VIZIO jumps into the sub-$200 Blu-ray player ring with its VBR100

Never mind that VIZIO is breaking from its discount-market image, the combination of a known brand name and $199 pricetag for its VBR100 Blu-ray player is the one-two punch here. The company is showing off this new 2-inch thick (not the slimmest, but not exactly portly, either) Blu-ray deck at CES this week, and the feature set is pretty encouraging. The upconverted DVD feed coming out of the HDMI jack can be switched between 720p, 1080i and 1080p, but even more importantly, the unit's 7.1-analog jacks around back can output decoded Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA. Set for release in April for a penny under $200.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 8th 2009 8:11AM]

This is fairly significant news. EHD's obsession with "sub-$200 BD Players", which up until CES2009 have pretty much all been discontinued players being sold off cheap means that the significance of a manufacturer announcing a NEW sub-$200 player has been devalued, but nonetheless, the announcements this week are of Blu-ray finally hitting the $200 barrier.

Looks like a nice spec too. It's Profile 2.0 (not mentioned in the summary), and native support for TrueHD and DTS HD is very, very, welcome.

If I actually wanted a Blu-ray player, this would be top of my list.

[travistaylor Posted Jan 8th 2009 9:06AM]

I got my Sony BDP-S350 for $149.99 from SonyStyle.com when they had a very large and unusual sale before Christmas.

However, this is a fantastic deal! This particular BD Player has analog audio out. You can't find that feature on my player, only the S550 has that (roughly $100.00 more, and rarely dips under $290.00 from websites with lots of sales).

These are the complete specs from the read link:

Video outputs: HDMI (1.3), component, and composite

Audio outputs: 7.1 channel analog audio, coax and optical digital audio, and analog stereo (RCA)

Dimensions: 17 X 11 X 2"

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The 7.1 channel analog audio is huge. Basically, if you just got a lower-end HTiB for Christmas, or if you have an older receiver that doesn't have HDMI processing for sound, you can actually have DTSHD and DDHD with these audio outputs. You just have to run a few more cables. Optical out will get you good quality, but not lossless. These analog outs are a huge improvement at this price range! Good job, Vizio!

[hodedofome Posted Jan 8th 2009 9:40AM]

I don't know of a HTiB that has 5.1 or 7.1 analog inputs. Most receivers that do are fairly expensive.

It will be interesting to see how this player is implemented, and how the sound will be set up for analog.

[coreysmith Posted Jan 8th 2009 12:17PM]

@aaron,

there are plenty of Htibs that offer analog 5.1 inputs; iv'e yet to see one with a 7.1 setup though. more importantly, i wonder if vizio still outsourcing parts and manufacturing?

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 30th 2009 10:19AM]

Samsung HT 720a has 7.1 analog I love it