Thanks a lot Kaushik, just checked it out. Seems like a pretty high end player primarily for BD/Discs ? There is indeed a lot of focus on quality sound that is key indeed (to me) more than video. Does this play USB and other media as well. The reveiws did not seem to provide enough deail. Is there a link I can use ?
Also do also let me know any others in the approx 10-15 K bracket. I may also go in for good sub and need to use the balance budget for that as well. hence may like to look for a mid path..may be go for a pure media player and not a BD player may be for now.. would appreciate your advise based on this info
yes it plays from usb, also plays from the network, but only from dlna servers..it has two usb ports, I have tried upto 500 gb hdd formatted in ntfs, works without any problem whatsoever. Haven't tried my 2 tb powered hdd, will try it and let you know..
now there are many ways to get great quality music in that 15-20k but it will need a bit of research and tweaking..
Option 1 - use any old laptop that is lying around and add a usb dac, there are many options, odac being one of the cheapest (6-7k) but still one of the best in my opinion...then install foobar/xbmc and use wasapi to play music..you can control it with your smartphone, there are great remote apps are available...for the blu ray, you buy any sub 10k player of your choice all of them are equally good...your total expense would not exceed 15k...downside of this option the PC will take time to boot, which maybe annoying to some people, also I dont know what is your comfort level in configuring the smartphone apps to connect to your pc and using them as remotes, everything works beautifully after you set it up, but till then needs tweaking..one way to deal with the boot issue is installing openelec and booting or add a ssd maybe..
option 2 - another way would be again get a sub 10k blu ray player from sony; just make sure it plays all formats like flac etc. and add an optical DAC...this option is redundant in my view, as this option will go up to 25k (at least) and the Oppo 93 is 500 USD anyway...i dont know of any decent optical DAC below 20k..
option 3 - Another way to get great music (hopefully) and I am going to do this little project for my bedroom, is using the raspberry pi+USB dac, the only issue seems to be the availability of the raspberry pi, I have ordered it, and it should reach in maybe in 3-4 weeks..it will boot fast, consumes very little power (about as much as a phone) and you can sit back and control your music through your smartphone again...no downsides...but i think people have reported some kinks in getting USB DACs to perfectly work with the Raspbrry Pi...I am sure it will get sorted, the platform is developing quite fast in the open source community..this in my opinion is one of the best solutions for getting music out... cost - 3k for the raspberry, 6k for the odac and whichever blu ray player you buy add to that...again as far as controlling this system goes you can use a smartphone, and you don't even have to turn on the TV for listening to music as you can see your collection in the smartphone and simply play from their...
I am personally sold on the raspberry Pi option as u can understand..
i have been using option 1 (old laptop) for some time in my bedroom, and frankly not very happy with the result, keeping the laptop always on means unnecessary power consumption and risk of ruining the laptop..starting is every time is annoying because of the boot time, i tried openelec for sometime but the overall experience wasn't as fluid as i wanted (u know opening the lid of the laptop, start it etc. etc....)...I am a very impatient guy
...there are again ways to get around this with some tweaking...like openelec, wake-on-LAN for turning on the comp etc, but again too much hassle..
hope that helps!
