Yamaha BD-S667 Blu-ray Disc Player
January 27, 2012 by Cherry
Filed under Blu-ray Players
Yamaha BD-S667 Blu-ray Disc Player
- HDMI 1.3 BD Live with Bonus View
- HD Audio full decoding
- USB input for your music and photos
- DLNA compatible for home networking support
- Netflix compatibility lets you use your Netflix account via the player
The Yamaha BD-S667 Blu-ray Disc Player is the perfect way to jump into watching the latest high-definition movies and video. x.v. Color and Deep Color support along with the latest high-definiton audio decoders give you an experience unrivaled from traditional DVD video. Integrated Netflix support, HDMI 1.3 BD Live support and DLNA network compatibility keeps you connected to your entertainment beyond the disc.
List Price: $ 329.95
Price: $ 200.00
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Fast player with a high quality picture and well designed controls, but no resume feature,
Positives
The player is nicely designed and looks better than most others around this price.
Its startup time is a minute faster than the previous Yamaha model, and about 30 seconds faster than most of its competition. It took 1 min 13 secs to start playing Batman Begins. Only the Sonys are faster, at 1:06 for the Sony bdp-470 and 570. The LG bd-570 and Onkyo dv-bd507 were 30 seconds slower, and the Panasonic dmp-bd85 couldn’t read the disc.
Startup time for an audio CD was fine, at 11 secs. All the other Blu-ray players in the store took a few seconds longer.
It’s pretty quiet when it’s playing. You only hear it rarely, during certain sections of a Blu-Ray movie when it makes a light high pitched spinning noise that passes after a minute or so.
Negatives
It can’t resume regular DVDs after power-off. The player auto-powers off after about 10 minutes, and when you power back on it starts a DVD from the beginning again. Blu-Ray discs have a known problem with not being able to resume playback when they are launched within the Java environment, but regular DVDs should be able to resume.
My unit consistently crashed when asked to eject certain Blu-Ray discs (eg. Batman Begins). You can restart it by holding down the power button for 3 seconds, and wait for it to allow you to eject the disc.
When powering on, you have to wait a while for the controls to become responsive. Many players are like this, but the unit could let you know when you can use it.
Overall
Movies and CDs look and sound great. It’s intuitive to use. The firmware was easy to update with the USB port. It lacks quite a few features available in others (3D, BD-Live RAM, and Wifi), and it feels like a “first generation” player because of a few bugs and because the resume feature has not yet been implemented. I would suggest checking out Oppo’s player instead.
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|Yamaha releases what might be the successor to the JVC XV-BP1,
Unfortunately, JVC never released a direct successor to the XV BP1. Instead, the released the low budget profile 1.1 XV BP11 destined for closeout pricing at Sam’s Club. Nearly 16 months after the JVC’s release, I think I have found its successor, but strangely enough it’s hidden behind a Yamaha label.
Prior Yamaha blu ray players (1065, 1900) were Sharp-based players that lacked any real redeeming quality save an opportunity for Yamaha receiver owners to have some commonality in their rack. Upon reading the press releases of the 667, a few things caught my eye – that worrying quick start feature was dropped and the inclusion of dlna made me wonder whose format the player was based. It did not appear to be Sharp-based (unlike the new Pioneer releases) and also lacked the usual Funai or LG look and layout that is generally easy to spot.
The 667 arrived Thursday afternoon and I have been pushing this unit through an abnormally high number of tests. Its GUI, OSD, and setup menu were very familiar in that they struck me as very similar to my Oppo 83 and 80. The initial setup and overlain setup menu were different in look and lacked a number of options the Oppos have, but had an overwhelming Oppo-esque familiarity to them.
The center-mounted disc drive is a bit pokey, opening in 10-12 seconds (very similar to the Oppp 83 EAP first-run drives), but load times were very fast and were only outpaced by the newest Samsung models. Upon checking synthetic deinterlacing tests, I knew we had found the very competent Mediatek chipset. In fact, its synthetic deinterlacing tests for film cadence matched the Oppo BDP-80 identically. Unfortunately, its video deinterlacing was not quite up to par with the Oppo BDP-80.
Real world DVD testing revealed a very competent player that could not quite match the Pioneer BDP-320′s sharpness or the Oppo’s accuracy in avoiding aliasing, but was damn close. The player’s biggest deficiency is a lack of fine tuned noise reduction to bring a more detailed edge to the image. That said, the player is very versatile and offers the same smooth, accurate image other mediatek chipped players produce. The player offers a zoom function for dvds that is effective and similar to that offered in the Oppo 80, but a bit different in its gradients.
In respects of analogue audio, the 667 offers only stereo outputs that are adequate, but not inspiring in my testing. Moreover, it does not offer SACD or DVD-A playback like the Oppo (or even the Sony 470 for the former), but it does offer DLNA connectivity and Netflix streaming.
So why is this the next JVC XV-BP1? While its $329 MSRP is a bit stiff, it is currently heavily discounted and available for $250 in its second week of release. Should price pressure continue and it sells below $200, this might become my recommended entry-level player now that the Pioneer BDP-320 is scarce if not gone. It maintains the high quality dvd playback and speed very similar to the XV BP1, but with more modern features like DLNA and Netflix (yes, I know LG has had streaming for almost three years!). That said, prices have dropped considerably and arguing relative value is more and more difficult. The $250 mark is heavily competitive and you have older, discontinued models being closed at slightly higher prices (denon dbp-2010ci comes to mind). That said, with just a little more price pressure this player is ideal for folks looking for Netflix streaming, very fast disc loading times, DLNA connectivity and very good dvd playback. There are a number of players that give you more bells and whistles at a lower price (Sony BDP-S470 and LG BD570), but they cannot quite offer the dvd playback this mediatek chipped player offers. Highly Recommended at under $200; Worth Considering at $225.
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|sweet machine,
I purchased this unit as an adjunct to my existing Yamaha DVD – SACD player (I still use the latter to play SACD’s). I’ve used it for both Blu-ray discs (through Netflix’s subscription) as well as Netflix streaming over an AT&T DSL. The load time for the Blu-ray is slower than my DVD, but I’m guessing that this is simply due to increased information content on the Bluray discs. Streaming was amazing – after a slight delay of around 15 sec or so, the movie started (in HD). I couldn’t tell that it wasn’t a disc. Build quality is great, software upgrade is done easily over the net and the instructions are clear (much better than earlier Yamaha manuals). Particularly for the price, this unit is a winner.
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