Denon - DVD-3930CI

MPEG Maker: Unknown MPEG Model: Unknown Deinterlacer Maker: Silicon Optix Deinterlacer Model: Realta HQV     MSRP: $1499.99 Website: http://www.usa.denon.com

Denon is one of my favorite companies when it comes to DVD players. For the past few years they have been delivering outstanding quality and performance across a good majority of their price points and set the bar for what I feel a DVD player should be. To this date their flagship player, the DVD-5910, remains my standing reference for a DVD player regardless of price. The DVD-3930CI takes a lot of the performance of the DVD-5910 and scales it down to an attractive MSRP without skimping on video quality or features.

The DVD-3930CI is very similar to the 3910 in terms of build and appearance. The chassis is quite large and heavy, and all of the buttons and connectors are of a quality few players can match. You just know that a lot of effort was put into the design and manufacturing of the product. Even more impressive is the internal design. The power supply section of just the audio board is better than most DVD players I’ve seen costing several times as much. In fact, it appears almost like a receiver than a DVD player when you look inside!

The back panel has some very nice touches. All of the analog connectors are top quality and remind me a lot of my DVD-5910. They’ve even included BNC connections for the second component video output, allowing for high quality connections to displays or video processors. The 3930CI supports Denon’s proprietary Denon-Link connection for all audio playback sources and HDMI for video and audio. The Denon-Link output supports all audio standards, including SACD and DVD Audio. The firewire output featured on the DVD-5910 is not included. The HDMI output supports a wide array of video output options including 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. It also supports YCbCr and RGB colorspace outputs and pillarboxing of any display resolution.

The biggest difference between this player and my reference DVD-5910 is the omission of the ABT scaler. Instead, the 3930CI incorporates the full feature set of the Realta HQV chipset, including their keystone correction. This allows you to place a projector at extreme angles to a screen and do keystone correction from a higher quality scaler than what is typically found in most projectors. While this feature works quite well on its own, we always recommend setting up a projector straight on to the screen so you don't have to do keystone correction, but it's there if you don't have a choice in the projector placement.

I didn’t find much, if any, difference between the scaling of the ABT chip in the 5910 and the scaling in the 3930CI. Both are excellent, with a small edge going to the 3930 using a luma burst test pattern. The 3930 showed a bit less ringing in the upper frequency range. De-interlacing performance was the same, i.e., superb. The HQV chip passes all of our tests without the slightest problem and represents one of the best de-interlacing solutions on the market today. I even tested this player with the AVIA vertical test pattern that has been causing problems for this chipset in some projector designs. Like my DVD-5910, the 3930CI has no issues at all with motion in the vertical direction and kept the cadence locked at all times.

Another new feature for this player is its 480i support via HDMI. This is nice for anyone looking to hook this player up to a stand-alone video processor, but I don’t think it is of much use. Outputting 480p will do just as good of a job and will take advantage of the player’s superb de-interlacing capabilities.

The only place this player ran into some problems was with our core video performance tests. When I opened the player, I was unable to find out what MPEG decoder they were using, but I think it is still the ESS chip found in so many other Denon designs. The 3930CI failed two of our CUE tests, including material with an alternating 3-2 cadence and our 4:2:0 ICP test. This means that the player is not incorporating any type of CUE correction filter even though I believe the Realta chip has this capability.

The analog output was a bit hot for its white level. We measured 105 IRE, using a gray ramp and a digital oscilloscope. The HDMI and component outputs were both devoid of any Y/C delay, and neither suffered from any pixel cropping, regardless of output resolution.

The player itself is very responsive with navigation, chapter skips, and general setup. The player handles layer changes perfectly, with absolutely no delay, even using our high bit rate tests.

Denon has designed some new menu items for their setup, and some of it I like in respect to my reference DVD-5910, but nothing new stood out too much. All of the noise reduction and sharpening tools of the Realta are included in the picture setup memories, and their performance is identical to the DVD-5910. Contrast and brightness settings were also perfect in their default settings, a problem I had with the DVD-5910.

Conclusions

So, is the Denon DVD-3930CI better than or equal to the DVD-5910? No, the 5910 is still the king. While I think the 3930 is every bit as good in terms of de-interlacing and scaling, the 5910 has some refinements that the 3910 is lacking (CUE filtering most notably). I also like the flexibility of audio outputs with the 5910 (Firewire) and the build and sound via the analog outputs. But, for its price, the DVD-3930CI comes VERY close. Those looking for the same level of video prowess at a lower cost need not look any further. Denon has continued to set the bar at their price point and delivered one of the best DVD players I’ve seen to date.

Video Frequency Response
Denon

Arcam - DV-137

MPEG Maker: Zoran MPEG Model: Vaddis 888S Deinterlacer Maker: Zoran Deinterlacer Model: Vaddis 888S     MSRP: $1999.00 Website: http://www.arcam.co.uk

Unbeknownst to most people, there really isn’t that much difference between mass market DVD players and specialty DVD players. If you open them up you’ll find that a lot of them use the exact same components that the big box movers use. The main difference is the care and consideration that goes into how those components are used. Rather than just slapping a player together, the higher end companies (for the most part) tweak the performance of their components, allowing the end user to truly see the potential of a product.

Arcam has made some extremely impressive DVD players in the past. The DV-27A remains one of my favorite analog DVD players to date and has remained on my short list of recommend DVD players ever since I first reviewed it. Unfortunately, I haven’t been as impressed with their players since they stopped using the Sil-504 chip for their de-interlacing and started relying on the various Zoran all-in-one chips they use for MPEG decoding. While I think the Zoran chip is adequate for value oriented DVD players found at your local big box electronics stores, I don’t think it has the level of quality for de-interlacing that you would expect from a company like Arcam.

The DV-137 utilizes one of the newer Zoran chips, the Vaddis 888s. This chip is used for MPEG decoding and de-interlacing. The thing that separates this player from the last player I tested from Arcam is the inclusion of Anchor Bay Technologies (ABT) scaler chip for upconversion to HD resolutions. This is the same scaler found in the popular DVDO iScan VP30/20 series video processors. ABT’s scaling solution is a very good one, and the result is some very nice HD imaging from standard DVD sources. The problem is, the de-interlacing isn’t quite up to the task. I would have loved to see Arcam implement ABT’s new de-interlacing solution as well. That could have made this player in almost a class of its own in terms of performance! Instead, the Zoran does an average job overall. This player fails most of our tests that involve any break in cadence or bad flagging. While it is slightly better than the other Zoran solutions we’ve tested, it isn’t in the same league as the higher end video processing chips or the former Sil-504 chip Arcam used to employ.

The Zoran chip does a mixed job in the core video performance department. The player does not show any signs of Y/C delay, it has very little pixel cropping, and its analog output is impeccable. Arcam has done a superb job with the analog video output of this player. The video frequency response is very flat and very sharp, and the video levels are perfect. Via HDMI there are some differences. Unfortunately the DV-137 clips head and toe room except when output the YUV colorspace option, which unfortunately didn’t synch well with either my projector or video processor.

In our CUE tests the player did fine. The Zoran chip uses a chroma filter to pass our 4:2:0 ICP test and seems to use a filter with our 2-2 test as well. Setting the output to 480i, I noticed that the MPEG decoder failed both the 2-2 and ICP tests, but once 480p or higher was selected, it passed all of the tests.

From a usability standpoint this player is quite remarkable. Arcam has gone the extra mile in terms of features and support. The DV-137 is HDMI 1.1 compliant and will pass DVD Audio material over its HDMI output. The player also supports SACD, but not via HDMI. The HDMI output is also selectable from 480i all the way to 1080p and even includes 768p for plasma displays. The real surprise though was the built-in test patterns this player incorporates. Why in the world has no one else thought of this before?!?! Arcam has included test patterns for setting color, brightness, and sharpness. While these may not be the most inclusive tests, it is still nice to see a company put this kind of effort forward and give the end user at least something to use for initial setup.

Menu navigation and chapter skips were quick. The included remote control isn’t the most user friendly in the dark, but all of the necessary controls are there. The player is quite responsive overall. The layer change is also quite fast and clocked in under a second.

Conclusions

The Arcam DV-137 is a good DVD player, but not a great one. Just a bit more effort would have gone a long way. I would really like to see Arcam return to using better de-interlacing solutions and not all-in-one chips. Tweaking in the HDMI performance would move it towards being a top contender. While I appreciate some of the extras included here (universal support, 1080p and 480i over HDMI, built-in test patterns), I would have preferred a more refined video output.

Video Frequency Response
Arcam

Rotel - RDV-1092

MPEG Maker: Unknown MPEG Model: Unknown Deinterlacer Maker: Unknown Deinterlacer Model: Unknown     MSRP: $1500.00 Website: http://www.rotel.com/

The RDV-1092 is the first player from Rotel to offer HDMI and 1080p support. It is HDMI 1.1 compliant and offers full playback of DVD-Audio through the HDMI output.

The RDV-1092 is a very ruggedly built player with a solid chassis and cosmetic makeup. Nothing looks cheap on this player. I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t support SACD, which would have made the 1092 a Universal DVD player, but with high resolution audio selections dwindling, I can see the hardware market fading away as well.

Opening up the RDV-1092, I discovered that the chips used for video processing had been either blacked out or cleaned off so there was no way to identify the components. It appears that the Rotel uses a single chip solution, but I am not really sure which one is in there.

Video performance for the RDV-1092 was good, but not reference. This player’s HDMI output supports 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. It also has selectable colorspace options, which is a feature many HDMI-based DVD players lack, unfortunately. The drawback here is that the Rotel only uses the proper video levels with 4:2:2 YCbCr selected. Both 4:4:4 and RGB clipped head and toe room. Because of the 480i output, the Rotel actually makes an attractive stand-alone DVD transport for an outboard video processor. It passes all of our CUE tests with the exception of 4:2:0 ICP (which is expected) and has a very good power supply for a clean output. Menu navigation is a bit sluggish, but overall, this would make a nice higher-end transport.

The inboard video processing is decent but not without its own drawbacks. The player does well with standard film-based 3-2 content but has some issues when the cadence changes. The player fails with a 2-2 cadence and drops into video mode. This also occurred with some of the mixed cadences. The player did fare very well with our bad edit tests, as well as our high-detail test. So overall, it should do quite well with the majority of current DVD content.

The RDV-1092 does use some type of vertical line filtering. I tested its performance using the 3 angles test from the HQV benchmark DVD, and its performance was far above average.

The component video output wasn’t quite as solid as the HDMI output. The frequency response of the player is inconsistent. The middle band is a bit amped up, which can add to some ringing in the image. The default white level is also on the low side and measured in at 96 IRE instead of the ideal 100 IRE. Therefore, I would recommend use of the HDMI output rather than component.

Operability was good with the RDV-1092. Menu navigation was a bit slow, but the layer change was near seamless, and chapter skips and setup were quick and easy.

Conclusions

While I wouldn’t call this the best player I’ve reviewed for the benchmark, it is a very solid offering. The video performance could use some tweaking, but it should perform quite well with the majority of DVDs out there. Add to this Rotel’s solid form factor and build, coupled with their outstanding audio section, and you have a very attractive DVD player.

Video Frequency Response
Rotel

Microsoft - Xbox 360 HD DVD Add-On

MPEG Maker: Microsoft MPEG Model: Deinterlacer Maker: Microsoft Deinterlacer Model:     MSRP: $199.99 Website: http://www.xbox.com/en-US/default.htm

Last year, Microsoft delivered their next generation gaming platform, the Xbox 360. This platform combined state of the art high definition gaming with media console features, making it a well rounded entertainment hub. When we tested the 360 in our DVD benchmark, it set the bar for performance from a game console with DVD playback. Since then, Microsoft has offered several software updates through Xbox Live and has recently shipped out the HD DVD add-on. This add-on allows the 360 to play back the new HD DVD format on top of standard DVD support. We decided to test the add-on as a standard DVD player to see if Microsoft has indeed raised the bar again.

The HD add-on is relatively small and reminds me of the older stand-alone Jazz drives that you could attach to PCs or laptops. Its shape and aesthetics are very similar to the main console, and connection to the 360 console is made through a simple USB cable. The add-on comes with a CD that walks you through setting the drive up.

The performance of the add-on is very similar to the 360 as a standard DVD player. Like the main console, the resolution is limited to 480p. The console supports resolutions of up to 1080p, but the DVD forum mandates that all DVD players limit their analog video outputs to 480p, so I guess we’re stuck with that for awhile.

All of the video processing and de-interlacing is done in software, and Microsoft developed all of their own codes for this. They did quite a good job, but fell short of what you might expect from a high-line progressive scan DVD player.

This player does not seem to be cadence based, but rather relies on the flags to decide how to de-interlace. This makes it quick to recover from a hiccup in the flags, but combing is evident at each hiccup. The add-on passed the same tests as the 360, but this time it passed our Bad Edits test.

The add-on failed most of our tests that have breaks in cadence or flags. This is what separates a good progressive scan player from a great one. There is a reason that names like Gennum, Faroudja, and ABT have become synonymous with great DVD playback. Rather than rely on the disc's flags (which are usually poor), they examine the cadence of the material and make smarter decisions on how to combine the progressive fields and deliver a progressive image.

For video based material, the add-on is average. It passed our motion adaptive tests but does not feature any diagonal line processing for video-based material. Jaggies were abundant using the 3-Clocks test on the Silicon Optix Benchmark DVD.

On the core side, the add-on does extremely well. Response times have not changed at all. This is a really fast transport, and navigation is basically instantaneous. It is almost unnerving how fast this player navigates menus and chapters. I wish some of the DVD player manufacturers would take note. The layer change is nearly seamless, and clocked in just under a half a second.

Core video performance is also quite good. The add-on passed all of our CUE tests with the exception of the 4:2:0 ICP test, which requires an extra chroma filter to pass. There are no signs of Y/C delay, and pixel cropping is limited to 2 pixels on the left and 1 on the bottom.

All of the video levels are correct, and this player passes below-black and above-white information. The output retains the full resolution of both the luma and chroma signal, and the analog video frequency response remains unchanged from the original 360 console.

Conclusions

We will be serving up a complete review of the HD DVD add-on very shortly that will cover the full capabilities of this accessory as a HD DVD player. For now, the add-on continues the performance of the 360 as a stand-alone DVD player and continues to set the bar as a game console-based DVD player. At only $199 (for current 360 owners of course), this thing is a steal.

Video Frequency Response
Microsoft

Panasonic - DMP-BD10

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Zensonic - Z500

MPEG Maker: Sigma Designs MPEG Model: EM8620L Deinterlacer Maker: Sigma Designs Deinterlacer Model: EM8620L     MSRP: $429.00 Website: http://www.zensonic.com/

The Zensonic Z500 represents almost a completely new breed of DVD player into the market. At its core, the Z500 uses the new Sigma Designs EM8620L chip, which is a powerhouse of features and flexibility. No longer are we limited to watching DVDs or listening to our CDs on a DVD player; now we can literally run our entire media library and home media network from it.

The Z500 has so many features, it is daunting. On top of standard DVD playback, it can tap into your home network and access your music, videos, and picture files. This essentially makes it a media hub that could replace something like a PC or large media server for a fraction of the cost. It can access this network with Ethernet or via its built-in wireless antenna (80211G). In addition to this, the Z500 handles transport streams from a variety of souces, including the network, discs, or an external drive. I used an external hard drive, and the Z500 had no problems with high definition transport streams or DVD transport streams that were on disc. So you can have a whole library of high definition material at your fingertips without the need for a separate player. The Z500 also supports internet radio!

The Z500 has an HDMI output, as well as the typical analog outputs (S-Video, component). The only real differences you’ll find on the back panel are the Ethernet jack and the wireless antenna. The chassis overall is quite small, and build quality is about average for its price point. The remote control wasn’t my favorite. It has two separate cursor controls: one typical of most remotes with soft keys and another that is more of a small joystick. The remote is backlit, which was nice for my dark room, but commands didn’t always seem to work as intended even with a perfect line of sight. This made operations somewhat frustrating at times while navigating my test discs. It also lacked some of the controls typically found on remotes for DVD, including a title menu key.

The user set-up and overall menu navigation are good. Set-up wasn’t an issue, but getting the player into my network was a bit tedious, although I finally managed. The player uses a nice menu scheme when you power up that lets you select what you want to do (e.g., video, audio, pictures, etc.) From there, it shows you the available sources for the chosen function or menu roots. I used this a lot for accessing my music files on my home PC and despite having to go through a few menus to get to my music, it accessed the files fine. HD transport streams were also easy to use, but the player did not allow for smooth transitions between files if I had a movie broken into multiple streams. Not really a big deal, but something worth noting.

As a DVD player, the Z500 is about average to just above average. The Sigma chip does a good job for the most part with de-interlacing and scaling. It does have its hiccups though with more difficult material. It passed the majority of our tests that involved film cadences and good flags, but once the flags went awry, so did the player. Essentially, this means the player will do fine with the majority of film-based material, but you may see a comb every once in awhile if the authoring has issues.

The core performance of the player was quite good. The player does not clip head and toe room, and Y/C delay was not an issue. Chroma performance was good, but there was some flickering with 3-2 material that had an alternating cadence. The player had outstanding performance with 4:2:0 ICP material though. Pixel cropping was very slight, with 3 combined pixels missing from the left and right sides and only 1 from the top.

Audio quality was quite good, though I wouldn’t call this a reference design. The ability to tap into my music files was definitely a highlight. This allowed me to pass the data via HDMI to my Anthem SSP, so the player had little to do with the decoding.

Conclusions

The Z500 really makes you re-think the word "Value". For the money, I know of no other player that offers this many features or this kind of flexibility. Its video performance is fine for the majority of the material out there, and combined with its performance in other areas, it almost makes this player a steal. It’s exciting to think about what else could come down the pipe in the next few years.

Video Frequency Response
Zensonic

Samsung - BD-P1000 Blu-ray/DVD Player

MPEG Maker: Broadcom MPEG Model: Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI8638-LF     MSRP: $999.99 Website: http://www.samsungusa.com

The Samsung BD-P1000 is the first consumer available Blu-ray player to be released into the market. Up until now, there have been a few Blu-ray recorders available in Japan, but they will not play pre-recorded Blu-ray software (high definition movies). I recently reviewed the Toshiba HD-A1 as a standard DVD player and while I did think it did a commendable job as an upscaling DVD player, I did not recommend the transition to HD DVD overall due to other limitations of that player (which, for the most part, have been addressed by Toshiba so far!). So does the Samsung change my mind about future formats in general? Let’s find out.

At nearly $1,000, the BD-P1000 is almost the most expensive Samsung DVD I’ve reviewed. Samsung is not really known for releasing high dollar players, though they did market a fairly expensive player overseas. The build quality of the P1000 is quite a bit better than what I’ve typically seen from Samsung. The chassis has a gloss black outer case, and, overall, it feels more on the hefty side. The front panel is attractive and uses several blue LEDs, giving it a regal look in a dark room. Problem is those blue LEDs don’t dim down anywhere near enough for anyone concerned about ambient light in their theater room and can be a bit on the distracting side. Samsung has not included any way of shutting them off either.

Set-up is straightforward but lacks most of the flexibility of a player this expensive. The P1000 features both component and HDMI outputs, with HDMI supporting upscaling of DVD to 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. Both outputs support Blu-ray software at all resolutions.

The new Genesis FLI8638-LF chip handles video processing. This incorporates the newest Faroudja video processing algorithms and even handles high definition de-interlacing of both film and video sources (inverse telecine and motion adaptive respectively), which is a bit of the catch when it comes to this player. The Samsung is reporting a true 1080p output for Blu-ray software, a feature lacking from the HD DVD camp, but the output of the decoder is NOT 1080p, it is 1080i. Both the Toshiba HD-A1 and the Samsung use the same decoder chip for high definition (Broadcom). The only difference is that Samsung added the Genesis video-processing chip afterwards, allowing for de-interlacing to 1080p. This is pretty much the same as adding a 1080i capable de-interlacer into the path if you were outputting 1080i from the Toshiba before your display. It also means that the 1080p native video stream from the disc is being re-interlaced, then de-interlaced again. I would really like to see native 1080p feeds from these new players.

For SD de-interlacing, the Samsung did not fare well at all. In fact, it may be one of the worst DVD players I’ve seen to date. For some reason, this player drops into video mode if there is anything even approaching high detail on the screen. This caused the player to fail every single one of our standard cadence tests because of the resolution wedges we use. Does this mean that the player cannot handle standard 3-2 material? No, but it doesn’t seem to handle it with a higher amount of detail. I’ve been using these same wedges since I started doing the benchmark several years ago, and most players (regardless of price) handle these wedges without so much as a glitch with standard 3-2 flags. The Samsung would properly lock on to some other 3-2 material like that found on the new ABT test disc that DVDO is shipping. I am still going to fail the player on these tests though, since it means that this player will more than likely drop into a softer video mode with the majority of detailed content. This was the case with the majority of the content I looked at. Genesis has taken a big step down and failed the majority of our tests. I really wish there were some other players on the market that used this chip to compare their performance and see if this is an implementation issue or a serious limitation of the chipset.

I also found that the chroma filter of the Genesis chip is in a constant “On” mode, which may not be required. If this player uses the Broadcom chip for its MPEG decoding like the Toshiba did, it does not need a CUE filter. This would result in a loss of color detail as it robs about half of the chroma resolution. Faroudja has said in the past that this isn’t perceptible in playback, but in our comparisons to players that don’t use this filter, colors always seem softer and have a washed out appearance.

For high definition material, I used an assortment of high definition cadence patterns that were custom made. The FLI chip does do proper inverse telecine and motion adaptive de-interlacing of 1080i material to 1080p. The Genesis chip did about the same as my Anthem D2’s Gennum chip in this regard with easy material. It did break up more with bad edits though, with occasional short drops into video mode.

Despite using Faroudja algorithms, the BD-P1000 does a poor job with diagonal lines, both with HD and SD video material. Regardless of the test material used, the player would not resolve smooth lines like better video processors out there. I was surprised to see this even with SD material, as Faroudja is usually quite good at this with their DCDi processing.

The output of this player via HDMI is 4:4:4 YCbCr, which is the same as the original firmware for the Toshiba HD-A1. Fortunately, the Samsung does not clip head and toe room. The player does suffer from Y/C delay though, via both HDMI and component video. With HDMI, I did a subjective measurement using the ABT test disc and came out with just over one pixel in delay. Via component, I used a digital oscilloscope and measured just over a full pixel as well. There was no sign of Pb/Pr delay though. Pixel cropping is hardly an issue, with only a few pixels being cropped from any one side.

Overall, usability of the player is decent. The remote is good, but not great. The buttons aren’t very intuitive, and the remote is not backlit, making it cumbersome in the dark. Set-up menus are easy enough, though the player lacks flexibility in its audio set-up (more on that in the full review). The player has a quick start-up, but menu navigation can be somewhat sluggish. Chapter skips are quick enough to not draw too much attention. The layer change clocked in at a sluggish 3.5 seconds.

I will go more into subjective comments on Blu-ray playback performance in my upcoming full review. Right now the hardware has issues, but overall, the software (movies) have been the main drawback. Up until recently, the transfers being put out from Sony and Lionsgate haven’t been very impressive to say the least, but some of the recent Warner releases and even the very latest Sony titles have shown signs of promise for the format.

Conclusions

As a standard DVD player, I can’t recommend the Samsung BD-P1000 at all. It does a poor job with anything involving a high amount of detail, and its video processing leaves a lot to be desired. This is really a shame, as I had high hopes for the new Faroudja processing. As a Blu-ray player, it seems to be doing a fair job, with a few caveats that may be holding it back. Maybe Samsung will release some updates like Toshiba has done with their first generation player that will resolve some of these issues. For anyone planning on using this player in their system, I recommend keeping their standard DVD player for watching anything other than Blu-ray titles, as the performance here is extremely lacking.

Video Frequency Response
Samsung

Neodigits - Helios X5000

MPEG Maker: Sigma Designs MPEG Model: EM8620L Deinterlacer Maker: Sigma Designs Deinterlacer Model: EM8620L     MSRP: $579.00 Website: http://www.neodigits.com/

Just recently I had the opportunity to test the Zensonic networking DVD player and I was extremely impressed with the network connectivity and features the player brought to the table. Now NeoDigits has released a very similar design with the Helios X5000. These players, although similar, go about it in a slightly different way.

The Helios X5000 is what I would call the flagship design for NeoDigits. Its build quality is infinitely better than the previous players I’ve seen from them and reminds me more of a higher end line from a specialty company. The quality of the components used inside is also far better than its price point dictates. Audiophile quality digital to analog converters and an impressive power supply are just some of the rare touches this player offers for a very reasonable price.

Like the Zensonic, the X5000 is a network-capable DVD player; basically it's a media center in a box. It can connect to your home network via its wireless antenna or through an Ethernet connection on the back panel. It also has two USB inputs for connecting external devices like stand-alone hard drives or USB flashdrives. Using these features allowed me to incorporate the player into my entertainment system in a way few players can. I can access all of my music from my home computer and essentially have a music server complete with disc art and playlists. I can access my photos or even the Internet, all from a sub-$600 DVD player. This is very impressive.

The Sigma Designs EM860L is the core-processing chip and allows for all of this flexibility. Sigma has really separated themselves from the other MPEG decoding chips out there and have an impressive array of features offered from their single chip designs. The only problem with this is, the chip isn’t really that great for DVD video processing, so a benchmark like this one doesn’t show it much mercy.

The X5000 performed almost identically to the Zensonic player we reviewed just a few time ago. This was expected since the chipset used is exactly the same. The only real difference was the X5000 didn’t pass our bad edits test. There was actually some horrible combing all throughout our test clip from The Big Lebowski. I don’t really know why this player’s output would be any different unless a register was changed somewhere when they were implementing it.

The EM860L is a below average chip when it comes to de-interlacing. It is not motion adaptive, which at this point in the game is almost unforgivable. With as many video based DVDs out there, support for motion adaptive de-interlacing is pretty much a necessity. It also fails just about any test that has a break in cadence or a bad flag. This will result in a lot of combing or drops to video when watching any disc with less than perfect authoring. It does properly handle 3-2 and 2-2 based material properly though, which (fingers crossed) represents the bulk of most film based Hollywood DVDs on the market today.

For video based material, the EM860L is just not a very good solution. On top of the lack of motion adaptive de-interlacing mentioned before, this solution has absolutely no support for diagonal line processing. So diagonal lines in video material will have obvious jaggies that can distract from the image.

For its core performance, the X5000 does a decent job. It supports a wide array of video output modes via both component and HDMI. The HDMI output even supports 480i and 1080p. 480i is important for those looking for better video performance from this unit, as it allows you to have a direct digital feed from the decoder to a stand-alone video processor. This would solve a lot of the de-interlacing issues associated with the player but allow you to take advantage of all of the other features.

Pixel cropping is very slight with the X5000. One pixel was cropped from the left side and top of the image. There are no signs of Y/C delay with either the HDMI or component output. This player clips head and toe room via HDMI but retains the full signal with component video. This is a trend we’ve been seeing in too many HDMI-based DVD players, and we hope it is addressed in future designs. The default white level is too high though via component, and measures in at 108 IRE.

The X5000 did fair in our chroma upsampling tests, passing them with standard 3-2 and 2-2 material but failing material encoded with an alternating 3-2 flag. The Sigma Designs chip also employs a chroma filter to eliminate the chroma banding associated with 4:2:0 ICP.

The X5000 is extremely fast with navigation and basic functions. Its layer change is also quite fast, clocking in at about one second.

We did have some issues with our test discs during the evaluation. For some reason the X5000 was very finicky with both Video Essentials and our homemade test disc. As we navigated deeper into the menus of the discs, the player would stop showing us the image or it would overlay the previous screen onto the old one. This is probably a bug with the player, but it was distracting enough to make some of the testing a bit tedious.

Conclusions

The Helios X5000 represents an outstanding value as a media center based DVD player, but a below average investment for DVD playback quality. I guess trade-offs need to be made to get the kind of features you’ll find here, at a low price. Since every other player of this nature has the same issues, I would probably recommend this one the most in that category. Its build quality and interface are far more impressive than what I’ve seen from other similar designs.

Calibre - Vantage-HD

MPEG Maker: MPEG Model: Deinterlacer Maker: Silicon Optix Deinterlacer Model: Realta     MSRP: $2899.00 Website: http://www.calibreuk.com/index.php

Video Frequency Response
Calibre