Get One Now Before Their Reputation Gets Out and Price Go Up!

OPPO is a relatively new company in the US as far as their DVD units are concerned. In actuality they make almost as many DVD players as Sony and Panasonic do, but have only recently marketed them in the US. I recently purchased the OPPO DV-981HD on the advice of several online testing sites who rated it higher than most players costing thousands of dollars. Here are my findings:

Build Quality and Aesthetics.
While the packaging is very impressive, I don't feel the DVD player lives up to this. This is one of the new generation of DVD players that is only about an 1 1/2 inches high, about 17 inches wide and about 10 inches deep. It weighs about 4 or 5 pounds, so if you are old school, and judge equipment by weight, you'll be disappointed, as it doesn't have a heavy power supply or drive mechanism. You can probably forget about stacking anything on top of it as it's not deep enough for the usual amps VCR's etc. It also seems to be a tad flimsy as are most DVD players. The back panel is the usual stamped metal piece which will flex a little while plugging in RCA cables. Also unusual is the fact that there isn't any component video outputs, so if you don't have an HDMI or DVI equipped television, you'll be stuck with either the S-video connection or the composite video connection. According to OPPO, the only reason it has the S-video and composite inputs is for trouble-shooting and testing. Their other models come with the component video outputs, so if you don't have one of the HDTV's you don't want this model.

Also, there is a very minimalist approach to the front of the DVD player. Only an open/close, play/pause and a stop button are on the front. Everything is controlled by the remote control, so this is one remote you don't want to lose. The display is via one of the intense deep blue LED displays, so probably won't match many TV's or receivers, and is rather small in size. One feature that people will either love or hate is the intense bright blue illumination arount the open/close button. I didn't like it as it was too bright and would distract from the television if the player is anywhere close to it while watching. I suppose if you like the blue ring around the volume controls of Onkyo or HK receivers, you'll like it, but I could do without. Fortunately you can turn it off via the remote control.

Finally, the tray on the player doesn't eject all the way out, like most players. It only opens about 3/4, so in order to put a DVD or CD in, you'll kind of have to slide it back. Also the tray is made of thin plastic and seems pretty flimsy, but then again, I have a Sony DVP-NS999ES which originally sold for almost $1000 and weighs almost 20 lbs whose tray feels the same way.

In Use
Setup of the unit is pretty straight forward. You'll go through a setup menu system which will let you make choices regarding your setup. While not the most attractive menu system, it is functional. Take my advice and go through the owner's manual before, or while doing the initial setup. It will likely give you good information on different menu choices that you might otherwise pass over. One other piece of advice is to get a copy of the Avia HDTV setup disc or similar. If you can't find the Avia, use the Lucas films THX test program which is included with many THX discs such as Ice Age. While going through the setup, I found that there were plenty of adjustments for the tinkerer or videophile, but even more importantly, it was adjusted almost perfect right out of the box. Truth be told, one of the main reasons I bought this was for its ability to play DVD-Audio and SACD discs and to pass the signals through the HDMI cable (included with the DV-981HD), assuming your receiver is HDMI 1.1 equpped. No longer do you need to hook up 6 analog cables to enjoy DVD-A and SACD. Since I used to have a dedicated SACD player and a dedicated DVD-Audio/Video player and switchboxes I had to hook up 18 analog cables and 2 switchboxes for the high resolution audio sources, 3 cables for component video and a digital optical cable. Now one HDMI cable has replaced 22 analog/digital cables and performs better than the previous connections. That alone is worth the price of admission if you have a similar setup. Heck, the DV-981HD with the included HDMI cable costs less than the 22 cables and switchboxes alone.

I compared the DV-981HD to a year old Denon DVD-1920 that sold for around $400. The Denon also featured video upconversion through the HDMI ouput. It's worth noting that the OPPO will output at 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i and 1080p, while the Denon will only go 480p, 720p and 1080i. Also, the Denon did not output SACD through the HDMI cable. As far as picture goes, the OPPO was slightly richer in detail than the Denon. I didn't notice any jagged edges on rounded or diagonal items in video, so I can only assume the Faroudja DCDI was working as advertised. (FYI, until recently Faroudja processing was available only on players costing hundreds of dollars more, and is usually available only through the component outputs.) In my comparison, my HDTV never looked better or more detailed while playing DVD's, although to be honest, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference between it and the Denon if I didn't have them to compare side by side. One area where I did notice a differnce was during layer changes on multi-layer DVDs. On the OPPO, it was totally un-noticable, while you could definitely notice a pause with the Denon despite it having a 2Mb buffer to minimize the lag.

As far as DVD-Audio and SACD sound goes, I can't really give a good opinion, as I went from an analog receiver to a digital receiver when I switched out the DVD player. It sounds fine and works good, although it seems to lack refinement and depth when compared to my old setup. I can't tell you if this due to DVD player or the receiver. One slight disappointment is that the sound will start up and then drop out for about half a second when playing SACDs. It might happen on other sources, but only noticed when playing SACDs.

Conclusion
I highly recommend the OPPO DV-981HD for anyone who wants an inexpensive DVD player. It might not have the highest build quality, but there's no arguement regarding the quality of the picture or convenience it offers. I doubt it will last as long as the afore mentioned Sony DVP-NS999ES, but then again, I could buy 4 of the OPPO players for the same price. My advice is get one now, before their reputation gets out to the public and prices go up!