Blue Ray Players

The Korean Company has been involved recently in producing blue ray players and one among the many players is this Samsung BD-C5500. Samsung has developed this as a major entry level blue ray player. Blue ray players have become a field of interest these days. In the beginning the blue ray players itself were considered something very high and interesting and as the time progressed, the output that was expected out of this little player started mounting and now these players have found great improvement. At present, the users of a good blue ray player can do almost anything related to the media field by investing few hundred pounds on a blue ray player. “Imagine the possibilities”, being the slogan, it extends its imaginations to its possible level and has designed a basic entry level player, the “Samsung BD-C5500”.

The Samsung  BD-C5500 Blu-Ray Wi-Fi Ready Player has all the essential features of an entry level player. Being a profile 2.0 player it supports the BD Live contents which mean the users can enjoy few features. If you want to know in detail about the features of this player and also check whether it would be suitable for you, then read further.

Design and Ports:

Glossiness always adds value to the product and so has the look been enhanced in the BD-C5500. It is completely glossy black in colour with a strip of silver colour on the right side top corner which contains the control buttons. Though the glossy black looks simple and good, the fingerprints are easily shown on the player and this makes maintenance a bit tough. On the silver strip are present four control buttons, Play/Pause, Stop, Forward and the power button. This arrangement is neat yet the placing of the buttons on a separate silver layer might seem unnecessary. These control buttons are not of much use since the remote control is the most easiest and comfortable one. Below the control panel is a USB port. This port is actually used to store the contents of the BD Live, that is, the users can actually download and store in the flash or any other drive by plugging it into this port. Since the player does not have 1GB of on-board memory storage, this USB 2.0 port is the main source of storage area. The design is thus simple and good.

On the back side of the BD-C5500 Blue-Ray Disc player are present few of the most important connections or ports. Beginning from the left most end, there is a port for wireless LAN. This player does not support Wi-Fi. So the users have to buy a dongle as an extra expense to avail the wireless connection. Next to this is the ethernet port for LAN connection. Next is the HDMI port for watching in the big screen. The Digital audio output port, the optical port is present and then follows the AV out plugs. This machine weighs merely 1.6 kg which is good for an entry level player. Moreover, this player has a width of 433 mm, depth of 205 mm and a height of about 43 mm. These dimensions do not make it an ultra thin player, but definitely queues it up in the thinner players’ line.

Remote Control:

The Samsung BD-C5500 package comes along with a remote control included in it. Remote controls usually reduce the work of the man since he no longer needs to get up from his couch time and again to do the basic controls or make any changes in the video or movie or anything that is being played through the player. This remote is an IR type remote control which has a neat layout of the buttons and is designed to be used by the user in a comfortable way. All the buttons, even the numbers and volume and channel control buttons, required are laid out in different nice colours. There is no trouble in using the remote control at all.

Amazing Features:

The most important part of any player is the features that have been included. Features are kind of packages that add value to the product in terms of its quality. Higher the number of good features higher the quality and hence higher the demand. This product has a good number of features and a brief description of some of its important features is given below.

Picture Quality:

5x the original quality – this is what the blue ray players were initially described to have and this is their basic character. The quality of the movies or the images viewed in the blue ray is excellent that at times it might be a little hard to differentiate whether it is real or reel. The blue rays offer the maximum possible resolution, that is the 1080p, which mean that the on-screen object would be crystal clear. The colour perfection attained by the player is extraordinary since it provides the exact colour to the eyes. In short, watching the movies or videos or images would be a treat for the users because of the amazing picture quality. Moving on to the speed or the time it takes for the player to load the movie and start playing, Samsung actually boasts of this ultra fast play, but in real, the time taken for loading is quite high and this increases the wait time. Since the response time is very slow, it adds to a minor flaw in the profile of this player.

The All-Share DLNA:

One of the most interesting and new features is the All Share DLNA. The Digital Living Network Alliance aims to help the people to get the best of the available resources. “Connect and enjoy” is their main logo and with the DLNA, the users can have a whole lot of fun with the other devices that they have. Using the DLNA, it is possible for the users to connect their player to their mobile phones or PC and thus play the contents through the player. This DLNA is actually an evolution in this field because with the DLNA you can do wonders. Any video taken in your iphone can be watched in High Definition and at 1080p with full clarity in your home theatre by just connecting them. The All-share is exactly true because you can share everything, everywhere and at anytime you need to.

Wi-Fi and Ethernet:

As said earlier there is a port on the back side of the player for getting connected to the internet. Though Wi-Fi connection is not available as a ready made it can be made feasible by using an extra dongle, at extra cost of course. Once the connection to the Internet is done, the interesting things that the player holds for us is excellent. Let us study some of those.

Interface and Firmware Updating:

The interface of this Samsung BD-C5500 Blu Ray DVD player is quite simple. There is a wooden grain background and over this background the icons take their positions. In the bottom the main menus like the Internet@TV, Music, Videos, Photos and Settings are present. On the top of the screen, the list of the applications present in the Internet@TV, in other words the Samsung Apps, are listed in a horizontal row. Though only few basic applications have been included at present, Samsung has promises of expanding its range further and for this, time will give the answer. If the expansion really does occur, higher firmwares will be available and they can be easily upgraded since this is a profile 2.0 player and BD Live is supported.

Internet@TV:

The applications that Samsung has included at present are You Tube, Vudu, NetFlix and Pandora. As said earlier, this is expected to increase in the near future though. So, with you tube, the users can watch the videos that they wish to or even upload the videos from their mobile or camera to the website. The presence of the application NetFlix implies that the users can now endlessly watch movies by renting them and watching in the big screen at their home sweet home. For music lovers, the happy news is that Pandora is an included application. Anytime and every time the users can listen to their favorite music with the Pandora. Thus this player offers a good number of options.

Audio and Video Functioning:

The Samsung BD-C5500 does not support 7ch surround sound unlike few other blue ray players. But then, this player can decode the audio files of the type Dolby Digital, digital plus, Dolby True HD and DTS HD High Resolution, DTS HD Master Audio, LPCM, MP3 and WMA. So this means that most of the basic types are covered and the clarity of the audio is pretty good. Moving on to the video functioning, as explained earlier, this device gives a good output at 1080p and as intended by the director.

Execution and Performance:

Being an entry level and a profile 2.0 player, this device supports BD Live 2.0 which means that the users can watch video-in-video, that is, the commentaries on a particular scene by an actor or the director. The audio and video functioning is quite acceptable. But then, one big flaw is the time taken for the disk to load. Apart from this issue, the player has done a good job. In a nutshell, it has executed its potential well, but then the point is that its potential could have been increased further?!

Power:

The device normally consumes 13 watts of power when it is used in the usual mode. But then the amount of consumption reduces to nearly 0.1 watts when it is in the standby mode. The power button on the silver strip of the player glows when the player is in standby mode making the status obvious to the player and reducing the job of checking it.

Warranty:

The Samsung BD-C5500 has a warranty period of 1 year.

Verdict:

The Samsung BD-C5500 is an entry level blue ray player which brings to the users “The Future of Entertainment”. It is obvious that it is a less-cost player with good number of features. There are many other players in the market which offer other features almost at the same rate. So, this is not for those who have different expectations. But then, if the features of this machine suit your choice and expectations, then you can proudly become the owner of this simple Samsung BD-C5500.