$349 seems cheap, but is there a catch, or just good value? We look at one of the cheapest Blu-Ray players on the market to date.
Kogan today caught our attention with a press release trumpeting what would have to be the cheapest Blu-Ray player to date, at a fairly wallet-friendly $349. Sure, you can pick up a DVD player for about $20 these days, but Blu-Ray players have largely been premium priced.
This got us thinking -- is there a catch compared to a "brand" Blu-Ray player?
Based just on the specifications (we're yet to get our hands on a review unit), there's some distinct upsides -- and one notable downside. 1080p output is naturally supported, as is high definition audio and a range of other video playback modes are also offered, which is a nice bonus.
The press release we received claimed that it "can play Blu-ray movies from around the world", although whether that's true multi-region playback or just the fact that we're in a fairly heavily populated Blu-Ray region isn't clear. You can check the player's full claimed specifications here.
Where the Kogan player falls against the bigger "brand" players -- something like the Sony's BDPS350, which retails at $449 -- is that it's lacking in an ethernet port and is based around the older Blu-Ray 1.1 profile.
Profile 2.0 players require an ethernet port, which both enables any future firmware upgrades, as well as the downloadable BD-Live features becoming slightly more common on Blu-Ray discs.
Without that, the somewhat cheaper player could be stuck in something of a dead end, even with the promise from the specifications page that it's "firmware upgradeable".