PAL/NTSC player with DVD-Audio/SACD capabilities

[wenospeak]

Looking into a PAL/NTSC player with DVD-Audio/SACD capabilities right now.

Any recommendations (under 500.00)?

thanks..


I saw a nice looking Yamaha for 199.00 at Amazon (a specialty dealer wanted 3.19.00 for the same player)...

[manono]

Hi-

The Oppo Digital DV-970HD does what you want (and a whole lot more):

http://www.oppodigital.com/dv970hd/dv970hd.html

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=682896

At $150, it's a steal.

[Dr_Layne]

The cheaper DVD players that do what you want do not use the best chips for decoding DVD-A/SACD. Most will convert SACD to PCM then to analog. I have a Yamaha DVD-S657 which I bought for it's multi purpose use. Has audio sync issues when playing DVD videos. Every once in a while I have to stop and restart the dvd to get the audio synced back up. DVD-A/SACD audio performance is ok, but not as good as those formats are capable of.

Personally, I'm looking into the Denon DVD-3910 model. Tired of cheap dvd players, time for a decent deck.

A_L

[manono]

If you'd even bother to read the AVS Forums thread to which I linked, you'd quickly find out that it's a serious DVD-A/SACD player. If you want to spend $1500 (10 times as much, and well above the $500 limit wenospeak imposed), then be my guest. I have a different Oppo, the OPDV971H, and as a DVD player, it handily beats the Denon 3910. Doesn't have SACD, but then I'm not interested in that:

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cgi-bin/shootout.cgi?function=search&articles=all

The Oppo is rated at 98, while the Denon is rated at a 93. Don't get me wrong; it's a great player with the same Faroudja chipset, but price alone isn't always a determiner of quality.

As for this player's DVD-A/SACD quality, although it has an 86 rating, mostly because of no Faroudja, the review does say this:

The 970HD supports the new HDMI v1.1 specification, so DVD Audio’s high-resolution multi-channel PCM sound can be output digitally via HDMI. This is also the only player I’m aware of that allows SACD’s DSD sound format to be converted to high-resolution PCM (88.1kHz/24bit) and transmitted via HDMI as well! End users should be aware that your receivers or surround processors need to be HDMI v1.1 compliant as well to use this feature.

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cgi-bin/shootout.cgi?function=search&articles=130#Oppo%20D igitalDV-970HD%20(HDMI)

The problem mentioned in that review will be fixed with a firmware upgrade. This is a very new player. Since their customer support is top-notch, and their return policy very liberal, you might consider ordering one and then returning it if it doesn't meet your expectations.

[wenospeak]

Right now I have the Pioneer Elite DV-47Ai and it's ok, but the reader is very sensitive. If there's even a slight flaw in the disc, it won't play.

It was a 1200.00 unit "on sale" for 600.00 when I bought it 4 or 5 years ago.

Maybe I should just get a PAL/NTSC player and keep the Pioneer, maybe that would solve the enormous price issue for SACD/DVD-Audio quality.

Whew, I'm posting in another forum here trying to re-sync a bad PAL to NTSC DVD conversion and my head is spinning. The whole idea behind getting a new player was so that could avoid having to convert PAL to NTSC.


Thanks,

Rick