octaamal firebird odeena
Karon Howey
Blu-ray players in the same way as DVD players before them is becoming something you may almost buy at the store around the corner. This in heavy contrast to those early generations, where the bplayes hung high. And were sour...
Sony is one of the producers who are heavily involved in this market, but perhaps not necessarily in the heavy end of the market. In last year's collection of Blu-ray players, all count in below a kilogram, and the review sample being the smallest in the collection weighs 0.8 kg. We are, in other words in the light end. But is it any good?
The new series is obviously different from previous generations by having a much cleaner design. Outgoing models have received some pepper because of some of its slightly quirky design, with a little gratuitous almost flat pyramidal top. Maybe okay, but not very pleasing in my eyes. The new series is far more pure in design - not something that stands out, but it's really a brilliant design concept. In all its ease and simplicity there is something a bit chic with the Cubist and clean design.
And while we're at with weight - fair enough that 0.8 kg is not a lot of steel. But when it is combined with a compact design that these new players hold, it is not really saying wrong anyway. For a body that is half the width of a regular full-size HiFi component, it becomes a sensible relationship between size and weight. It has a pretty decent bulk density, and therefore feels straightforward to touch.
Physical noise from the drive is a very relevant parameter for both Blu-ray and DVD players. And BDP-S1500 is not complete silent during the entire process. But the good news is that the noise is very limited, and also has a pleasant character. It is also largely limited to startup and manouvering of Blu-ray playback. I am in possession of a Blu-ray player from Denon at 10 times the price of the BDP-S1500, which has much larger powerful noise problems. From Sony BDP-S1500 noise never is apearant others thatn when the sound is muted, and even then it is only faintly audible at a distance of two meters. Not flawless in other words, but very good for the price. Only wormwood is that it is a tad weaker in this exercise than an even more affordable player from Samsung, which I also have in my collection.
Sony was always top of the class in the exercise quickness in Blu-ray players' childhood and youth. And even though the terrain has largely been leveled eventually, Sony is still among the leaders in terms of speed.
The review sample of BDP-S1500 uses 20 to 25 seconds from standby to load the menu of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles , one of the very few movies in the Norwegian market currently available with Dolby Atmos. This is certainly more than approved.
The remote control is an important part of AV components, especially Blu-ray players. BDP-S1500's remote control is odefinitively in the compact class, but it scores well on many parameters. One of the most important one is that it is a logical and easy to navigate. Equally important is that it has good transmission power of the control signals, and the player has good sensitivity for the orders given from the listening position. Here the remote for BDP-S1500 scores very good. Even commands given from a position behind a sofa cushion is promptly executed.
A direct button for Netflix means that you don`t have to scroll through menus to activate this streaming service for movies. Netflix has in quite a short time conquered the market, and is actually starting to get a very dominant position in relation to "linear TV." The fact that the remote has received a direct button for activating the streaming service is to my knowledge unique. And I like it - a HiFi and AV enthusiast is using too much time and frustration deep inside silly menus.
Sony BDP-S1500 is thus a smart player that offers services like Netflix via the player. It depends on wired network connection, or at least a solution with receiver for wireless bridge if you don`t have access to wired network near the player. This is a limitation that it is possible to grumble over, if you have talent for that excersise. But to me it makes sense as an intelligent solution for the most affordable player in a series, to politely refer to the more expensive models if you need WiFi. It is more than equally relevant to be impressed that the player has wired network and Netflix available.
And if for some inexplicable reason vote that surfing the internet is a mandatory exercise for a Blu-ray player, you also need to put some more money into the pot. Here we talk BDP-S4500 and upwards ...
On the audio side, the player holds only digital outputs, in terms of HDMI and Coax. A very common development, and also a choice that makes sense for a player in this price category. This limits costs, as DACs are totally absent. The only parameter for sound quality in the player remains to be jitter characteristics. Since the test has been performed in a budget setup with an AV receiver costing 6.000, - (NOK) I have not had the ambition to dvelve into the sound properties via the digital outputs. I just note that it works pretty much the same with other players in the same general price segment. And BDP-S1500 is on par as a sound transmitter in the digital domain.
I think that Sony has done very much appropriate here. This is a player that has a suggested retail price of 799, NOK, but which in practice are available in major brands of 599, - (NOK). When you in addition to a highly competent player of Blu-ray get a thoroughbred Netflix machine that runs more bluntly into film streaming than any other instrument I have been in contact with, there is no battle left.
On top of all, it has a design that in its simplicity may go under the umbrella "gently elegant". I am pretty sure Mies would nod approvingly here. Less is more, even if it does not cost your shirt ...
If you miss WiFi and UPnP you can scroll up a few hundreds (NOK) extra - this is available in the more expensive models. Can you cope without , you get an incredible amount of bang for the money in this base model from Sony. Right now Sony BDP-S1500 a real bargain!
Hi... I just bought a RCA Roku TV, which I quite like so far. However, I have one issue I can't seem to figure out. I have a blu-ray receiver attached to an HDMI port on the tv, and the player keeps powering up automatically whenever I turn the TV on. Is there a way to set things up so that the player stays powered down when I turn the tv on?
Update for anyone who may be interested ... turns out it was a setting on my Sony blu-ray receiver, called "Control for HDMI". Apparently it's a Sony Bravia thing that lets devices connected via HDMI cable communicate with each other. It was set to ON on the receiver, so when the Roku TV powered up, it basically said 'hi' to the receiver, causing it to turn on. I went into the receiver's settings and changed the "Control for HDMI" to OFF and voila, the receiver now ignores the tv when I turn it on.
I do not have HTTP / HTTPS scanning on. My older Blu-Ray players 3 plus years old with Netflix work just fine. I am guessing that the Samaung unit needs to talk to a NTP server and sync it's time with before it will stream the Netflix or the others. Any suggestions or has anyone else experienced this with a Samsung blu-ray player streaming Netflix / YouTube, Prime? I do see many people seem to experience this issue with the units, but not seen a sure fix offered in the post for that. All I can see if something about the NTP time sync.
Why this device needs to sync with time when it does not display a time or anything on screen related to time is a mystery. My tow older other brand players don't care or must not use NTP and work fine. Ideas, suggestions?
One think I might try is to crimp a really long Ethernet cable to go from my DSL modem directly to the Blu-ray player and see if it will get and updated it's time, and then if things play, plug it back into my normal LAN passing through XG. Next question is if the thing does a NTP every time you click on a streaming service or not. I am using AT&T DSL Internet (Uverse service, and no I am not lucky to have the fiber to the house, but it is over copper) I was told I could have up to 6 devices on the modem, so I am guessing have up to 6 I.P. addresses? Anyway, glad the TV has two HDMI inputs, Use the old Blu-ray to stream Netflix, and the Samsung to play DVD's since the DVD drive on the old unit stopped working. Miss not having YouTube and Prime.
Ever since we learned the Xbox One S included an Ultra HD Blu-ray drive, people asked me if the Xbox One S was a good 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray player. One friend, in particular, an early Dolby Atmos adopter, has been hoping to pick up an Xbox One S to go with his OLED display. Happily, now over a year since I first reviewed a 2TB Xbox One S, I can say that, yes, the Xbox One S is every bit the 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Microsoft promised it would be.
There remains one caveat that I will come to shortly, but the last year has seen both significant changes to the Xbox One S as well as certain consistencies (gasp!) that lead me to this new, revised opinion of the Xbox One S' media prowess.
To re-test the Xbox One S, I took my own year-old 500GB Storm Grey model and put it against my go-to player, the Samsung UBD-8500. (I used both an LG 65UH7700 and a Samsung QN65Q7F for the display, and a Marantz SR6011 for the AVR.) I tested around twenty discs, mainly 4K Ultra HD Blu-rays with a few normal Blu-rays thrown in. With recent favorites like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2, John Wick: Chapter 2, and even the '2017 DTS Demo Disc (Volume 21),' I had plenty of Atmos and DTS:X tracks to test, as well as Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio tracks. (During this test period, Microsoft released their Fall 2017 update for the Xbox One S, which necessitated lots of retesting.) I even included one Dolby Vision Ultra HD Blu-ray, Spider-Man Homecoming. But even with a display that supported both Dolby Vision and HDR10, neither the Xbox One S nor the UBD-8500 support Dolby Vision, and thus, this was strictly an HDR10 run.
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