Sony BDPS470B 3D Ready Blu-ray Disc Player with Full HD 1080P
Posted by Notcot on Jul 27, 2010 in In-Car Technology |
Product Description
3D Ready Blu-Ray Disc Player with BRAVIA Internet Video & Wireless LAN Ready.
- 3D Ready Blu-Ray Disc Play
- DVD/-R/-RW/+R/+RW Playback
- BRAVIA Internet Video
- Xross Media Bar & BBC iPlayer
- Wifi LAN Ready
Sony BDPS470B 3D Ready Blu-ray Disc Player with Full HD 1080P
I’ve taken a gamble and an investment on the future that 3D tech will take off as currently I do not own anything larger than a 22inch monitor.
The unit itself comes fairly standard, the power cable is connected to the base, it comes with a remote and batteries and some instructions. Assembly is straight forward, however, if your TV / monitor’s native resolution is not able to cope with 1080p you may end up with a black screen like I did.
The instructions are very clear and in this instance were able to help straight away in telling me how to adjust the setting manually without a display to follow. It’s working at 720p via an HDMI to DVI cable perfectly happily on my monitor and bluray looks stunning. I cant say there’s a vast improvement on DVD’s but maybe the DVD software on my PC has upscaling too. I’ve tested some other formats and it seems to cope well with the usual XVid / DivX type avi.
The interface is easy to navigate, it can be a bit slow to respond at times though there seems to be a method to speed it up in the menus at the expense of extra fan usage. It’s quiet the unit is closer to me than my speakers and I can’t hear it when a movie is playing. The I/O options are varied and useful for people like myself who have filled up virtually every slot this thing uses my last coax connection.
The build quality is a little flimsy and the remote is quite bulky but aesthetics don’t bother me so much as it’s hidden away.
BUT the big big issue for me is not so much a blemish on the device and more on Sony’s tactics. The unit comes prepared with an ethernet port for you to connect to a router with a cable, however, I would guess not many people are close enough to their routers to warrant a cable connection for their entertainment centres. At nearly £80 you can buy a wireless adapter purpose built for this machine, it’s a huge price and personally I will be using a shared internet connection with my laptop to get the online functionality without having to shell out that much for a USB wireless dongle.
Rating: 4 / 5
When I came to buy a Blu-Ray player a couple of weeks ago and started researching I quickly realised that I didn’t know anything about them anymore. The latest generation of players are basically media streamers that happen to have a Blu-Ray drive mounted in them. This Sony player is a great example.
Out of the box the first thing you notice is it’s size and weight. It is a very small item front-to-back and heightwise and weighs very little. The build quality is OK. It looks fine but very plasticy and attracts dust very easily due to static build up. It’s a standard width and looks nice under my Sky HD box (if a bit buried).
On startup (which is very quick indeed, a couple of seconds) a wizard-type easy setup guides you through the video and audio connection options. It also immediately connected to the internet and ran a firmware update. The user interface is attractive, easy to use and very responsive. I’ve read reviews of earlier players being slow to start and to load discs and this is neither, being comparable to a DVD player, even when loading a Blu-Ray.
The internet connection elements are well presented, divided into audio services (radio), video (YouTube, BBC iPlayer…) and picture (nothing yet). It takes USB and disc stored files as well and let’s you browse and play these in the same way. Since I got the player a week ago several new services have been added such as Channel 5’s catch-up service so I have high hopes for the future. It also plays most formats of file copied from a computer to USB or DVD local storage. MKV support is very strong and I haven’t found one yet that it doesn’t like.
As of today (10th June) the DLNA support has just been released. It installed without problems over the network and immediately spotted my Windows Vista PC’s media library. Photo and audio support are great, and video seems OK so far (but some of my files don’t play right now). Great stuff!
One last note, this player (well for sure mine anyway) has WiFi built in, contrary to Sony’s own published specs.
Rating: 4 / 5
Right off the bat I’m going to tell you this Blu Ray player is superb. I’ve owned a PS3 since launch day, and, up until now, have used that for my HD movie experience. Lately, the noise of the onboard fan has been annoying me. With also using the PS3 as my media server and for occasional gaming, I thought it was time to lessen the load and opt for a standalone HD player. After a lot of to and fro, I finally decided to opt for this player here. I have to admit, access to iPlayer HD and LoveFilm (as I have an unlimited account there already) was a factor.
Ok, there’s no in-built Wi-Fi, contrary to what another reviewer has stated. There’s a Lan port which you can plug a cable into or a USB slot you can use to upgrade the player with a seperate Sony dongle to turn it Wi-Fi. Since I already have a cable running all the way into the living room, spending an extra £50 for the next model up just for wi-fi seemed a bit silly.
As soon as the player’s connected you’re prompted to update. Once that’s done (all automatically) the player can stream most types of media files from a PC or laptop. It’s outstanding at this. A lot of people find MKV’s don’t stream. I found this as well, despite them being encoded in H264, a codec this blu ray does support. I found that if I changed an H264 encoded MKV to an .mpg extension, suddenly the player could see and stream it, smooth as silk.
Internet streaming is flawless, and gaining access to your LoveFilm account couldn’t be easier. With over 3,000 films to watch online as part of an unlimited subscription package, opting for this player becomes a no-brainer. YouTube is also a lot of fun. On top of iPlayer, there’s also support for channel 5’s catch-up service. Quality is as good as the over air transmission.
The Blu Ray player itself is a step up from the PS3. RGB support doesn’t offer the kind of black-crush associated with PS3 playback. Images are rendered a little sharper. Where you will notice a difference, however, is in audio. Audio is much more open than the PS3. And, finally, I have HD audio playback via Bitstream (note, to get Bitstream playback enabled you have to go into the BD Audio Mix setting and set to ‘off’). DVD upscaling is incredible. Previously I owned a fairly highly regarded Philips dvd upscaler. Trust me, it has nothing on this. I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. Almost HD quality, Sony claim. They’re not joking.
Multi-region dvd playback is possible. Simply Google ‘Sony bpd-s370 multi region’ and you’ll immediately find out how to do it. The 370 model is cheaper and more popular, so Googling that gets a quicker result — both models are the same, except the 370 doesn’t have 3D support. When you’ve found out how to multi-region the 370, you’ve found out how to do the 470 (it involves buying a One for all remote with a magic button). I performed the unlock and everything works sweet, with all my multi-region films now upscaled to near perfection.
I have one SACD disc which I’ve given a spin. It sounds incredible. So, if you have a large collection …
Oh, and 3D. I don’t have a 3D TV as yet, so I can’t tell you what it’s like. I opted for this model to be that little bit more future-proof, should I decide to go down that road.
Hopefully I’ve answered all the questions I had running around my brain before buying this player. It’s utterly superb, and a steal at the price (I was fortunate enough to get it with the 10% discount promotion). If you have no need for 3D and have a wired internet Lan connection close by, opt for the £99 Sony BDP-S370. It’s exactly the same player, and the steal of the year.
Rating: 5 / 5
After the Sony update, streaming is available and easy to set up.
The Blu-ray player itself, though, is amazing – especially at upscaling normal DVD’s to almost Blu-ray quality.
Overall, feature packed and easy to use. Excellent value for money.
Rating: 5 / 5
purchased this player today just so that i could test my 3d tv found the picture very clean and vivideven with standard dvds the one thing that a did find very good over my ps3 is that it will play standard dvds at 24 frames just waiting for the update to my ps3 for the 3d blurays then i can put this away in the kids bedroom if you don’t have a bluray player just go out and buy this one
Rating: 5 / 5