Considering a universal Blu-Ray player

[jsaliga]

For the past three years I have been using a Denon 5910CI as my SACD and DVD-A player.  I've been extremely happy with its performance and have no complaints.  But lately I have been thinking about buying a universal Blu-Ray player to replace it.  Blu-ray audio titles are starting to trickle into the market, but that by itself is not reason enough for me.  It would also be nice to be able to watch the occasional Blu-Ray movie on the 42" set in my home office, or better yet get Blu-Ray concerts and be able to enjoy the audio through my main listening system.

The models that are currently on my radar are:

Denon DBP-4010UDCI Universal Blu-Ray Player MSRP $1,999
Marantz UD8004 Universal Blu-Ray Player MSRP $2,299
Oppo BDP-95 Universal Blu-Ray Player MSRP $999

I have had some experience with Oppo in the past.  I had an Oppo DVD Player that got fairly heavy use for about 2 years before it broke.  I was favorably impressed with its performance and very underwhelmed by the build quality.

The Denon 5910CI is massive, built like a tank, and features stellar DVD-A and SACD playback.  I am inclined to rule out the Oppo just on my experience with their build quality, but don't want to exclude a potentially great player.  At this point I am merely kicking the idea around and am not even close to a decision.  If there was enough room in my rack I would probably buy a universal Blu-Ray player and keep the Denon 5930CI.

What say you?  Are their other players I should be looking at?  My budget is up to $3,500 -- but no higher.

--Jerome

[stringdriventhing]

Hello Jerome - as an Oppo BDP-83 owner, using it primarily for Blu-Ray movie playback, I can simultaneously agree with your concerns about build quality while still feeling confident that if I was in your shoes, I wouldn't be inclined to write-off the BDP-95 as a candidate. The BDP-95 looks to have a substantially "beefier" chassis than the somewhat flimsy BDP-83 version. Also, at the comparatively reasonable asking price it'd be a fine candidate for one of Dan Wright's upgrade paths for that model. While his tube package is a hefty $1,750, the solid-state package is "only" $500. I'm confident enough in Dan and his work to trust that he wouldn't involve himself with a product that didn't represent a good "platform" for his upgrades. In the time with my much more modest BDP-83 I have found it to be a solid performer for its intended movie playback duties, while also being favorably impressed with it audio capabilities via coax output to an external DAC. It faithfully plays back Redbook CD's, HDCD's, and the handful of SACD's friends have brought by. My only gripe with my unit, and it may have been resolved with the later models, is an awkwardness with remote-control CD playback as I was accustomed to being able to pre-select tracks for playback BEFORE initiating play mode. It may be there's a way I haven't discovered but I've had to begin play and THEN enter a different track number. - String      

[jsaliga]

Or perhaps I should consider pulling the Denon and my Slim Devices Transporter and replacing both with a PC...

http://www.bricelucas.com/bricelucas/?p=260#more-260

I doubt I'll go in that direction but I was struck by the computer case (and its whopping $599 price tag).  Still, with solid state drives and the right sound damping materials you can build a very quiet computer these days, and there are a number of high end sound cards on the market.  Hmmm....nahh.

--Jerome

[jsaliga]

I was hoping for more replies but that's ok.  This can be a space where I just think out loud and if anyone wants to jump in and tell me how crazy this all sounds then that's fine.

The computer idea is getting a bit more traction.  I would give up SACD compatibility unless I wanted to buy something like an Oppo BPD-93 (which sort of defeats the purpose of this exercise).  Then again I only have about 50 SACDs and most of those are hybrids, so the investment in SACD that I have is not huge.  I have much more content in the DVD-A format and 24bit FLAC downloads.

The computer can be used as my main PC rather than a dedicated audio device.  The computer on my desk is about 30 months old, and will be due for replacement soon.  Might as well kill two birds with one stone.

The cost for what I have in mind, however, is high and comes in at about $2,900.  That much dough would buy a screamin' fast computer with a six core i7 processor, 24GB of memory, Nvidia GTX 570 video card, audiophile sound card, Blu-Ray burner, 200GB solid state system drive, and a 2TB 6G SATA hard disk for application data and music.  I think I would get much more value out of the computer than I would a universal Blu-Ray player (which I have already said I would go as high as $3,500 for).

I could sell the Denon 5910CI and Transporter, perhaps recouping a sizable portion of the cost.

--Jerome

[bpape]

If you're going to dump the player all together and go with straight computer out, I'd check into either a PC or a Mac Mini running out to an Empirical DAC.  Some of the cleanest, most dynamic digital I've ever heard.  Lived with it for 4 days during last RMAF and was stunned at what could be had from that combo.

Bryan

[jsaliga]

I was thinking of a high-end RME or Lynx audio card.  The goal is to get three boxes out of my rack (Transporter, Denon 5910, and Oppo DVD Player) and replace them with a PC.

Spending $4K on a DAC isn't what I had in mind, but I appreciate the suggestion.

--Jerome

[BobM]

I can;t speak for the current crop of universal players but in the past the universals were known for doing one part of the whole very well, but falling down on the others. I think it takes a bit of coin to get one that does each of them good.

The Oppo's always had a great picture, but the sound was usually a bit hard and not quite up to par for similarly priced single format players. I agree that if you can go PC based for your music it might be worth your while to explore that, and get a decent unit that does the picture well for your home theater.

[tmazz]

I to have had a similar experience with Oppo. I have a 981 DVD player that I used in my living room primarily for video.Great performance on all fronts (The audio was just OK on the main system in the mancave but was more than adequate for the Paradigm/Sony HT receiver based system in the living room. Just like you, after about two years of heavy use one of the caps in the power supply bought the farm and the machine went down for the count. I called Oppo and they told me that they have a $49 flat service fee that would cover whatever was needed to get the machine back on its feet. They also said that turn around time was usually right around 3 days. Now this just happened last week and I haven't had the time to search the garage for the original Oppo box to ship it in so I can't verify that things will go exactly as they claim, but it does sound like a good service program. That at least takes a little bit of the sting out of the lower build quality.  Hey, of course it would be better if the Oppo was a more solidly built machine, but heck , it is also half the price of the machines that are. Once again, everything in this hobby always come down to some kind of trade-off.

As for a computer based system I would add two suggestions, which are based  on my experience with computers in general since I have not taken the plunge into PC based audio yet (although at the rate that I am running out of space I may be forced to soon.  ) First I would plan on equipping the machine with two 2Tb drives one to be used as primary storage and one for backup. One of the biggest investments you will make in this type of system will be the time it takes you to load all the music.If that storage drive goes down, you don't want to have to go through all that work again. A second drive is cheap insurance. And no, I would not want to set them up in a RAID array. If you get a virus or file corruption problem on your primary storage drive, the last thing you want is for that same problem to replicated on the backup drive in realtime. The second thing I would  do is put in another small drive for just OS and application and keep them separate from your data files. Windows has this nasty habit of corrupting drives the fix for which often involves repartitioning and reformatting the affected drive.  If it was me I would feel much better knowing that my data was in a safe and secure place. In the grand scheme of thing hard drives are cheap and spending a little more up front on the machine can save you a whole lot of headaches later on.

[jsaliga]

Thanks Tom.  I probably should have mentioned that I am an IT systems engineer with 30 years of technical experience.  Trust me when I say that backup is well in hand.  I have a dedicated 6TB NAS backup solution and make archival duplicate backup sets of critical stuff (including music) to LTO tape.

As I mentioned in a prior post the OS and applications will run from a 200GB solid state system disk.  Application data, user data, and music will live on a 2TB 6G SATA drive.

The more I think about this solution the more I like it.  I just need to settle on a sound card.

--Jerome

[richidoo]

I like the way you're thinking. With a computer you'll have access to internet radio.

For audio hardware, you want to reduce jitter to lowest level possible, get the 24/192 conversion you want, and have an audiophile quality output stage. Such a DAC with USB input would be ideal, but a USB>SPDIF converter is available from M2Tech. http://www.m2tech.biz/

[tmazz]

 I have a dedicated 6TB NAS backup solution and make archival duplicate backup sets of critical stuff (including music) to LTO tape.

A man after my own heart.  

[hometheaterdoc]

this one is right up my alley having used PCs as transport for going on 10 years now... will try to write more later... just passing through at the moment...

[JLM]

this one is right up my alley having used PCs as transport for going on 10 years now... will try to write more later... just passing through at the moment...

Can't wait Shane, as I'm computer DUMB!!! but am interested in eventually setting up a single, simple, full featured computer/TV/audio system.

[jsaliga]

Well I'm not computer dumb, and this won't be my first foray into multimedia PCs.  But there is always something to learn.

I have decided to run with the idea.  This will also give me an opportunity to move some other gear out that I am not really using.  I'd rather see it go to a good home than sit in my rack collecting dust. 

I think it's time for an audio gear yard sale.

--Jerome

[jsaliga]

I have been doing some reading up on the PS Audio PerfectWave DAC.  Looks like an interesting product but at $3K I would imagine that sales aren't exactly brisk.  There does seem to be some discounting going on through a few dealers, though not much.  Anyway, still kicking the idea of a DAC around. 

The PC configuration is pretty much set and written in stone.  I have settled on the RME HDSPe AIO PCI Express sound card.

This should be a fun project.

--Jerome