Best Combination Bluray/HD DVD Player is.....

[Gravion2005]

Hi all. Which is the BEST Combination Blu ray And HD DVD all in one player? I want to match it up with my 905 onkyo cause after reading the post on that guy who took off his ps3 for the panasonic stating the hd master and dly true was so noticeable over the ps3's, i want to get the best blu ray player possible but at the same time, might as well get the best combo player so i can get jet li's universal film b4 war came out.

[cawgijoe]

.....is none.....sorry.....I know some of you here are combo's, but buying HD DUD just prolongs the war........

[Blu-Raider]

"Best Combination Bluray/HD DVD Player" = oxymoron

You'd be better off buying the cheapest one of each rather than a combo. Too many issues from my understanding.

[ronjones]

There are really only two choices since only LG and Samsung make dual format players. The just released Samsung BD-UP5000 is probably the better choice ($799 typical street price). This is the Samsung web page.

[quetzalcoatl]

The universal players are plagued with problems. So if you want to deal with them go for it.

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Originally Posted by Blu-Raider

"Best Combination Bluray/HD DVD Player" = oxymoron

You'd be better off buying the cheapest one of each rather than a combo. Too many issues from my understanding.

I agree.

The appeal of the combo players seems to be to give the illusion of everything being in a single format when that's really not the case at all.

Both formats separately have enough oddities and quirks to deal with on their own that to try and combine them into one player and make it work as flawlessly as possible just seems like a futile effort. I've heard bad things about the LG combo players. And while I haven't heard to many specifics about the Samsung combo player, given the difficulties that seem to plague their Blu-Ray only players, I really wouldn't bet on their combo machine being very reliable.


And one format or the other is more than likely going to die off while the other prevails, and based on current trends things are looking in favor of Blu-Ray. But regardless of which survives and which doesn't, if you plan to be format neutral now, then down the road after one dies off, you'll actually probably be better off having 2 separate players. The reason being is that by having a combo player and playing everything on it, you are putting more wear and tear on the machine with constant use, thus increasing the possibility of the machine wearing out sooner.

If you have two separate players and one format dies out, at least by having the separate player for the "dead" format, you will potentially be able to prolong the life of those discs by only using the respective player when you absolutely have to, since at that point, any players that play the 'dead' format, including combo players, will more than likely be discontinued and unavailble short of hunting ebay for them.

The only potential exception to this would be *IF* Blu-Ray were somehow to become to format to die off, odds are PS3 will still continue on as a game system, and would still probably have the ability to play BD movies since the games are BD based anyway, thus keeping people's existing collections going. Of course, this is dependant on Blu-Ray being the format that loses, which is really not likely to happen unless some crazy unforseeable catastrophic event were to happen within the format war to shift things the other way. But I wouldn't gamble on that happening, unless you like taking insanely risky bets that aren't likely to work out in your favor.