Are there any BD players that do an excellent job of upconverting SD? (1 Viewer)

I haven't been keeping completely current on what has been developing regarding the SD video quality when played on a BD machine. One thing that I have noted, perhaps incorrectly, is that Sony regards SD upconversion as an annoyance to be disregarded because there is no profit in it.

Now that I have the funds to actually buy some items, it appears that the best upconversion is handled by Toshiba's HD players or perhaps their dedicated SD upconversion player.

Is this the sorry situation?

The new Panasonic line of Blu-ray players allegedly give the Toshiba XA2 a run for its money. Every review I have read of these models have rated their upconversion capabilities superb.

Do the newer Panasonics put black on the sides of 4x3 video? My friend has one from last year that will only put GRAY bars on the sides, and there's no way to change it. He has an LCD so burn-in isn't even an issue. I would avoid any player that does that. Also, as has been pointed out in another post, it seems that Panasonic isn't including any button on the remote for subtitles.

Damn, I read subtitles most of the time because of my crappy hearing.

No big deal if you just turn on subtitles at the beginning of the movie--especially the ones that begin at the menu.

From reading in the user forums, you have to go into the user menu and uncheck "screen saver." When you do that, it puts up the regular black bars for 4:3 material.

For me, no subtitle button is a deal breaker.

Every time I watch a DVD, they'll be a moment of unintelligible dialogue, so I'll quickly rewind, switch on the subtitles, re-watch the moment, then switch them off and continue the movie.

I used to have the Sony 7000. I loved that remote because it had a subtitle AND a subtitle on/off button. My newer Sony forces me to scroll through all the subtitle tracks to switch them off, which is a little annoying.

So is the bottom line here, that the Panasonics play SD-DVD better than the Sonys?

Ditto for me, No subtitle button is a major deal breaker. I too used to have the Sony 7000, my first player actually, and I still have the follow up model to that, Sony 7700 and I too really loved the fact that they both had a Subtitle ON/OFF button. In my opinion every single player, DVD or BD should provide this button on the remote.

There is a workaround for the GRAY bars on the sides. If you turn off the 'screen saver' funtion, the player then displays 'BLACK' bars instead of the 'GRAY' ones. What the two have do with each other? Beats me. But then again, I am still trying to figure out why Panasonic would not provide a subtitle button on the remote.

Amen Sanjay!

I don't think manufacturers realise how vital a subtitle button is in day to day DVD/Blu-ray viewing.