Standalone Blu-ray players have certainly been held back by confusing Blu-ray profiles and high movie prices, but one of the biggest reasons they haven't taken off is the Sony PlayStation 3. As we mention in nearly every review, the PS3 is an excellent movie player, and it offers significantly more functionality than standalone players, such as high-definition gaming, media streaming, and a browser. The LG BD300, however, has one killer feature that the PS3 doesn't.
The LG is "Netflix Internet Streaming Ready," which means it's capable of playing movies, TV shows, and other videos available via Netflix's Watch Now service. While we weren't impressed with the selection on our first go-round, Netflix has recently added some significant content partners, such as CBS and Disney, making the service much more compelling (Disclosure: CBS is the parent company of CNET.)
Aside from Netflix, the BD300 is a capable Profile 2.0 Blu-ray player with solid image quality. Even better, the list price has fallen all the way to $350, which means you're paying a relatively small premium for Netflix over competitors like the Sony BDP-S350. There are better options to consider if you're just interested in Blu-ray playback, such as the Panasonic DMP-BD35, but if you'd like to supplement your high-definition movies with Netflix content, the BD300 is a compelling package.
Design
The LG BD300 is a slick-looking player. The front panel is glossy black and nearly completely flat--even the front panel buttons are flush with the panel. The left side of the unit covers the disc tray, and the panel flips down when the disc ejects. Just to the right of center is an LCD screen that's a little on the small side. Further right are the front panel controls, including chapter forward/backward, which are handy if you can't find the remote control. We appreciated that LG decided against any additional front-panel lights, as we've seen on the Panasonic DMP-BD55. Our only complaint with the design is that the two buttons mounted on top of the player--power and eject--are a bit awkward to reach.
The front-panel USB port is hidden behind a removable cover.
The included remote control has a lot of functionality. Our biggest complaint is that there are too many buttons surrounding the directional pad--we prefer the standard four buttons. Unlike some other Blu-ray remotes, the BD300's clicker is well-suited to control a TV, with input buttons and button rockers for channel and volume control. Of course, we expect most home theater buffs to opt for a universal remote control anyway.
The graphical user interface on the BD300 is one of the best we've seen so far. It consists of five colorful and intuitive icons: movie, Netflix streaming, photo, music, and setup. And while we can't give the BD300 credit for the excellent Netflix menus--they are the same as the menu on the Netflix Player--it integrates nicely in the graphical user interface. Compared with the blocky menus of the DMP-BD55, the BD300's interface is a real treat.
Features
The most standout feature of the BD300 is it's the first Blu-ray player we've seen that has built-in Netflix streaming capability. The user experience is nearly identical to that of the Netflix Player by Roku, and we recommend you check out that review for more information. In short, you can stream anything in Netflix's "Watch Now" section and while there are some flaws--much of the content is not wide screen--overall, it's a pretty great user experience. While the initial catalog of movies and TV shows was fairly lackluster, recent deals with CBS and Disney have significantly improved the content selection.
The LG BD300 is Profile 2.0 compliant, which means it's capable of accessing Internet-enabled features (often referred to as "BD-Live" features) available on some movies, such as Transformers and Walk Hard. To access the features, you'll need to have the BD300 connected to the Internet via its Ethernet port, as well as have an USB drive in the front panel port. So far, BD-Live features have been pretty underwhelming, but we expect the content to improve as more compliant players hit the market and disc makers get a handle on the new technology. As we've noted with other standalone Blu-ray players, the BD300 still offers a significantly inferior experience to the PS3 on these interactive features--the PS3 is just faster, and its built-in hard drive is more convenient.
There are plenty of logos on the BD300, but it doesn't have onboard DTS-HD Master Audio decoding.
Soundtrack support is about average, but LG makes it pretty confusing to figure out exactly what the BD300 can do. Those interested in the nitty-gritty can check out page 40 of the manual (you can search for the manual on LG's support Web site), but the short story is that the BD300 has onboard Dolby TrueHD decoding, but lacks DTS-HD Master Audio decoding. On the other hand, it does support both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio bit stream output, if you have a relatively new audiovisual receiver that has decoding for those formats. Of course, we would have liked to see onboard decoding for DTS-HD Master Audio, but it's worth remembering that even with ideal conditions, it can be tough to hear the difference between the high-resolution audio soundtracks and their standard Dolby Digital and DTS counterparts.
There aren't any multichannel analog audio outputs, but the jack pack should be enough for those with an HDMI-enabled receiver.
Connectivity is standard on the BD300. The HDMI output is the most important connection, capable of outputting high-definition video up to 1080p resolution, as well as high-resolution multichannel audio. There's also a component-video output, which can output Blu-ray Discs at 1080i and DVDs at 480p, along with a legacy composite-video connection. Audio connections also include both optical and coaxial digital-audio outputs, although analog audio is only supported by a stereo output--no multichannel analog outputs on the LG. There's also an Ethernet port in the back, which can be used for firmware updates, Netflix streaming, and downloading content for BD-Live-enabled discs. Rounding out the connectivity is the USB port on the front panel, which can be used for photos, MP3s, and storing BD-Live content.
Blu-ray performance
For our Blu-ray tests, we compared the BD300 with our reference Blu-ray player, the Sony PlayStation 3, and our top-rated standalone Blu-ray player, the Panasonic DMP-BD55. We started off by looking at test patterns, with both players connected to a full suite of top-performing HDTVs, including the Pioneer PRO-111FD, Panasonic TH-58PZ800U, Panasonic TH-50PZ800U, and LG 60PG60. The first disc we checked out was Silicon Optix's HQV test suite on Blu-ray.
The Film Resolution Loss Test is the most important test pattern on HQV since most Blu-ray Discs are film-based. The BD300 failed the test--the most detailed sections looked strobelike, and showed no detail where there should be several individual lines. On the other hand, it did better with the second portion of the test--a panning shot across Raymond James Stadium--betraying some slight moire but not as much as we've seen on lesser players. Next up, we looked at the video-based tests, which are less crucial since not many Blu-ray Discs are video-based. Again, the BD300 failed the resolution test pattern, exhibited the same strobe-like effect on the most detailed section. It also did poorly on video-based jaggies tests, showing tons of jaggies on a test pattern with three pivoting lines, as well as a test with a rotating white line. This surprised us, as many Blu-ray players we've reviewed handle this test well. For what its worth, the PS3 and DMP-BD55 pass all the HQV tests.
The BD300 didn't do so well on test patterns, so we were interested to see how it handled actual program material. We started off with some scenes we know often give players problems. First up was the end of chapter 6 in Ghost Rider, and the BD300 performed well--we couldn't make out any moire in the grille of the RV as the camera pulls away. Next up was chapter 8 of Mission Impossible: III and again the BD300 performed well with no jaggies in the stairs in the background.
We also looked at some of the video-based portions of Tony Bennett: American Classic. Here, the BD300 didn't do so well. For example, at the beginning of chapter 7, we could see plenty of jaggies on the opening graphics and clapperboard, as well as on the shirts of the dancers that followed. The jaggies showed up again in chapter 14, as we could see them in several time in the dancers' canes. These are relatively minor issues--only videophiles will probably notice--but the PS3 and DMP-BD55 handle these scenes better.
It's worth noting that the issues we saw only occur with 1080p output at 60 frames per second. The BD300 looks as good as top-performing Blu-ray players in 24 frames-per-second mode, and also in 1080i mode, which relies on your HDTV to do much of the video processing. However, as many HDTVs don't do a great job with video processing and don't accept 24 frames-per-second content properly, we consider 1080p at 60 frames per second to be the most important output type.
We also tested disc loading times, and the BD300 did well. It loaded Mission Impossible: III in a very speedy 14 seconds, which is 6 seconds faster than the DMP-BD55 loads the same disc. Discs with BD-Java were considerably slower, with Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest loading in one minute, 45 seconds and Spiderman 3 loaded in 1 minute and 33 seconds.
If you're interested in how streaming Netflix movies look on the BD300, we covered it extensively in our review of the Netflix player. The bottom line is that it's not quite as good as DVD at best, and the quality depends heavily on your Internet connection. Our biggest gripe, as we said before, is that much of the content is presented in standard 4:3 aspect ratio, instead of the proper wide-screen aspect ratio.
DVD performance
There are about 700 Blu-ray Discs titles available, compared with more than 90,000 DVD titles, which means that its DVD performance is still a major issue. The LG BD300 didn't fare well in our DVD tests, and while some viewers might not notice the difference, videophiles will want to have a separate DVD player.
We started off our DVD performance testing using Silicon Optix's HQV test suite on DVD. The BD300 did OK on the initial resolution pattern, clearly displaying the full resolution of DVD, although we saw some image instability that we didn't see on the competing DMP-BD55. Next up were some jaggies tests, and the BD300's performance was mixed, showing only minor jaggies on a test with a rotating white line, but showing quite a few jaggies on a test with three pivoting lines. The BD300 did better on a 2:3 pull-down test, kicking into film mode quickly and showing very little moire in the background. Rounding out the tests, the BD300 didn't have any problems with scrolling CNN-like titles or rolling credits sequences.
We switched over to program material to see how the BD300 handled actual movies. First up was Seabiscuit, and the BD300 struggled on the introduction sequence. The slow pans over black-and-white photographs are a torture test for 2:3 pull-down processing, and we saw plenty of jaggies and image instability that detracted from the movie watching experience. It was particularly bad at about 2:07, when jaggies filled the entire screen and appeared to shake back and forth. We also took a look at the opening of Star Trek: Insurrection, and the BD300 did manage to engage film mode and render the scene without excessive jaggies. However, as we continued to watch, we did notice it slip out of film mode a few times, which we found very distracting and confirms what we found in the test patterns.
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LG BD300
