By now a fair number of companies have introduced machines to play Blu-ray Discs. Having checked out a handful of them, including models from Sony, Panasonic, and Samsung, I can tell you that their features and capabilities vary widely. Sure, they handle high-def movies, but some also let you play videogames and connect to the Internet, as well as listen to DVD-Audio discs and Super Audio CDs. One area where they're all the same, however, is in their handling of high-rez soundtrack formats like Dolby True HD and DTS-HD Master Audio. At present, not one of the first-gen Blu-ray models (outside of Sony's PS3) provides built-in support for these new formats, instead delivering regular old Dolby Digital and DTS.
But there are some key areas where the BDP-HD1 comes up short. For one, the Pioneer sports an earlier version of the HDMI interface, as opposed to the state-of-the-art 1.3 port found on Sony's PlayStation 3. On a practical level, this means that it can't deliver Dolby True HD and DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks in native bitstream format to an outboard receiver or processor for decoding (no such hardware is available yet, but a few models should be showing up this summer). Like most other Blu-ray players out there, the Pioneer doesn't provide built-in decoding of either format. And although the player has an Ethernet connection, it doesn't support BD Live — the online component of interactive BD-Java content for Blu-ray Discs (Pioneer says the specs for BD Live are just now being finalized and players that support it won't appear until next fall at the earliest). The real kicker, however, is the BDP-HD1's inability to play regular audio CDs. I know the music industry's business model is transitioning to online distribution of tunes, but last time I checked, I had a sizable collection of CDs — one that's still growing!
At least Pioneer's player looks the part of a high-end piece of gear. Its case is relatively slim, and the front panel sports the same gloss-black finish found on other Pioneer Elite components. On the panel's top half are a disc tray, LED display, and a group of indicator lights to tell you if the player contains a Blu-ray Disc, is delivering signals via HDMI, or has its dimmable display switched off. Lifting the flip-up door at the bottom reveals a slew of control buttons that duplicate those found on the player's remote. These let you rewind, fast-forward, and chapter-skip through discs, switch the player's video output format from 480i up to 1080p, navigate both disc and player menus, and access Pioneer's Home Media Gallery feature, which allows streaming of music, video, and photo files from a PC when the player is connected to a home network.
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The Short Form
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| Price $1,500 / pioneerelectronics.com / 800-421-1404 |
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Snapshot
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| Pioneer's pricey Blu-ray Disc player is light on features but delivers superior picture quality. |
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Plus
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| •Top-of-class video performance •Wide range of custom picture adjustments •Crisp video upconversion of DVDs |
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Minus
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| •Expensive •Slow boot-up and disc loading •No built-in support for Dolby True HD or DTS-HD Master Audio formats •No audio CD playback •Soft picture via component-video output |
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Key Features
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| •1080p/24-fps video output •Ethernet output supports media streaming on home networks •6-channel analog audio output •HDMI and component-, composite-, and S-video outputs; optical and coaxial digital, 6-channel analog, and stereo analog audio outputs; Ethernet port •10.5 x 4.5 x 13.5 in; 10.5 lb |
SETUP Pioneer sent along its PRO-FHD1 50-inch plasma TV for me to use in testing the player. (Plugging this fantastic 1080p TV into my system once again was like welcoming back an old friend.) Initially, I used a direct HDMI and component-video connection to the TV for testing. Afterward, I routed the player's HDMI signal through an Anthem AVM 50 processor — a hookup that enabled me to hear the uncompressed 5.1-channel PCM audio tracks on select discs while simultaneously passing through the player's native 24-frame-per-second video signal on to the TV (yep, the Anthem lets you do all that).
For a disc player, Pioneer's machine has a relatively deep setup menu. An HDMI color space setting lets you choose between YCbCr (the normal setting for HDMI connections) or two different RGB options (useful if you're connecting to a computer monitor or HDTV with an RGB-capable DVI connection). There's also the optional 24p video output, Standard and Cinema picture presets, and a trio of Memory settings with Brightness, Contrast, and Color/Tint adjustments that you can customize and store for quick recall. Using the Memory controls, I was able to dig out the below-black bar on a PLUGE pattern from a test disc — an adjustment that helped me optimize the TV's black level.
PERFORMANCE Anyone who's been following the reviews of first-generation high-def disc players knows that, with the exception of Sony's speedy PS3, these beasts take a painfully long time to power up and load a disc. The Pioneer was no exception, clocking a full minute of boot-up time and another 30 seconds from disc insertion until a picture appeared on the screen. Wake me up when the movie starts!
Once the BDP-HD1 starting playing movies, however, the wait was well worth it. When I watched the Tim Burton-directed animation Corpse Bride, the picture was nothing short of breathtaking. The Pioneer combination's ultrasharp picture revealed fine details like the canvas texture of paintings and the subtle black-on-black pattern of wallpaper in the hallway of the Everglot family's drab Victorian mansion. Picture contrast was also remarkably good, with the omnipresent shadows in the film's various scenes looking deep, punchy, and detailed.
Searching for some more natural material on Blu-ray Disc, I flipped in Eight Below, a Disney movie about abandoned sled dogs fending for themselves in the Antarctic. Wide shots of a scientist and his guide traversing the ice revealed a remarkable depth, with a wide range of subtle white highlights coming across as the sun broke through the clouds. The reds and yellows of their parkas also looked appealingly vivid, as did the eerie green and blue shadows emanating from surrounding ice formations.
Checking these discs against a Sony PS3 that I had on hand for comparison, the Pioneer's picture looked cleaner and had a more dynamic contrast range. I'd like to think that the BDP-HD1's 24-fps output made a contribution here, but it's hard to say — as much as I searched, I couldn't find a good example where this feature visibly eliminated so-called “judder” from the picture. Other tests that I performed showed the Pioneer to have a satisfyingly crisp 720p-format video output as well, although its component-video picture was comparatively soft when playing Blu-ray Discs, with the image literally looking only a notch sharper than regular DVD. Speaking of DVD, the Pioneer's superb upconversion of discs in that format made them a pleasure to watch.
Although the BDP-HD1 lacks built-in decoding for advanced audio formats, the core Dolby Digital and DTS soundtracks on the movies I watched sounded really good (a data-rate increase for both formats on Blu-ray delivers a noticeable quality boost). For example, in a scene from X-Men: The Last Stand where Magneto (Ian McKellen) liberates Mystique (Rebecca Romijn) from a security convoy, the impact of vehicles jettisoned from the highway with a flick of Magneto's wrist sounded incredibly dynamic. And a jazz number sung by skeletons in Corpse Bride was wide and enveloping, with the brass instruments and vibraphone sounding both full and crisp.
BOTTOM LINE If your main goal is getting top-notch video performance from a Blu-ray Disc player, Pioneer's BDP-HD1 is the one to buy. Of the four players I've tested so far, this model was by far the picture-quality standout. But compared to the other available models out there, it's light on features, including some real no-brainers like audio CD playback. Would I spend $1,500 on a Pioneer Elite BDP-HD1 Blu-ray Disc player? Given its current limitations, I can't say I'd be champing at the bit. But early adopters are a single-minded lot, which is why Pioneer will undoubtedly move its stock of BDP-HD1s into high-end home theaters as fast as it can produce them.
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