Sylvania NB530SLX Blu-ray Disc Player (Black)

 (126 customer reviews)

This player does all the important stuff very well. I was able to have it entirely set up in about 5 minutes. The picture quality is great, and I'm especially pleased with the upconversion of my DVD library. It does not have a remarkable number of outputs, but it has the HDMI and Coax outs that I need. The downsides are the cheap-feeling remote, the time it takes initially to load Blu Ray disks, and the fact that higher-end players have higher-end features.

Pros:
-cheap (especially since I got it free with the Amazon deal!)
-has the necessary features (mute HDMI audio, picture settings)
-great picture.
-Really easy to set up and use.

Cons:
-The remote is rather sad and pathetic.
-Long load times of Blu Ray disks (does not appy to regular DVD)
-Lack of high-end features.

I am writing this review because I see that nobody has addressed problems with firmware yet. I have and I am really frustrated. Firstly the player has no ethernet ports so downloading firmware is something that has to be done manually. This player comes with an SD slot which I figured would work for downloading firmware updates but it apparently doesn't even do that. I downloaded the updates to my SD card and the player recognized the updates; only the "loading software" screen stayed on the screen for about a half hour to an hour before the player just shut off from sitting idle too long. Having read a few forums, I concluded that I would probably have to go out and get discs to burn the software onto so just to make my player play newer blu-rays, I have to spend more money. My point is that other blu-ray players have the feature of simply plugging in an ethernet port or connecting wirelessly to the internet; which means firmware happens without doing a thing. The player will...Read more

We've had this for a month and are real happy with it. Consumer Reports rated it (actually the precursor model) as a best buy and they seem to have got it right. It is every bit the equal, or superior, to the Sony Blu-Ray that we paid 3 times as much for and crapped out just after the warranty was over. The picture quality is execellent and it is simple to set up and use.