Do all bluray players upconvert standard DVD's?

[Youthman]

I'm looking to buy a bluray player for my student ministry. We are projecting onto a 10' screen and most videos we watch on disk are on standard DVD. I went to best buy and walmart tonight and didn't see any blurays that mentioned that they upconverted standard dvd's. I did see a standard DVD player that stated that it upconverted.

[Youthman]

Just doing some quick "Best 2013 Bluray Player", I found several sites that recommend the Sony BDP-S5100. Looks like it will do great for our purposes. It's $90 at Best Buy.

[Schu]

gosh... you know, that is a good question.

The thing is, I have only ever seen BD players (that also play DVD's) that upscale... some do this better than others. I would assume, there is a good chance that a low end unit might not do it.

[derrickdj1]

I would make a bet that all new BDP upconvert since they are considered high def. Also at $90 that is not cheap and should do the job. I know all the Samsungs upconvert, that is the reason I rent some DVD's. The DVD's are slightly cheaper to rent for non-action movies I can't tell a difference in PQ. Good luck with the search for a BDP.

[JJkizak]

DVD's do look sharper on a Bluray player, well anyway on my Panasonic they do, and it's more than you think. But technically I do not know "what they are doing" to improve the sharpness.

[psg]

I would yes, all BluRay players upconvert. How well they do it is another issue. If not, the projector likely upconverts?

Say you feed a 480i DVD signal to a 1080p plasma. Even if the DVD player does not upconvert, you are no longer watching 480i AFAIK because the plasma display is incapable of displaying that. It is doing the upconversion. So in most cases, upconversion is happening somewhere along the chain.

I have a Sony S590 in the HT room (full width, plays SACD) and a more recent Sony S1100 (smaller form factor, cheaper) in the kid's room feeding a 55" and they both look good to me playing DVDs, although I avoid DVDs as much as I can on the 120" screen.

[Quiet_Hollow]

Many of the early HDMI equipped Panasonic blu-ray players (2008-2010) up converted DVDs with incredible results, as the ability to do so was such a strong selling point.

The DVD playback on my older DMP-BD80 easily rivaled Blu-Ray playback over HDMI. One of its strongest features IMO.

[Rich_Guy]

I believe that most Blu-ray players will upconvert std DVDs, however it is also regulated that the upconversion is only done on the hdmi output since all hdmi outputs employ HDCP encryption for copy protection. So DVI and Component outputs as well as conventional RCA or s-video outputs won't have any upconversion.

[derrickdj1]

Great info Rich_Guy.

[Youthman]

Thx for the info guys. I forgot to "follow" this thread. I thought I had it in my settings to automatically follow any threads I start or comment on. I'll have to check that.

Well, I went to pick up a new toy (will post about that in a few minutes) from a friend in the A/V business. I told him I was going to run by Best Buy to buy a bluray player and noticed one brand new in a box on the floor in his office and I said, "One that looks like that". You can buy that one if you want. It was a Sony BDP-BX510. The specs looked like it has more features than the BDP-S5100. As I'm typing, I'm just now looking up info on it online. Most say it's the same unit with identical specs...some even call it the 5100's twin. He gave it to me at his cost so it saved me a few bucks. Should work out great.