Please suggest a DVD player to go with my Panny plasma

[venkatcr]

I have the opportunity to could pick up 983 in the US this month - are there any catches (region etc.) to be aware of. BTW, i have Rs 15K budget (could stretch that a bit) - will that get me the OPPO. And does the additional spend justify the performance vis-a-vis, say a Pioneer DV610. I will be running it with Onkyo SR606, and a 42" LCD, that we plan to buy.
BDS

BDS, the 983 is not available any more. Oppo has stopped manufacture and distribution of this model as they don't want it to compete with their upcoming BD player that has similar features.

You can safely pick up the 980 or the 981. Both are excellent models and will beat the Pioneer 610 in audio any day. Actually I would suggest the 980 as it has slightly better audio circuitry than the 981. Actually Oppo recommends the 980 over the 981.

Oppo player come fixed for Region 1 playing, but they have a very simple way of making it region free. Just follow the following steps:

1. Press setup
2. Enter the numbers 9210
3. A new menu will pop up. Press 0 to make it region-free.
4. Press setup again to exit.

Oppo players can work in any voltage from 110 to 220. When you are ordering for the Oppo player, get a HDMI cable also along. They make some excellent HDMI cable.

At $169, the Oppo 980 will be well within your budget. Get yourself a HT set up disc such as Avia II also.

You are all set to go, as the Yanks love to say.

Cheers

 

[spirovious]

I went for the Sony 708. Sorry but Oppo is way beyond budget for now. I tried it with Ice Age and Dostana. The results were very satisfactory. Colors in the animation especially were excellent.

I purchased it for Rs 5K including the HDMI cable which is the connection I'm using.

--
About HDMI CEC, Panasonic say they support it but it can't control the Sony DVD player. Vice versa, Sony has remote code for TV models including Panasonic and support for that is iffy. The button mapping is unintuitive so I'm using 2 remotes.

The Panny remote has all the buttons to control a DVD player and they are separate from the TV-specific buttons (unlike the DVD player remote where the functionality overlaps over the same set of buttons). The TV manual states the remote codes only for the Panny VCR and DVD player. And that too, I don't konw if those code enable controlling the devices via HDMI or directly talks to those devices.

I tried the steps listed in the manual to see if I could accidentally get the remote to talk to the sony DVD. I got sore thumbs entering codes from 0 to 99 in hope that it might work.

Panasonic has Viera link which works with sony,onkyo products through HDMI.
Pana will obviously backup its products.

 

[marsilians]

The 980 comes with 1 cable in the box.

... When you are ordering for the Oppo player, get a HDMI cable also along. They make some excellent HDMI cable.

 

[venkatcr]

The 980 comes with 1 cable in the box.

Oops Sorry, forgot about that. Thanks.

Cheers