BDP-S500

The BDP-S500 the top of the range Sony Blu-Ray DVD Player for now and is the big brother to the BDP-S300. Whilst the picture quality of the BDP-S300 is impressive, the omission of some key features made its price appear to possibly be a false economy.

However, the BDP-S500 adds most of these missing features to its list of tricks, including Dolby True HD and DTS HD decoding. The external design of this Sony is also a lot nicer, thanks mainly to the motorised front panel that glides smoothly down when you press the open/close button. The case is also larger, presumably to give all that high tech circuitry inside plenty of room, but despite its large dimensions the player still looks classy in an understated sort of way.

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The BDP-S500 Blu-Ray rear panel is well equipped without having gone over the top. Video output duties are handled by the HDMI v1.3, component, S-video and composite sockets, though why anyone would use the composite socket to view HD discs is explained! On the audio side the
Sony S500 has optical and coaxial digital audio outputs as well as 5.1-channel analogue outputs. These allow anyone without an HDMI-equipped receiver to enjoy de-coded HD audio sound-tracks, together with Dolby Digital and DTS.

But if you do have a receiver with HDMI input and the relevant decoding capabilities, then the BDPS500 can transfer True HD, Dolby Digital Plus and DTS HD bitstreams or up to eight channels of linear PCM via the HDMI output. It doesn't support DTS HD Master Audio however, so if you wanted to access these high resolution sound-tracks you could be left a little upset.

The digital connection also outputs its video in resolutions of 720p, 1080i and 1080p. The BDP-S500 can upscale normal DVDs to any of these resolutions. When playing Blu-ray discs encoded in 1080p/24, the BDP-S550 will output them in their native frame rate, so as long as you TV has the relevant processing then you can watch films in the same way they were shot for the cinema. If not, then the deck also supplies 1080p/60 output.

BDP-S500

The BDP-S500 is an very good Blu-ray Dvd Player, delivering the such an impressive picture and sound quality that film critics really will be amazed. And ignoring the disappointment concerning the fact DTS HD Master Audio support and SACD playback have been left out, the feature list is rather good as Profile 1.0 players tend to be.

But this is the big drawback. There simply is no escaping the fact that the BDP-S500 will be outdated sooner rather than later, unable to play the interactive Blu-ray features found on the new Profile 1.1 compliant discs. The sensible thing would be to wait for the next generation of players like the BDP-S350 to come out, but if patience isn't your thing or you aren't really bothered about the interactive extras, then you could do a lot worse for yourself than to buy a BDP-S500.

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