After a week of being really busy with too much of stress and pressure in the office, all we would like to do in the weekends, is just sit back, toss a DVD into the player and peacefully watch a movie with family or friends. This has become customary for almost all the working people. This does not stop just with working men and women but almost all the people of different age groups give more importance to media and entertainment. In such a scenario, the importance of a blue ray player can be well understood without the need of telling. Blue ray players have begun to dominate the techie world drawing more and more attention. Therefore more and more players make their debut into the market each trying to outshine the other. This Sony BDP-S580 player is one that offers a number of services and has a truly attention grabbing appearance. For any gadget, if there are few positives, there definitely has to be few minor negatives at the least. Let us take a closer look at this handsome looking young fellow S580 and try to spot out the notable positives as well as the negatives.

Design and Display:

Black has been the universal colour code for most of the blue ray players. Very few players are available in grey or silver color. The BDP-S580 also takes up the black robe for its attire and sports a pretty cool and attractive look with a glossy and reflective panel. The design of this Sony BDP S580 gives a dignified look and Sony has made an astute decision in giving importance to the appearance. Moving on to the details of the keys and controls present in the player’s front and rear, the disc tray and the power indicator are on the left. The power indicator glows white whenever the power is on thereby helping out the user to identify easily the condition of the player. Below the disc tray on the left most side is the button for either turning on the player or changing it to the standby mode. The standby mode is used when we want the player to consume less amount of power. For a change, the display has been shifted to the right side to let the users know what the player is actually doing, like, lighting up as HD when any video is played at high end resolution, etc., The common controls, open/close, play/pause and stop buttons are present at the bottom. By long pressing the play button the disc tray gets locked thereby preventing the users from opening it by mistake and this is usually made by children and would therefore be of great use.

The fact that the player comes with 2 USB 2.0 ports would bring smiles on the faces of all the users because, while one port can be used for downloading the BD Live contents, (Yes this means that the player does not include on-board memory!) the other port can be used for plugging in another USB device for playing the videos or photos in a HD TV. One port is located on the front panel while the other is on the rear end. The audio and video outs, HDMI, LAN ports and the second USB 2.0 port are at the back side of the player and there is nothing unique or unusual about it. The coaxial and the component video output plugs are also present at their usual places.

The Ordinary and the special remote Control:

Would you have ever thought of your mobile phone working as a remote for a blue ray player? The answer would have definitely been no few years back. But the technology has taken such a big leap that the link between the gadgets is showing great improvements. One of the most interesting applications is to use the media remote application of Sony. This facility, however, is available only for the iOS or more rightly, the iPhone Operating System and the android OS users. But great news that would incite you all the more to use this app is that the users can user their mobile keyboard to search for the internet services offered by Sony. Then there is always the Infra Red remote control for any bluye ray player and this particular remote control is same as that of the S480 model and has a neat layout of the buttons that is quite comfortable to use.

Features:

The Sony BDP-S580 blu ray player is a profile 2.0 player and that includes the common features of all profile 2.0 players; the users can feast their eyes with the profile 1.1 feature bonus view, wherein they can actually get to see the commentaries by particular actors or directors. And as usual, the BD Live contents can be downloaded but unfortunately the player does not support onboard memory. So as said earlier, the users would have to make use of one of the USB ports provided for downloading the contents. The top players in the market come with onboard storage. However, the presence of two USB ports does not make this problem seem a big blunder. Let us peep into some of the prime features of this BDP-S580.

DVD Upscaling:

If you try to count the number of blu ray players that do not support this commonest feature of all, the DVD upscaling, then you would not even get a count of hand few. This is because almost all of the blue ray players provide dvd upscaling whereby the users can watch their all time favorites at the best 1080p resolution. This S580 model delivers great image quality and plays almost all the videos and movies, regardless of whether it is old or new, amazingly well.

User Interface:

The Play station users will have no hard time working with the interface because this is similar to the PS3 interface. The design of this interface is that the main menus are displayed horizontally while the sub-menus are listed out vertically. The design would be liked by all but you would soon start getting disappointed while moving down the streaming service options because of a very high number of services provided. Another big change that immediately catches our eyes is Sony’s interface for media services. It is different from the normal interface and it is not really convenient. The usual media streaming interface could do a lot better. The user interface of this blue ray player is rated to be just passable.

DLNA and 3D compatibility:

3D players are becoming common these days and this glossy black attractive player is one too. You can watch the screen spring into action and all the lifeless images come out with full life the moment you put the glasses on. 3D players are not very rare to get since there are good number of the same. However, Sony has given 3D for its users at an affordable price. DLNA and BRAVIA are two features mainly provided in Sony devices. When we say a player is compatible, it means that you can actually access files from the devices connected in the DLNA network. The player supports BRAVIA Internet Video that includes the Catch Up TV too and this said, it means a whole new world of fun and excitement awaits you.

Audio and Video Output:

The audio and video qualities are par excellence. Sony has provided a number of media services for its users, to name a few, the Amazon, Vudu, Pandora, Netflix and lots and lots more. The audio quality delivery is also quite good with the player capable of decoding Dolby True HD and DTS HD formats. The player loads the disc at an average speed only. However, there is the quickstart option for the users to get their disc loaded swiftly. The video quality is brilliant that it would treat your eyes with a high flavor.

Internet Connection:

Without the Internet connection there would be no meaning for a profile 2.0 player because you would never be able to access the streaming services without this big feature. With due respect paid, we move on to the types of internet connection supported. There is both the wired and wireless connection. You can either download the BD Live contents via the Ethernet RJ45 connection, the wireless connection is always there because it is built in.

Power:

This Sony BDP-S580 3D Blu ray player consumes 22W of power while it is in normal use. This power is slightly higher than few of the other players. However, it has been designed in such a way that the power consumed is within the limits and does not affect the buyer much.

Warranty:

The Sony BDP-S580 has a limited warranty of 1 year.

Verdict:

As far as the blu ray players are concerned, their functionality is getting better and better everyday. The Sony BDP-S580 is one excellent piece that carries a weightless price tag. Not only that, it is 3D compatible, supports Wi-Fi, facilitates operation with the iPhone remote and above all, the number of media services supported is very large in number. Definitely the BDP-S580 is not the best, since its Panasonic, LG and other such competitors are seated very high sporting an outstanding performance. The BDP-S580 is for those wise people, who wish to invest their hard earned money on a player that is simple, profitable and admirable.