Samsung's BD-UP5000 HD DVD / Blu-ray combo player gets previewed

by Darren Murph posted Sep 16th 2007 at 2:03AM

The folks over at HDGuru managed to spend a few quality minutes with Samsung's forthcoming hybrid player, and initial impressions look to be pretty positive. Granted, their BD-UP5000 was a pre-production sample, but they were mighty impressed with the BD-Java / HDi support, HDMI 1.3 functionality, and the Reon scaler chip within. During limited time with the player, the assortment of HD DVDs and Blu-ray films that they got to view "all looked spectacular, with every image appearing clean, crisp and sharp as a tack," and the "faster chapter changes and quicker entry into other menu functions" compared to previous generation units were highly praised, too. Overall, it seems that we've got a respectable combo player on the horizon for those not willing to choose a side, so be sure and give the read link a visit if you're too impatient to wait for a full-on review.

Filed under: Reviews, Blu-ray, HD DVD, Players, Samsung

Tags: bd-up5000, combo player, ComboPlayer, hybrid player, HybridPlayer, preview, samsung

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Neutral

misterhearn @ Sep 16th 2007 2:54AM

1st!!

Price point will make or break this, ironically this is geared towards people sitting on the fence so to speak but when you think about it people on the fence dont really want to pony up to much money.

600.00 combo players may have a chance but it kinda prolongs things. Who knows we may actually just have two formats for a while. I'll stick with my HD DVD player for now. We'll have a winner maybe two years later? If not I guess its possible to have two formats, hell we have PCs and MACs and Linux somewhere in the mix, so I guess it could happen

Neutral

Hamza Benamar @ Sep 16th 2007 8:06AM

The issue in Europe is that even if we wanted to buy either one of the formats there are no DVDs to rent to make the purchase worth the double price people pony up in the US. I could buy a $100 device but there are no movies ...

Highly Ranked

Kevin Murphy @ Sep 16th 2007 2:00PM

This would be very very tempting at the $500 price point, but $1000? Need a new laptop more.

Neutral

MI @ Sep 16th 2007 2:33PM

So if Samsung calls it a Blu-Ray / HD DVD player, why does Engaget insist on calling it an HD DVD /Blu-Ray player? Oh yea, forget I asked.

Neutral

huntsvilletiger @ Sep 16th 2007 4:05PM

Neutral

mike @ Sep 17th 2007 4:40AM

I too would love to get into the HD market starting with one of these, however thats not gonna happen at $1000. I would buy for $499. @ $1000 its too much money. I would rather spend $500 on a player for 1 side only if this is the case.

Highly Ranked

JeffDM @ Sep 17th 2007 11:00AM

I think this one might justify the price if it's an HQV chip, which is the best you can get in a consumer machine. Machines with Reon HQV scalers usually cost a lot more, the Denon was $2k USD. This is the cheapest I've seen so far.

Neutral

KC @ Sep 17th 2007 12:37PM

I'm with the crowd on this one, nice and shiny, and neat that it plays nice with both formats but at $1000 bucks it's just to expensive to matter in the format war.

If Samsung is listening, your consumers are telling you this needs to have an MSRP of $499 if you hope to sell any

Neutral

KC @ Sep 17th 2007 12:37PM

Highly Ranked

Raptor007 @ Sep 18th 2007 3:17PM

I wish that Samsung would give us two options: this player with the expensive and awesome HQV Reon, and a cheaper one to help get people off the fence and into HD.

Personally, I will be getting this player. I want all three formats on one player, and I want my SD DVDs to look as good as they can on my 1080p screen.

My only concern is the lack of USB for storage (so far). It'd be nice if I could put downloaded material onto a flash drive and play it with this player. Oh well, there's always my modded Xbox. :�)

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