Pioneer shows new Blu-ray players
Pioneer chairs the Blu-ray Disc Association, yet they never had a consumer-level Blu-ray player … until now.
Showing at the CES expo in Las Vegas, NV are three new Pioneer branded Blu-ray players. The BDP-120 is the entry-level player with a price of $250, clearly priced competitively. A step-up player, the BDP-320, will sell for $400, and a new BDP-23FD Elite-branded player will sell at $600.
Each of the three new players will use HDMI 1.3 HDMI-CEC technology to detect what display it is connected to and make picture adjustments accordingly. This will initially work with ninth-generation Kuro plasma displays but should eventually work with other brands as well. They are all BD-Live players with no less than 1GB internal storage, and a USB port for memory expansion (including bus-powered hard drives).
The BDP-320 and BDP-23FD will offer Pioneer’s exclusive Precision Quartz Lock System (PQLS) which works in conjunction with the newly-announced Pioneer A/V receivers, as well as the current Elite receivers. PQLS syncs the audio output of the player with the internal clock of the receiver via HDMI to reduce judder.
Absent these players in the ability to stream video from online services. This seems to be the show item at CES this year with LG, Samsung and Vizio all offering streaming of some sort to Blu-ray players, and several television manufacturers including this in the display itself. Gizmodo does report that Pioneer is aware of this shortcoming and will work to remedy the situation.
It’s good to see many more Blu-ray options are now available.
