In more 3D-enabled product release news, Denon has unveiled a pair of 3D Blu-ray systems that the company is boasting as “true universal players.” But it’s not so universal just yet.
The generically-named DBP-2011UDCI and DBP-1611UD (pictured above) should be able to play “virtually all 5-inch silver discs” At release time, that includes standard Blu-ray discs, video and audio DVDs, CDs and SACD playback, along with streaming support for Netflix and YouTube. Both players also come with HDMI v1.4a outputs and 1GB of onboard storage.
However, that nifty 3D Blu-ray support won’t be available until fall when it will become available in the form of a firmware update. But for the meantime, that’s still a lot of media support and there aren’t that many 3D Blu-ray discs on the market anyway. There will probably be many more by the end of the year.
What lifts the BDP-2011UDCI above its counterpart is the inclusion of a RS-232 port for third-party controllers and Dolby and DTS high-definition audio decoding. Given that most of the other specs on these two media players are the same, including 36-bit deep color image resolution, I’m not sure it’s worth spending an extra $400 on the 2011UDCI.
The BDP-1611UD costs $399 and will ship in June, and the higher-end BDP-2011UDCI will be released in August for $799.
