What's the best Blu-Ray player for 300.-350.


I just bought a Pioneer Kuros PDP-5020 and need to squeek a Blu-Ray player out of the budget. I'm thinking around 300. to 350. for now. Anyone with any suggestions on the most bang for the buck? Thanks
kallefornia
Mcroth66
Again that was my exact point driven home… No point of waiting or paying more for a pretty much underground format that has been around for 10 years if you don't own an extensive collection.. Which by the way I am a huge oppo supporter, also was a SACD adaptor, but now in the end you can see where all this is going.. Part of the issue is that in fact if you are big on SACD you already have or can have a killer player or you would not be that highly invested in the format, and guess what Oppos SACD aint all that great, unless you go and do a mystical modded machine available from the various modders out on this site and dump another 1000 bucks to do their recommended advancements into these 300 dollar transports! So from my point of view if your already a OPPO 983 owner, keep it and get a damn good blu ray machine calling it a day, because I can tell you right now most of oppos sales will be based on somebody owning the 983 machine and coming back wanting it all in one again… That’s just silly if your on the consumer end of it!

Interesting thing is that in fact somewhere I read even under their breath oppo would not have even released the 983 had 3 months later they known blu ray would win. Even as we SPEAK you can go on the used sites including this one and see a bunch more 983 units coming up for sale, probably due to a 50 - 50 split of they are either A- gearing up to go and spend double on the new Oppo machine with blu ray to keep up with the jones, or B - because they have finally gone out and seen the capability of Blu ray and decided they will no longer invest in standard DVD…

Which in fact is the next issue that most have put all their stock into oppo over the past 4 or 5 years because nobody had a better upscalling machine to 480p, 720p, or 1080p so it had a good market, but I am here to say don't worry about that, because not only does the new sony machines blow the doors of standard DVD with blu ray, but does the Standard DVD picture as good as the oppo for the most part so you lose nothing. That being said if you need an all in one universal and definitely can not live with having 2 machines on your Rack being one for SACD and standard DVD if you choose and another for blu ray, by all means wait it out and buy a far more expensive player…But even at that point for most today I would HIGHLY recommend staying away from the universal machine because you would be far better serving yourself with an even better sounding stand alone SACD - CD player if your that highly invested in it, and a Good Blu ray player which probably will cost you no more than the new oppo.

There is only 2 reasons most would wait on the oppo to pay for it at this point, 1- the need for upscalling pristine standard DVD playback and fear no other machine due to trust oppo has gained can do it, and 2- because they really NEED SACD and possibly DVD-A which is completely gone much like HD-DVD and in fact supposedly the new Oppo might just drop DVD-A all together but seems to promise keeping SACD on board.

Just my opinion as I have seen the scurry and rush many times now of people wasting time and money especially on audiogon reselling these machines almost overnight!           
Agreed Undertow. Just saying that if one has never heard SACD and does not care about having it within their Blu Ray player now would be a great time to check it out. I still can't believe so many people have never even listened to SACD. Good luck Kalle.
Part of the answer depends on what receiver your have. If your receiver can decode the new audio formats (DTS Master Audio and Dolby Digital TrueHD) then you can go for the less expensive versions (like Panny 35 and Sony 350). But if your receiver does not decode them and you want the player to decode these formats and send them to your receiver over HDMI 1.1 and via multi channel analog, then you need to go for the higher priced ones (Panny 55 or Sony 550). If your receiver does not have any of the above, then you can go with the lower cost ones and use optical or digital connections although you will not get the new audio formats. If you go with with a player that does not decode the new formats, then the Panny 35 is hard to beat.
Thanks for all of your responses guys, they all have been informative making my decision on which units to look at quite easy. Undertow, I appreciate the link to your past discussion on this subject which will eliminate a ton of leg work on my part.
Based on my needs and audio gear it looks like the Sony 550 is the one to look at since the Panasonics have all dried up in the stores locally and have become quite evasive. I can't really see waiting for the Oppo to hit the market since I mainly watch movies during the winter months and we can only wait to see if it will live up to it's expectations when released for production.
Again thanks for the solid info, now I can go out and make a choice that will best suite my A/V needs.
Kallefornia
Panasonics dried up because they are discontinued! CES has the new versions like the BD 45 and 65 or something like that... The sony is far superior trust me, and very affordable, with future update ability so don't worry too much.. And the nice thing is you can get a S550 at the local Target, best buy or anywhere really to just try it out vs. many other models, and if you did not like it for some reason return it no questions asked, however you will of course get a far better deal online, but you can lose shipping it back and forth.

Good Luck