The DMP-BD10 will output all these hi-def formats when you stick a Blu-ray Disc in the tray, provided the conditions are correct (ie 1080p requires you use an HDMI cable and have a compatible screen or projector). To set your preferred output format, you simply dip into the setup menu and select it from the list -- any unavailable formats will be greyed out and unselectable. It will also upscale DVD video to your selected format using its Pixel Precision Progressive Processing (P4HD) video technology, which should make them look much sharper and more detailed.
Panasonic has included several image-adjustment tools, which are accessible both in the setup menu and via a dedicated button while a disc is playing. These can be used to sharpen a picture, adjust the contrast and so on. It doesn't hurt to have them there, but as your HD Ready television or projector probably has much the same options it's not always necessary to touch them.
Unfortunately, the remote control bundled with the player is, well, rubbish. It seems pretty good on first viewing: the main controls are well laid-out, and there's a clean, uncluttered feel thanks to many of the less-used functions being hidden away underneath a flap. Picking it up and using it, however, reveals it to be annoyingly unresponsive, especially when you're trying to change menu settings. The fact that the navigation buttons are part of a loose, spinning wheel (used to skip forwards and backwards when watching films) doesn't help either. It's quite simply a dog's dinner of a remote control -- and a device as cutting-edge as this deserves a really good one.
Performance
To test out the 1080p quality, we hooked the DMP-BD10 up to a 50-inch Pioneer PDP-5000EX (full review coming soon) -- one of only a handful of 1080p-compatible plasma screens available. It's fair to say that it looks streets ahead of DVD, even DVD upscaled by the most expensive players on the market, and there's also more detail and far less noise and fewer compression artefacts than you see with the movies on Sky HD -- it's quite simply the best picture you can get at home (without shipping in a proper cinema projector and a few reels of film, anyway).
In fact, it's better than the Samsung BD-P1000 -- and this is where that extra £200 really makes itself known. We should point out, however, that having also tried 1080i and found it really looks no worse, we're not sure all the fuss over 1080p is justified. At least, not yet -- it could well be due to the discs having to improve slightly. Sound quality is also very good, but not really any better than DVD at the moment.
Upscaled DVD playback isn't quite so impressive, and there are cheapish DVD players out there that do a better job of this -- but hey, who buys a £1,100, bleeding-edge Blu-ray player to watch DVDs?
Edited by Mary Lojkine
Additional editing by Nick Hide
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