DMP-BD35 Player

Well I finally took a swig of the blu-ray kool-aid, and so far it is not too bad. This weekend Costco was having an $80 off sale on their two BD players (BD-30 and BD-35). I stopped by 3 stores trying to locate the BD-35, but all they had was the BD-30 (which I did not want). At the last store, I had one of the employees look up the sku for the BD-35 and he came back with some interesting news. They did have several of these players, but they would not put them out until all the BD-30's were sold. It seems there was a note that indicated that the BD-35 were meant to be a replacement for the BD-30's so they were not bringing them out. That sort of frosted me, so I thanked the guy for his help and left. When I got home, I grabbed the Costco Connection magazine that had the ad, and headed by to the second store (which had 72 units). There I spoke to another employee, who was very knowledgeable about the BD-35. He knew where they were, but also gave me the same story about having to sell all the BD-30's before they could bring them out. I showed him the ad, and pointed out that the sale specifically mentioned the BD-35. I also explained to him that they had different sku numbers, and even a different price. After a little more small talk, I was able to convience him.

I had to wait 30 minutes or so for the forklift to make it to the far end of the store where the prized BD-35's were sitting in wait. When they were finally lowered, I snatched one up and headed home. I had also picked up a copy of Iron Man in BD to test it out (since they were $5 off). A neighbor and his friend stopped over to give the player its first showing. There was some issue getting the PCM channel working through my receiver, but after about 5 false starts, we finally had full audio. Something still seems a bit odd about that experience, but I didn't have time to figure out what component was at fault.  

The BD-35 is quite nice, from the time I have had to play with it.  It loads fast, has a very nice menu layout, and was easy to update the firmware over the internet (took about 10 minutes to load V 1.5).  It is hooked up through my DVDO Edge, so it is hard to judge the picture quality without bypassing this processor.  Everything seems to look good hooked up through Edge.

This definitely pushes me one step closer to purchasing the 1080p projector. Just need the first user reports to start rolling in on the 6500UB.