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Blu-ray and decent gaming graphics for less than a grand: Vaio FW560F/T

(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)

Several months ago, one of our favorite retail laptops was the Sony Vaio FW480J/T. Besides offering no-hassle Blu-ray playback and a large if not full-HD 1,600x900-pixel resolution, 16.4-inch screen, it had decent discrete graphics that could handle many mainstream games. At the time, its $1,199 price was a little high, but very good when compared with traditional "gaming" laptops.

Just a few months later, the Sony Vaio FW560F/T has found itself at the top of our Holiday 2009 retail laptop roundup, a high-end system by definition of its price and features. At $999, however, this Vaio slips right under that psychological $1,000 line, while keeping Blu-ray and slightly improving the processor speed--and now it has Windows 7 Home Premium preinstalled instead of Windows Vista.

This has jumped from a good deal to a great deal for anyone looking for a Blu-ray-ready multimedia laptop. The package offered is a big improvement over the Vaio FW351J/H, which cost nearly the same amount of money early this summer.

On the other hand, gaming laptops have changed the landscape recently with the release of the Intel Core i7 processor. High-end laptops have never been faster, and going with a Core 2 Duo is now a significant step down from that new plateau. We can't really call the Vaio FW560F/T a gaming laptop, but it's certainly affordable, and can handle many games better than you think.

Read our review of the Sony Vaio FW560F/T.

Sony Vaio FW560F/T (photos)

The 720p-shooting Kodak Zi6 is on sale for just $99.

(Credit: CNET)

The deals are coming fast and furious this week, to the point where I couldn't pick just one for today. Instead I've rounded up a little cheapskate trifecta. (Note: All have a high sellout risk!) Take a look:

1) CompUSA has a 24-inch Synaps LCD monitor for $159.99 shipped. It's a 1080p display with VGA and DVI inputs (no HDMI, alas), built-in speakers, and a 5ms response time. User reviews are overwhelmingly positive. And this is almost an all-time low for a 24-inch monitor.

2) Amazon is offering the Kodak Zi6 HD pocket camcorder for $99 shipped. It can record 720p video on inexpensive SD/SDHC cards (here's an 8GB card for just $15.45). CNET liked its "solid video quality" (read the full review here), and Amazon customers collectively rated it 4 stars out of 5.

3) At US Appliance you can score a new LG BD270 Blu-ray player for $94, plus $5.99 for shipping. (Use coupon code welcome10 to get that price.) That's not the best Blu-ray deal I've seen, as this model doesn't do BD-Live or Netflix, but it's definitely rare to see an LG for under $100. CNET hasn't reviewed it, but user reviews on Amazon are very high.

Anything strike your fancy? If not, be sure to check out Five Black Friday deals you shouldn't miss (if you haven't already). And if you spot anything awesome that I've missed, by all means post it in the comments or shoot me an e-mail. Happy shopping!

Editors' note: Updated on November 23, 2009.

A few years ago, we used to do a feature highlighting some of the top DVDs that made your home theater really look and sound like one. Well, with Blu-ray in full swing, we thought it high time to come up with a similar roundup of our favorite Blu-ray Discs that will help show off your home theater in all its glory.

While my face is at the top of the column, the list was compiled with input from editors John Falcone, Matthew Moskovciak, and David Katzmaier, who look at a lot of content in their day-to-day testing of products. We also keep an eye on AVS Forum's Blu-ray picture- and audio-quality threads and have always appreciated the site's "tier" rating system.

This list is not set in stone, and we'll be adding and removing discs as new ones come out. As always, feel free to make comments and suggest your own personal favorites. They may get added to the list in the future.

Also: If you're someone who likes demoing your system and skipping around between scenes, you'll want a fast Blu-ray player. Right now, the fastest players we've tested are the LG BD390, Sony PlayStation 3, and the Samsung BD-P3600. Though not quite as fast as its step-up sibling, the Samsung BDP-1600 is among the fastest sub-$300 players we've tested. (See CNET's full list of best Blu-ray players.)

Click any of the images below to start the slideshow.

CNET's Top 40 must-have Blu-ray Discs

Vizio's VBR110 goes sub-$100 for Black Friday at Costco.

(Credit: Vizio)

We knew it was coming and now it's here: Costco will be serving up Vizio's entry-level VBR110 Blu-ray player for $99.99 on Black Friday. As usual, this comes with the disclaimer: "While supplies last."

In case you're wondering, while the VBR110 is an entry-level player that retails for around $150, it does have an Ethernet port and BD-Live capabilities. And you also get a free HDMI cable.

Here's a complete list of all of Vizio's Black Friday deals:

• Vizio VBR110 Blu-ray player with free HDMI cable: $99.99 at Costco and online at Costco.com from November 27 to 29, while supplies last ($40 savings).
• Vizio VSB210WS sound bar with wireless subwoofer: $199.99 at Costco from November 27 to 29, while supplies last ($50 savings).
• Vizio VA19LHDTV10T 19-inch HD LCD TV: $178 at Wal-Mart; available now through the end of the year ($30 savings).
• Vizio VA26LHDTV10T 26-inch HD LCD TV: $248 at Wal-Mart from November 21 to 27, while supplies last ($99 savings).
• Vizio VO320E 32-inch HD LCD TV: $339.99 at Sam's Club, Samsclub.com, Costco, and Costco.com; available now through November 29, while supplies last ($50 savings).
• Vizio VL320M 32-inch full HD 1080p LCD TV: $399.99 at Costco from November 27 to 29, while supplies last ($50 savings).
• Vizio VO400E 40-inch full HD 1080p LCD TV: $599.99 at Costco from December 3 to 20 ($100 savings).
• Vizio VF550M 55-inch full HD 1080p 120Hz LCD TV: $1199.99 at Costco and Costco.com from November 27 to 29, while supplies last ($300 savings).

Episode 58 of the Digital City, where we wrangle with the legal arguments over Apple vs. Psystar; show off the latest super-fancy laptop to hit our desks, the $2,000 HP Envy 15; and find the world's best laptop backpack in the Booq Boa.

Both Modern Warfare 2 and New Super Mario Bros. Wii get some praise, while PSP Go sales seem to hit a wall; and we compare the original God of War games to the new polished-up versions in the God of War collection for PS3.

Related links:
>>Booq Boa Squeeze review
>>Spend some time with New Super Mario Bros. Wii
>>Modern Warfare 2 arrives

>>Watch the Digital City live every Monday at 3pm EST on CNET Live!
>>Subscribe to Digital City on iTunes
>>Join the Digital City Facebook fan page
>>Need more? Follow Dan on Twitter!

Two Pixar classics on Blu-ray for just $11. How can you go wrong?

Here's an interesting deal for anyone who has:

1. Children
2. A Blu-ray player
3. A nearby Target store
4. A love of Pixar films

With a little coupon magic, you can score the "Monsters, Inc." and "Up" Blu-ray combo packs for $10.98 (plus sales tax).

Each bundle has four discs: two Blu-ray Discs (one with the movie, one with extras), one DVD of the movie (bonus!), and one disc containing a DisneyFile Digital Copy (for viewing on, say, a laptop or iPhone).

Start by printing this $8 off "Monsters, Inc." coupon. You'll need to install a small app called Coupon Printer, but it appears to be harmless.

Next, print this $10 off "Up" coupon. It also requires Coupon Printer.

Finally, head to this Hot Coupon World post, scroll down to the Expiring November 25, 2009, section, and enter a '1' in the field next to "Blu-ray movies: "Up AND Monsters, Inc. together." Then scroll all the way down, click "Get Coupons," and print the coupon.

Now hop in the car and drive to your local Target. I'm not 100 percent sure they'll take all three coupons, but a blogger over at Frugal Find (source of this nifty deal) reported they had success using it.

As someone who has children, a Blu-ray player, a nearby Target store, and a love of Pixar films (particularly these two), you had better believe I'm looking for my car keys. How about you?

"9" will be one of the new Blu-ray titles to feature iPhone interactivity.

(Credit: Amazon)

Excluding the recent Netflix PS3 disc, BD-Live has been a bust. Still, we give the movie studios credit for not completely abandoning the technology yet, and according to a recent Video Business story, Universal will feature iPhone interactivity on many several releases, "including Bruno, Public Enemies, 9, and Inglourious Basterds."

While it's easy to write it off as a gimmick, the iPhone functionality (called "Pocket Blu") is aimed at overcoming one of the biggest hurdles to interactive content, which is the painful process of entering text using a standard Blu-ray remote. While iPhone functionality won't solve that problem for Blu-ray owners that don't own iPhones, it's probably the easiest workaround at this stage. (We would have loved if Blu-ray players included a remote with a built-in keyboard, similar to Vizio's bluetooth remote.)

Universal is also planning to offer some exclusive content for iPhone users. We've complained about this before, but there's really no reason to limit that content to iPhone users (or even BD-Live users), since there's nearly always extra capacity on the disc for the bonus features.

Perhaps the best news is hidden at the bottom of the Video Business article; Universal says new titles will allows users to view much of the BD-Live content without having to register first. BD-Live has plenty of problems, but nothing kills enthusiasm faster than having to enter an e-mail address using an onscreen keyboard and a Blu-ray remote.

(Credit: JVC)

These days, what separates Blu-ray players from one another has less to do with how they play Blu-rays--they all do that pretty well--and more to do with the sort of extra features they offer. Many players, for instance, can access a variety of online entertainment options, including Amazon Video On Demand, Pandora, Vudu, and especially Netflix. Unfortunately, JVC's latest player doesn't have any of those online features. In fact, it can't even access the online extras found on some Blu-ray Discs.

JVC has released an entry-level Blu-ray player, the XV-BP11 ($200), which--surprisingly--only complies with the older Blu-ray Profile 1.1 standard. That means it's not capable of playing back any of the Internet-enabled BD-Live content that is included on some Blu-ray Discs. Now, we'll admit that virtually all of the BD-Live content we've seen is disappointing, but that's still not reason to get an underfeatured Blu-ray player when there are Profile 2.0 players with Netflix streaming for $100.

The rest of the features on the XV-BP11 are somewhat more respectable, including onboard decoding for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. There's also a USB port on the front panel capable of playing back a few digital media formats, like AVCHD, JPEG, MPEG-4, MP3 and WMA. (Sorry, no DivX.) On the other hand, like we said, there's no support for any online streaming-media services, unlike the entry-level players from LG, Panasonic, and Samsung. In fact, there's not even an Ethernet jack (at least according to the specs) for easy firmware updates.

HP's ultra-compact Pavilion is stuffed with home theater-friendly features.

(Credit: HP)

If you're in the market for a PC to serve as the hub of your home theater, look no further than the refurbished HP Pavilion Slimline S3750F. It's compact, loaded, and on sale at Buy.com for $479.99 shipped.

As many of you pointed out in last weekend's post about the Nero LiquidTV TiVo PC, Windows Media Center offers some pretty killer DVR features.

I agree 100 percent, which is why there's a PC much like this HP sitting in my family room, connected to my TV.

The S3750F features a quad-core AMD processor, 4GB of RAM, a 640GB hard drive, and a Blu-ray drive/LightScribe DVD burner.

It also comes with an AverMedia ATSC/NTSC TV tuner, which can pull in analog cable or over-the-air digital signals. My advice: add a couple extra tuners so you can record multiple shows from multiple sources simultaneously. (Thursday night is just a bear this year, isn't it?)

HP supplies a remote for couch-friendly operation and 802.11n Wi-Fi for wireless-friendly operation.

My one and only complaint with this system (apart from the 90-day warranty, which I consider minor) is that it comes with Vista Home Premium, not Windows 7. And because it's a refurb, it's not eligible for a free upgrade.

Still, I'm running Vista on my media-center PC, and it's been absolutely fine and dandy. In other words, an upgrade isn't essential, IMHO.

Shop around a bit and you'll see this system selling for at least $800 elsewhere, and as high as $1,000 at many stores (including Amazon). A desktop this loaded for $479 is a real deal.