Nice. Looks Like Stand Alone Blu-Ray Players Are Nearing The WTH Price
In the continuing quest for digital video nirvana, I’ve long been missing one particular power up: Blu-Ray. I’ve been doing without a HD disc format, first because of the stupid HD format war with HD DVD, because streaming options over the Internet are eventually sure to catch up (the HD options on Netflix Watch Instantly and the Apple TV are good enough in my opinion), and lastly, price. Paying $300-$400 for a Blu-Ray player had me dancing around a PS3 for a while, but I never pulled the trigger.
Well, prices for stand-alone Blu-Ray players are fast falling, and now with this Christmas season underway it looks like a stand alone Blu-Ray player can be had for around $100. A quick Amazon search is equally drool-worthy.
$100 is my “WTH” (what the heck) price which means if I drop that amount on some piece of tech gear, I don’t really care too much if the product eventually becomes obsolete or finds a secondary use as a paperweight.
But even after getting a player, I’m adamant about not buying any Blu-Ray discs, especially not purchasing movies I already own and getting on that annoying treadmill of yet another disc format. There’s only so many copies of Star Wars one can justify buying, even if the Blu-Ray version has some behind-the-scenes interactive extra on how many animators created Jar-Jar stepping in poo. Instead, I plan to just rent Blu-Ray discs from Netflix, and eventually, when HD is commonplace streaming over the Internet, use the Blu-Ray player as a $100 cat bed warmer.
I think I’ll wait until January, when the post-Christmas sales take hold to take the plunge. Star Trek and Pierrot Le Fou already in the Netflix queue.
Like you, I’m tempted by the $100-ish price point, but I can’t quite convince myself that it’s worth the leap. Are the added features on Blu-ray discs really that much better in quantity or quality? I’m itching to buy Up! as kind of a Christmas gift for the family, but I dunno if the BR extras make owning that format worth the extra expense of the movie itself, much less also the price of the player.
But also, like you, we’ve mostly gotten away from buying movies. We rent from Netflix like crazy, but only occasionally buy movies. See, now I’ve sorta talked myself outta the Blu-ray again… Dangit.
Yeah it’s tricky, I’m sure others have a different price point higher or
lower than $100. Like you, I’m totally not into buying any more discs and
relying just on rentals, but the fact that Netflix has Blu-Ray rentals for
just a buck more per month (last I checked, anyhow) I think I can milk that
HD source for all its worth without much added expense. If it weren’t for
netflix — wouldn’t bother with a Blu-Ray player.
But who knows. I’ve been doing fine without Blu-Ray for quite some time, and
am skeptical the added quality is going to make me only watch HD (still
stand by the idea that a good movie is good movie regardless of picture
quality — just watched Double Indemnity in black and white, definitely not
HD, and it was a great flick) — so I might find this purchase a frivolous
one.
[…] year, a christmas present to myself was a cheap-ass Blu-Ray player that cost a little more than my WTH price of $100. At that price, I am willing to take a chance on […]