Review: Panasonic DMP-BD30 Profile 1.1 Blu-ray player

Model reviewed: Panasonic DMP-BD30 - SRP $499.95

Now that the high-def format war is over, more people than ever are looking for a good, reliable, and all-inclusive Blu-ray player. But that particular search isn't as easy as it sounds, because as of this writing there are no BD players that will do everything a person might ask of them. Ideally, the player should be relatively compact, Profile 2.0 compliant, HDMI Version 1.3 compliant, with the ability to decode all of the higher audio codecs internally in up to 7.1 channels. No such animal exists. Yet. However, the Panasonic BD30 comes about as close as you can get.

You've probably heard that Sony's game machine, the PS3, does more than most brands' stand-alone BD machines, but even it won't do DTS-HD Master Audio. So let's start with the two things the Panasonic won't do. It is not Profile 2.0 compliant (but it is 1.1 compliant), meaning it does not have an Ethernet port to connect to the Internet for Web-enabled downloads; and it does not internally decode higher audio formats. Are these serious drawbacks? Not for me or for a lot of other folks, but they could be deal killers for some people. For instance, I have owned several HD DVD players over the past two-and-a-half years, all of which had Ethernet ports that I never used. So, for me, the Panny's not having one is no loss. So far, (again, as of this writing) there are no Blu-ray discs I know of with downloadable extras, anyway, and even the HD DVDs I own with such bonuses amount to very little. Probably the biggest advantage of the Internet connection is being able to download firmware upgrades directly to the player, but even here Panasonic makes it so easy to download and burn firmware upgrade CDs on your computer that the Ethernet port seems superfluous. As for the Panny not being able to decode higher audio codecs internally, this is only a concern for those people who own older receivers and amplifiers that cannot decode such formats on their own. Panasonic clearly intended their BD30 for home-theater fans who already own one of the newer Onkyos, Denons, Yamahas, and the like with internal decoding for top-end audio formats.

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Nevertheless, Panasonic has the BD30's two drawbacks covered. Their upcoming BD50 addresses both of these issues by adding the 2.0 Ethernet port and by decoding all audio codecs within the machine. The only thing is, the company hasn't announced a release date for the BD50 yet, aiming probably for this spring, and the BD50 will undoubtedly cost more than the BD30, given its added capabilities.

In any case, let's get down to what the BD30 can do, and that is significantly more than any other stand-alone player is capable of doing. First, it reproduces a magnificently clear, detailed picture, and it does so flawlessly. In playing dozens of BD discs now, I have yet to find the player skip, pause, freeze, or even hiccup during playback. Next, it bitstreams to the receiver all the higher, lossless audio codecs via its HDMI connection, and it does so in 7.1 channels if the disc contains them: linear PCM, Dolby TrueHD, and DTS-HD Master Audio. If your receiver won't decode the higher codecs, then the receiver extracts the core or basic lossy PCM, Dolby Digital, and DTS. Moreover, the player also has 5.1 analogue outputs, should you need or prefer them. And how do the higher audio codecs sound? As imposing as the video. Practically all Blu-ray discs contain one or more of these lossless formats, so if you haven't heard them, you're in for a treat. As to which format is best, I leave that to the listener. They all replicate a soundtrack identically, bit-for-bit, to the original, and they all sound better to my ears than their lossy core partners.

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Furthermore, the player upconverts SD discs to whatever your high-definition television is capable of reproducing--720p, 1080i, or 1080p. Just don't expect it to upconvert quite as well as some of the Toshiba HD DVD players. The upconverted picture quality on my Tosh A35 looks a tad sharper to my eyes than the BD30's, so I still use the A35 to play standard-definition discs.

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Insofar as what else the Panasonic does, well, it performs virtually every task that every other high-def player, BD or HD DVD, does. It plays all manner of CDs, memory cards, DVDs, DVD R/RWs, still pictures, MP3/JPG files, and the like. The back of the player includes connections of all kinds, the HDMI connection being the most important, but also component, S-Video, optical audio, 5.1 analogue, and everything else you'd expect to find, and the front display shows everything that's going on in the player (and going out).

The remote is handy, too. It's relatively small, lightweight, and simple to use, with large, easy-to-read buttons. With it, setting up the player for the first time is a snap. You use the on-screen menu instructions to set the machine's output to the highest resolution capability of your TV (at 24 or 60 frames, depending on your set), the aspect ratio, the speakers to multichannel or two-channel, and all the audio formats to bitstream, with the Secondary Audio and the PCM Down Coversion both to Off. If and when you need to access a Picture-in-Picture feature on a disc, you turn on the player's secondary audio, and the player outputs both soundtracks to the receiver, with the primary soundtrack reverting to its core only.

I might note here that a first-time set-up should also include a check of the player's firmware version number. As of the moment, it should be Ver. 1.6, which fixes a glitch in the player's PCM LFE bitstream output. If the player shows a lower firmware version number, as I said above, it's easy enough to download the newest version to a writable CD and apply to the player.

In addition to all of this, you can easily change the player's settings using its on-screen menus (during playback, too, if you like) for signal type, video, soundtrack, subtitles, audio and audio channels, and angles, with further options for sound effects, repeat or random play, seamless play, black level, dynamic range compression, aspect ratio, dialog enhancement, and screen saver. You can even adjust the contrast, brightness, sharpness, color, gamma, etc., of the outgoing video signal.

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As I say, the player does practically everything you could want it to do. Plus, it's almost exactly the same size, weight, and color as the Toshiba A3, A30, and A35 players, so if you have one of those models, this one makes a good match for it in your system. Oh, and it's quieter than the Toshibas. The Panasonic's fan makes hardly any noise, and its disc rotation is practically soundless. Additionally, its start-up time, while not capable of winning any races with a good standard-definition DVD player, is a little quicker than Toshiba's HD DVD players. Notwithstanding, both high-def format players behave computerlike at start-up, so expect some small delay. As for booting up a BD disc itself, that depends upon how much information the player has to read from the disc. I've discovered that some Blu-ray discs start playing faster than others if they don't have as many extras or fancy menus on them.

I have no complaints whatever with the Panasonic BD30. If you look at a chart of all the currently available BD players on the market (for example, http://www.idoblu.co.uk), you'll see that none of them do everything you might want them to do, but the BD30 comes close. It certainly does everything I want it to do, and it does so flawlessly.

Links:
Official page on Panasonic.com
Buy the player on Amazon.com