Bravo D1 $199.99 Upscaling DVD Player (1 Viewer)

[Mike Flanagan]

Go to Pacificcables.com. I got a 5 meter DVI cable for $32.00. Others have reported over on the AVS forum that they are excellent quality. Mine arrives this week but I cant get a Bravo because they are sold out. :frowning:

Flan

 

[Joe6pack99]

Mike I feel your pain i went to order but backordered....oh well i may as well wait now to the Samsung and compare both.

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

For 5M, it's a piece of cake, even pretty average quality cables are fine. At 10m, there are definitely some bandwidth issues with copper.

 

[Bob McElfresh]

At 10m, there are definitely some bandwidth issues with copper.

Just keep in mind that Gabriel is talking about parallel copper wires pushing digital signals changing at 100 Mhz or more. This is a speed that computer motherboards could not do until a few years ago. Converting the signals to optical for a long run solves a lot of problems.

Gabriel: we are all awaiting your report.

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

Well, at 10m, any reasonably good copper DVI cable will pass upwards of 1280x1024 at 60hz (or equivalent bandwidth, 118Mhz). This means 1280x720 at 85hz or 1366x768 at 75hz will work as well.

Since I'm putting the cable in my wall, I want to be sure it can do full 1080p. The fiber optic one can do 1920x1080 at 60hz.

There's a secret menu on the DVD player that allows you to adjust resolution, refresh, and other things. I'm still playing around. It looks pretty awesome. Who knows though, in 2 months, the Samsung 931 may come along and blow it out of the water.

 

[Nathan_H]

Analog component output on this player CANNOT scale to 1080i, right? even with the hidden menus....

 

[HanLee]

So any more reviews or thoughts on this machine? I'm about to buy a DVI DVD player soon. Trying to see if the Bravo is better than the Samsung.

-Han

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

Some people have tried both and prefer the picture quality of the Bravo unit because it does not have the edge enhancement problems of the Samsung.

Not all displays are compatible with the DVI input from these players.

Neither players are good for those of you not planning to use the DVI output. Picture quality from the component out is mediocre at best.

 

[HanLee]

I see. Well I have the Panny 47wx53 which accepts DVI. I think I like the fact that the Bravo plays mp3 CD's and mpeg-4 video. But the factor that really influences me in purchasing this is the pricepoint ($200) and the picutre quality. I might have to go see it for myself. Might just do that right now since I'm not really doing anything. Thanks for the information. =)

-Han

 

[Gordon Groff]

Just wanted to add my experience to this thread. Got my Bravo D1 hooked up last week with a 30' DVI cable from www.lastar.org (10 meter, actually) and it has given the PQ from my Sanyo PLV-70 projector a large step-change for the better. Makes the component out from my Panny RP-82 look anemic . Between that and upgrading my screen to DaLite HiPower, I'm now getting an image I can brag about. Bear in mind the Bravo is not perfect, but the small quibbles I've got are overwhelmed by the improvement into my digital PJ. For $200, it's a no-brainer.
Gordon

 

[Doug Schiller]

Just a quick correction. Neither player (Bravo or Samsung) supports DVD-Audio. I think they both were announced to but they removed that feature.
The HD931 supposedly will do 2CH DVDA, but I haven't tried it (still use my RP82 for that).

I was very interested in this player but there was only one place you could buy them (strike one), they were always backordered (strike two), and they insisted on charging your credit card before they would take your order (steeee-rike 3, yer OUT!)

Luckily, my Hitachi 51swx20b happily supports all the HD931 formats via DVI.

I think anyone would be happy with either player.

Doug

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

The 2 things that the Bravo have over the Samsung are:

1. No need for HDCP capable DVI device
2. Samsung has excessive EE, which is non-adjustable

If those 2 things do not apply to you, and the $60-100 price difference doesn't matter, the Samsung is an excellent choice. The fact that the Bravo is always backordered is a pain. Samsung is also a bigger company with a better support structure.

 

[Joe6pack99]

Well been playing around for the last few hrs. First of all calibration-wise like many others here there was a huge difference as far as setting black level(brightness going down) and saturation going up. Once completed i started playing with it.

My initial impression of the Bravo against the Rp82 is that they are virtually identical,very subtle differences really. At most i would say the Bravo is a little "crisper" for the lack of a better word. Now these are very early impressions and i will do a lot more testing this weekend. Overall i would say though if you do not have a Rp82 or one the the other similiar players pq-wise jump on this if you do have DVI on your set since this is fairly a low cost player with excellent performance.

I noticed that when i set the Bravo to 1080i of course with Dvi that on text or menus there was definitely some shimmering when my Hitachi locked on to the signal. When i set it to 480p or 720p and used my Tv's internal scaler set to 1080i it was much cleaner.




Been testing a ton of discs out and overall i really do like the Bravo. As confirmed by everyone it definitely upscales through component outputs,however it looks terrible so definitely do not get this player unless using DVI.

As far as pq goes it really does look excellent,especially on demo related material.For the most part again the Bravo and Rp82 are extremely close pq wise, with the Bravo having a little more of a 3d image at times but hardly anything drastic. Unless you are really doing hard a/b comparisons probably won't notice all that much.

I pretty much use 720p output of the Bravo and set the Hitachi at 1080i as i noticed a lot more jaggies and some bleeding when setting the Bravo to output 1080i(can really notice this on menu's) which the tv locks on to. At 1080i the internal scaler of the tv is better. I have noticed on some discs what i would call image tearing,which i suspect would be due to its normal deinterlacing,but could be upscaling artifacts. I will test later at 480p output.

An annoying thing about the Bravo is how it handles 4:3 content. You have to manually go into the menu and change from 16:9 to 4:3. Also you can ONLY watch 4:3 content in 480p output if you want to have the Hitachi set to 4:3 norm or 4:3 Expanded. Otherwise setting it to 720p or 1080i locks the tv to 16:9 mode. I was hoping it would stretch 4:3 content since out Hitachi 4:3 Expanded does not do the greatest job but it doesn't.

Again so far i really do like this player other than a few little things. For the price it gives out a great pic. However, i am going to keep the RP-82 after testing more discs out due to the poor deinterlacing that was very noticeable on a lot of discs. We all know the RP82 shines over most players in this category.

My Equip:
HDTV:Hitachi 65SWX-20B
Directview:Sony Wega 36xbr
Receiverenon 3801
DVD:Bravo D1
DVDanasonic RP82
DVDanasonic CP72
Speakers:Energy Encore 6.1(2 rears)
Subsual SVS 16-46
Surge protectionanamax Max8 DBS +5
Interconnects:Silver Serpent,Monstor,Acoustic RS
Speaker wire: 12 gauge all around

 

[John_F]

I'm interested in seeing the results of 480p thru DVI. I don't see the logic behind outputing 720p from the Bravo for 1080i native displays:

480p (Bravo) -> Scaled to 720p (Bravo) -> 1080i (Display)

versus

480p (Bravo) -> 1080i (Display)

It seems to me when you output 720p from the Bravo, you are introducing an extra processing which may degrade the picture.

Regards,
John Flegert

 

[larry crimmins]

I have been using the Bravo for several weeks now with my Sony 34XBR800 through DVI. DVI cable was from http://www.pacificcable.com/ and cost less than $20
Picture quality still limited by the amount of information on the DVD but is as good as can be gotten from DVD. It is probably matched by a really pricey progressive scan player through component and you can save the DVI port for your set top box. Presently , there is no reasonably priced switching hardware to allow the use of more than one DVI enabled device. This will become an issue when HDCP flags are turned on by the content providers.
I use 1080i and 720P and sometimes zoom anamorphic to fill the screen better. It is not HD quality but it is really good. The bang for buck makes it a very attractive option for DVI equipped displays, not component. The player itself is not a joy to use. It is balky and tries your patience often. For displays like plasmas , LCDs or front projectors that do pixel mapping it is a great and cheap alternative to a HTPC. The guys over at AVS Forum have lots of info on this piece, by the way.

 

[Mike I.]

The newer batch of Samsung HD931 doesnt seem to have EE problems anymore. They must'vs taken them out. The snow in 1080i input has now been corrected by Samsung. Just call them up at 1-800-SAMSUNG and they'll send you a firmware fix for that. Great support from Samsung for actually listening to our concerns. I think these guys surf the boards!

 

[Dave Mack]

Hey guys? How is the de-interlacing on the Bravo? Are there different modes? FILM, VIDEO, SMART...?? Since you cannot output 480i through DVI, what does 1 do for, say "Problem" discs like the BUFFY R1 sets which have MANY combing issues... For those discs, I just force VIDEO mode although they are flagged for FILM...

D

 

[Ron Reda]

I just found this which may be a good read for those interested in this player:

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cgi-b...deInt=0&mpeg=0

 

[Gordon Groff]

Hey guys? How is the de-interlacing on the Bravo? Are there different modes? FILM, VIDEO, SMART...?? Since you cannot output 480i through DVI, what does 1 do for, say "Problem" discs like the BUFFY R1 sets which have MANY combing issues... For those discs, I just force VIDEO mode although they are flagged for FILM...

We've got over 50 titles viewed on our D1 at 720p (with Sanyo PLV-70)so far and I have not seen anything amiss. I honestly don't know what bad de-interlacing would look like. Never seen it as far as I know. Previous player was a Panny RP-82. I don't think it has any "modes", but I could be wrong. I just treat it as a digital transport and let any processing occur in the PJ. Also don't have any idea what the "flag read" stuff means. Ignorance is bliss in this case! Picture looks great on everything we've thrown at it. Knock on wood.

For $200, I don't hesitate to recommend it based on my experience. It's NOT perfect - no track numbers show on the display when playing audio CD's, the remote is pretty bad, and I've had it hang up on DVD's that are dirty (always played fine after washing the DVD). I've programmed the remote into my Denon's remote, do very little CD playing on my system, and wash a lot of discs, so I'm pretty happy with it - 'specially as the image quality was a major step-change inprovement on my setup. That's the BIG reason to own this thing - the DVI output can make a huge difference with a digital projector.

Gordon