Blu-ray players best buys

Looking for a blu-ray player? well we have 3 of the best rated machines to suite most price ranges right here.

Under £300

BD-390Blu-ray Player

The BD390 has both wireless Internet access and 1GB built-in memory.

This speed us loading time significantly and with even the most feature-laden discs, loading BD-Live features is extremely fast.

Yes you can probably upgrade your BD players to including this functionality pretty easily, either by adding Ethernet kit, memory stick or both. The BD-390 attraction however is that it does everything it should out of the box without the need to purchase anything else.

Picture quality is excellent. The BD-390’s combination of smooth, low-noise backgrounds and crisply relayed details ensures a cinematic experience for the viewer.

The LG BD-390is much more than just a Blu-ray player – it brings multimedia into your living room! Thanks to Wi-Fi connectivity, you can access BD-Live content with the BD390 without covering your home in cables. An Ethernet is also on hand for a wired internet connection if required. The USB port is ideal for hooking up external storage devices, and the BD-390is compatible with the latest digital file formats such as DivX HD. Plus, thanks to 1080p upscaling, you can enjoy standard definition. All the for a very reasonable price, you probably won’t find a more feature rich machine for the price.

£300-£600

Sony BDPS760BBlu-ray Player with Multi-Channel Headphone Surround Sound System

Barely scraping in the ‘mid-price’ category we have the BDPS760BI say scraping in because you can pick this up for £304 at Amazon. This is arguably the first Blu-ray player  to offer built-in wireless connectivity, a godsend for owners whose internet connection isn’t within reach of their AV system. While other systems can boast that they’re ‘Wi-Fi’ ready you still need to shell out the extra cash for the dongle in order to enable it, which can be cumbersome and not that aesthetically pleasing.

Sony’s HD Reality enhancer allows you to fine-tune the picture on the fly, and tinker with aspects of performance such as grain and noise reduction.

Precision Cinema HD claims to help produce a smoother, sharper image. Finally, the BDPS760Balso includes Sony’s SBM (Super Bit Mapping) technology that helps match the image to your display’s bit depth (whether it’s 8, 10, or 12-bit). It is also Profile 2.0 enabled which means BD-Live functionality is included and with impressing sound in stereo or surround what you have here is a mid-range system at an almost entry level price.

Technical Details

Over £600

Sony BDP-S5000ESBlu-ray Disc Player

Build quality is on a par with the Denon DVD-3800BD, Marantz BD8002 and the Pioneer BDP-LX91. The solid, partly slanted, aluminium fascia gives the player a serious look – the number of buttons on the front is kept to a minimum to help preserve the solid, chunky appearance.

The feature rich system ranges from full Profile 2.0 and BD-Live status to onboard decoding of all high-definition audio formats. Ease of use is also an attractive quality of the BDP-S5000ES.
The XMB (XrossMedia Bar) menu system derived from the PlayStation 3 games console enhances the appeal. The menu system and remote control combine to give a smooth user experience.

The BDP-S5000ES really comes into it’s own by complementing its pictures with awesome sound, it perfectly layers the surround effects, dialogue and score for full cinematic quality. Yes is a more expensive system but it will leave you amazed at it’s capabilities.

Technical Details

• BD-ROM/R/RE, DVD-+Video/R/RW, CD Playback, AVCHD Playback
• 7.1 channel Linear PCM output as well as Dolby TrueHD/DTS-HD bitstream audio output to external AV receivers/decoders
• Built in BD-Live (Profile 2.0)
• 1GB of exchangeable storage