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Okay. That’s more like it. Walmart is offering the Magnavox NB500MG1F Blu-ray player for $68. Yes, there are lots of features that you don’t get with this basic model, but it does have an HDMI connection and an SD card slot. And it’s not even Black Friday! This brings Blu-ray into range for the average buyer. The difference in price between this and a DVD player is about the same as dinner for four at McDonald’s, which means that a lot of people will now be able to afford Blu-ray. Unfortunately, I still think it may be too late; Blockbuster is closing stores and Netflix is streaming movies over the Internet by the boatload. The days of distributing movies on plastic discs are numbered. You’ll probably get at least five years out of a Blu-ray player if you get one now, but I expect it will become a minor component in movie delivery to the home before the end of that period.
Posted by Alfred Poor, February 5, 2010 5:00 AM
Reader Commentary The price on the Walmart website is $78.... Spoirier, you are correct. The link now shows $78 as the price. All I can say is that it was $68 when I wrote the column, and prices can change quickly. I'd still argue that the $78 price still supports my basic conclusion. Instead of being hundreds more than a DVD player, it's something like $50 more, which is a small enough difference for many people to make the switch to Blu-ray. Alfred... Where are all the naysayers that said this would never happen?... Hey, I'm standing right here! I chose HD DVD to beat Blu-ray, but I never thought either would get to competitive prices this quickly. I still think that Blu-ray is too little, too late, and will never come close to DVD's success. But I'm ready to be proven wrong on that, too. (I'm getting used to it. <g>) Alfred... Of course it won't be the great leap that DVD was in comparison to VHS: smaller, lighter, less easily damaged, no rewinding, digital discrete channel full range surround sound, direct chapter access, cheaper to mfr Going from DVD to BD is much less dramatic - BD-Live and better quality audio and video. I've never viewed BD as a DVD replacement - just a better quality option for those with the equipment and desire to take advantage of it. I also believed that as soon as the war was over we'd see 3rd party mfrs start to make BD players and that competition would drive down the cost over time (as opposed to the artificially low, subsidized prices on the Toshiba HD DVD players). I expected HD DVD to do the same if it had won the war. For me it wasn't a question of HD DVD or BD, it was a question of picking one and letting the market evolve and move forward with competition and it appears that time has arrived.... Years ago I bought a cheap DVD player because it was cheap. I thought digital was digital and the picture and sound would be just fine for me. It was-when it worked. About a third of the discs wouldn't load, and half of the ones that did load had all kinds of freezes and stutters. I have since come to the opinion that "works as advertised" requires a larger investment than the minimum. I have been willing to pay it. Time will tell if this applies to Blu-ray players, also. I suspect it will.... I agree that you get what you pay for, but I suspect that the Blu-ray licensing fees are still high enough to keep the rabble out of the market. I don't know who the manufacturer is behind the Magnovox player that I mention here, so there is still plenty of opportunity for there to be corners cut inside the box, but I suspect that it's still better made than some of the cheap Chinese DVD players that have flooded the market. Alfred... As a person who has had the Magnavox 500MG9 for over a year (got it for $110 when THAT was considered a bargain!), I would say that it is better than many of the higher priced brand-name players. One can check any AV site and find people who are finding that players from Sony, Panasonic, etc. won't play this disc or that title. However, the Magnavox has played EVERY SINGLE TITLE (even the problematic ones) without fail. And it has had a LOT of use! When the time comes for it to be junked or replaced, I'll probably look at the Mag before most of the other brands. The manufacturer is Funai, who also make the Sylvania and Insignia (Best Buy's version) players. For those who really want a $69.99 player, Shop-Rite supermarkets has a sale on BD players by a brand labelled "Hiteker". Never heard of them, but the sale goes on until 2/13... Thanks for sharing your experience with the Magnavox Blu-ray player, film11; I'm sure many people will find it helpful. And thanks for flagging the Shoprite sale information. BTW, Funai makes products for many familiar brands, as they have licensed a lot of them. These include Sylvania, Magnavox, Phillips (TVs in North America), Emerson, and Symphonic. Alfred... Everyone is entitled to opinion but many factors were ignored regarding the comment that Blu-ray will be replaced by streaming in 5 years. Granted, anything is possible in CE, but: 1) Blu-ray has been reported many times as a format that took much less than DVD to reach similar success, and prices on the players have come down much faster than DVD. Blu-ray was established in 2006, in a battle with HD-DVD for over a year. It took 3 years, but actually 2 with no competition, to reach this level of pricing and penetration. Conversely, DVD was established with no competition in 1996, with an obvious improvement over VHS in quality and practicality of media; however, it took many more years to reach the same price level of players. 2) Due to bandwidth limitations, online streaming has high difficulty to match the high-bit in Mbps of a Blu-ray movie. This is not about 1080p, anyone can do 1080p with extreme compressions; this is about how good the 1080p image is. Certainly... More from Alfred Poor
More in Category: General Interest
About Alfred PoorAlfred Poor is a well-known display industry expert, who writes the daily HDTV Almanac. He wrote for PC Magazine for more than 20 years, and now is focusing on the home entertainment and home networking markets. |
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