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Best Buy Sells First Sub-$100 Blu-Ray Player, with a Caveat

Posted 10/21/08 at 10:23:13 AM  by Paul Lilly

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Whether you're looking to purchase a standalone Blu-ray player or going for the entertainment combo kill with Sony's Playstation 3 console, the cost of entry remains a prohibiting factor for many consumers. This gets compounded by the fact that upscaling DVD players cost far less than Blu-ray while still offering a better picture than standard DVDs. But what if you could pick up a Blu-ray player for under $100?

Now you can, in a roundabout sort of way. Best Buy has started selling Insignia's NS-BRDVD Blu-ray player for a cent under $200 and with it a coupon book for $100 worth of Blu-ray flicks from Disney, Touchstone, and Miramax. The player itself is pretty spartan with few of the features found on higher end models, and it remains to be seen whether $100 in free movies will prove enticing enough (for $1 extra per month, Netflix subscribers can add Blu-ray titles to their queue), but it is the least expensive Blu-ray player around. Kinda.

Know of any good Blu-ray player deals? Hit the jump and post a link!

Image Credit: Insignia

COMMENTS:4
TAGS: movies, hd, Blu-ray, high definition, consumer electronics, best buy
COMMENTS
avatarIs ANY player really ready for Blu-Ray ?

Submitted by canbbb on Wed, 10/22/2008 - 9:32am

It is a good thing for the adoption of blu-Ray to have such prices.  But, it is NOT a good thing if some movies don't play, or if java-heavy menus are jerky.  And (assuming it is not a 2.0 player), the frustration people will have when they see movies have a BD-Live feature that they cannot access.  I'm not even talking about the many players out there still taking 45+ seconds to load the disc.

The technology out there is not yet ready for Blu-Ray.  not surprising that the PS3 remains a good choice (with its on-board memory and CPU power), or better yet, my HTPC.  I don't remember DVD players ever having those technical problems.

Will it hurt the market to have early adopters buy cheap players, if those cannot deliver ?  This remains to be seen.

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avatarI notice they don't say what

Submitted by jcollins on Tue, 10/21/2008 - 9:35am

I notice they don't say what profile it is.  I'm assuming the stripped down model is 1.0 or 1.1 and not 2.0.  Also, the $100 coupon book shouldn't count.  You make the assumption that you're buying every movie in that book, and the odds are you aren't.  But still, it's a $200 Blu Ray player.

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avatarStill not interested

Submitted by skhills on Tue, 10/21/2008 - 8:42am

*Yawn* C'mon, even a $100 Best Buy gift card might START to get me looking at the deal, even on the stripped down box.

I love that you pointed out that the $100 you pre-pay for Disney movies is equivalent to 8 years of Blu-Ray on netflix.

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avatarHey, either way, I think

Submitted by BluFan on Wed, 10/22/2008 - 6:46am

Hey, either way, I think it's a great step in the right direction. Player prices really need to keep coming down across the board before it sees truly high levels of adoption. I've been working with warner home video on some projects and they're really counting on the prices to come down even more.

 

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