers will start to fall in price. The slowest consumer link right now is the standalone Blu-ray players that only offer 100Mbps Ethernet jacks instead of 1000Mbps Ethernet jacks like the PS3 offers.

I wouldn't hold your breath on that. American ISP's make their profit from overcharging for slow speeds.

NPR had a story a month ago about how internet speeds in the US rank 30th in the West, and yet we pay 20 times more than the average Western country for internet.

And not to mention data caps.

Until US ISP's get with the rest of the world, we're never going to have true high quality streaming video.

[rosskings]

yeah, i think so,Players like the 103 that use the Qdeo chip should have better quality if the chip is implemented during stream

[Flatnate]

I wish some of the player reviews could comment better as to the players ability to buffer various streaming services in a better manner than another player for a given connection speed.

[HDTV1080P]

Originally Posted by Flatnate

I wish some of the player reviews could comment better as to the players ability to buffer various streaming services in a better manner than another player for a given connection speed.

That would be good information to know. The PS3 has the biggest buffer since it most likely will use the internal memory and possible hard drive to buffer streaming services (large internal PS3 hard drive is used for BD-LIVE storage). The OPPO BDP-93/95 uses 2GB of internal memory with 1GB of internal memory reserved for buffering streaming services. The new OPPO BDP-103/105 only has 1GB of internal memory with 512MB reserved for buffering Internet streaming services.