Big upgrade. This is going to be a pretty long post.
It all started with an intense curiosity over the Algolith HDMI Flea, which is a video noise reduction device. A lot of people at AVS Forum have been raving about it and a lot of the Flea owners also had the DVDO VPO50Pro, which I own. I firmly decided to get one. But before the final decision, I asked a good friend and he almost hit me on the head and told me that I could get the top-of-the-line HD and BD players for less than that amount, and this would provide more bang for the buck!
I had tested both BD and HD in my HT and I was not tremendously impressed. It was very hard to distinguish between the video-processed SD vs the BD/HD. However, my friend did have a very good point. Furthermore, as I researched, I noted that the 3rd generation of HD/BD players had arrived and these seemed to be much more mature. Having previously sworn to indefinitely defer my purchase of HD/BD players, I had to justify this purchase so aside from its being cheaper than the Flea, I swore that I would not buy HD copies of SD DVD's that I owned, except for a very few titles (such as "The Fifth Element"), which I would use as comparisons. Also because of the big price difference, I resolved not to buy HD/BD discs unless there were favorable reviews of a particular disc. The point is that there have been many hi-def discs which have turned out to have video and/or audio quality the same as SD.
After doing more research, I decided to buy the Panasonic DMP-BD30 Bluray player and the Toshiba HD-A35 because of the good reviews they had received and because I felt they were the most appropriate for my system. In particular, the BD30 and A35 are among the very few players that can pass hi-def audio through hdmi 1.3a to an AVR.
Panasonic DMP-BD30 Bluray Player
Toshiba HD-A35 HD-DVD Player, mounted below my SD-DVD Pioneer 676
After buying the hi-def players, I had a second dilemma. I was intensely curious about Dolby TruHD and DTS-MA, both of which can send the original audio masters. However, I had to get an AVR (or prepro) that could decode these internally. The logic was as follows:
1. I had a Denon AVR-2807, which used the Audyssey room correction technology to adjust the 9-band equalizer of the Denon, as well as set the distances and speaker levels. I found the Audyssey to provide a huge difference in audio quality.
2. Whenever the input audio signal passed through the 5.1 analog inputs of the Denon, they by-passed the Audyssey. These signals could be SACD or DVD-A but it was clear that they had not been processed by Audyssey and so the sound quality was badly compromised.
3. To get Dolby TruHD and DTS-MA, you could use either the analog inputs or buy a receiver that could pass HDMI 1.3 and handle the decoding of Dolby TruHD and DTS-MA. In the Denon world, these were the latest AVR's, with the cheapest being the 2808.
It was clear to me that if you wanted to fully enjoy Dolby TruHD or DTS-MA, you had to get the latest-generation AVR's. I immediately decided on the 2808 because the biggest difference with the more expensive Denons seemed to be the power amps, which I basically don't need because I have separate power amps. Furthermore, I firmly determined that this was my Christmas gift to myself.
Denon AVR-2808CI
So what are my impressions? Essentially, I think I can say that there is definitely an improvement in pq and aq but compared to my previous system, which includes an advanced video processor, the improvement is subtle. You can sense the improvement and you can find it, but its not "night and day."
For the audio, there are subtle differences in detail, smoothness of surround and lower bass extension. Things like the fingers sliding through the frets of a guitar, or the panning of sound from front to back and up to down (which are more difficult than left to right). It's more realistic and you feel more like being "in the movie." But it is subtle. As someone at Pinoydvd pointed out, in a movie, I guess that a crash is a crash and a gunshot is a gunshot - hard to improve on that. Concerts should be better material to detect the difference and I have been trying to get concerts with high-def audio but there are so few. I only have two - "Dave Matthews Band" and "Jazz Legends." Both are good but if you try to switch between Dolby TruHD and plain Dolby Digital 5.1 or DTS, it is very hard to detect the difference. You can sense it but hard to pinpoint.
In addition, it appears the the new Denon AVR-2808 has made some minor improvements in audio over the old model, particularly in a new version of Audyssey which now uses 8 sampling points as opposed to 6 previously - there seems to be an improvement in the mid-bass.
For the video, there are subtle differences in greater detail, less grain, higher contrast. Again, in my system, it doesn't stare you in the face but its definitely there. Similar to hi-def audio, you can sense that there is an improvement but it's very hard to pinpoint exactly where. You have to pause the film and then compare it with its SD version and after 15 minutes of back-and-forth, mapapansin mo nga ang differences. Mas defined ang pilik-mata. Mas defined ang eye-bags. Mas maraming freckles. Parang "spot the changes." What makes it more difficult is that you are dealing with HDMI connections and they need to establish "hand-shakes." Paminsan, parang nalilito sila and you have to restart your system so that they can do the proper "hand-shake."
Here are a few shots of the Fifth Element (Bluray version):
The Fifth Element
Bottom-line is that I'm pretty happy with my upgrade. E kasi, pasko! Merry X'mas!
