Alan,
My most used saying is “it’s not what I say, but what I mean” LOL
Ya, the rainbow thing is what I meant.
I was pretty torn between that Optima you noted the Panny and also the Z4 when I bought my projector. It basically came down to price and the Panny beat the other two out. In retrospect, I wish I would have bought the Optima. It does the V-stretch and from what I’ve read in different reviews, has a better ‘real’ contrast than the Panny. I’ll most likely pick up a 1080P projector in a year or two to take advantage of the VP-50’s 1080P processing, so I’m not loosing any sleep over it.
A couple good points that most folks miss or don’t acknowledge about the 970 worth mentioning….
It up converts via component input. Not many players will do this and even less do it well. It is limited to the rights coded on the disks (some will not allow an up conversion via component), but I suspect some happy hackers will come up with a work around before too long if they haven’t’ already. This is advantageous for folks with older HD displays that do not have HDMI/DVI inputs.
It will send a 480i signal via HDMI right off the MPEG player. This is quite a plus for folks who use external video processors. Many hard core video guys would modify their DVD players to with a serial data interface modification just to get a ‘clean’ digital signal to their VP’s. With the 970, you don’t need to do this, it’s already there.
It’s a universal player: DVD-A, SACD and all the other CD variations. I’ve played a few SACDs with mine and I’m very happy with it. It sounds every bit as good as my $800 Integra player.
Both machines have excellent audio options for 6 channel direct and they are very easy to set up.
I really can’t believe they sell these little buggers for what they sell for.
