Sharp's Blu-ray player loads discs in 10 seconds
Sharp's new Blu-ray player, the BD-HP20U.
(Credit: Sharp)There are a whole bunch of Blu-ray players being announced at CEDIA, but for the most part, there's not too much to differentiate them. Sharp's new Blu-ray player, the BD-HP20U, is its first-ever, but is still mostly the same as other players. Yet the company's press release claims that the BD-HP20U will load Blu-ray discs in 10 seconds. For those of you not used to the sluggish speeds of high-definition media, that's very fast--we're used to most high-definition players taking from 40 seconds to well over a minute to load discs.
Sharp BD-HP20U's key features:
- 1080p output at 24 frames per second;
- Onboard decoding for Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby TrueHD;
- Quick Start mode, which can load discs in less than 10 seconds;
- HDMI output (version not specified);
- Possibly analog, 5.1 multichannel outputs (according to photos from AV Magazine.it);
- $550 retail, available in September.
The Sharp BD-HP20U back.
(Credit: Sharp)We definitely love the Quick Start mode, but we're disappointed that the BD-HP20U doesn't offer bit-stream output for DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks. On the other hand, the $550 price tag is pretty attractive, considering the only other $500 standalone Blu-ray player we've reviewed--the Sony BDP-S300--was extremely sluggish.
Sources: AV Magazine.it, Sharp press release
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- Expensive!
- by cchenoweth6 September 7, 2007 11:38 AM PDT
- I do not understand the appeal of a $500+ player. Why even bother talking about them.
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- 500 USD is a bargain for a blu-ray player
- by akira2 September 10, 2007 8:33 PM PDT
- most current blu-ray players are over 600 USD. even the old 60 GB PS3 is 500 USD, which is not produced anymore. Most do not load disks anywhere near 10sec (or others say 34 sec)
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