Pioneer BDP-140 and Elite BDP-52FD and BDP-53FD Blu-ray Players Preview

Pioneer Electronics has made Blu-ray players for as long as Blu-ray has been around. In prior years, however, they had partnered with Sharp in manufacturing their players and the results were far from noteworthy. While Sharp is doing fantastic things with their new Elite LED Television line, Pioneer decided to take back their Blu-ray players and do them in-house. Today we got to see the three new models which range in price from $199 to $499. The three players are the entry level Pioneer BDP-140 and two Elite models, the BDP-52FD and BDP-53FD. The players each have reduced loading times significantly and they can be used wirelessly with Pioneer's optional AS-WL300 network adapter (clunky, but it works). They can also stream audio and video from Pandora, YouTube and NetFlix (noticeably absent were VUDU and Hulu+). All three players are also DLNA-compliant so they can stream media from connected devices (we stream audio from the Mac all the time by using Playback software.)

All players support the requisite (but hardly-used) 3D and come with HDMI 1.4a outputs. As you'd expect, all the new players can upconvert video to 1080p via HDMI and 36-Bit Deep Color is supported for compatible displays.

Pioneer BDP-140 Blu-ray Player

Now we get into some features that are only available to the Elite models, the BDP-52FD and BDP-53FD. Both of these models offer Pioneer's Precision Quartz Lock System (PQLS) which delivers jitter-free multi-channel audio when connected to a compatible AV receiver. The Elite players are also universal, handling DVD, Blu-ray, SACD and DVD-Audio as well as CD content. Pioneer’s new Sound Retriever Link and Stream Smoother Link detects the bit rate of audio and video sources and can, if necessary, enhance compressed audio files (like MP3s). Sound Retriever "restores" high frequency data lost during initial compression and encoding and Stream Smoother reduces compression noise and enhances detail in video (perfect for camera phone-sourced video).

Rear panel of the BDP-53FD BD player

The BDP-53FD builds on the BDP-52FD by adding another HDMI output thanks to the capabilities of the Marvell QDEO video processing. It also uses a "layered chassis construction" which seems to impress audiophiles who love better build quality (Lexicon had a rather unique way of providing a layered chassis construction) - this one is legit. Oddly enough, Pioneer is providing a feature more associated with analogue audio performance, but there are no multi-channel analogue audio outputs on this player.

Pioneer is also now including/promoting its new free iControlAV2 App which turns iOS and Android phones and tablets into fully -functioning remote controls that can work with these new Blu-ray players. The way it works is intuitive and simple. When you connect the players to a network with a wireless router, the app lets you control basic functions of the player, like menu control and navigation.

The Pioneer BDP-140 has an MSRP of $199 while the Elite BDP-52FD is $399 and the Elite BDP-53FD comes in at $499. For more information please visit www.pioneerelectronics.com.

Unless otherwise indicated, this is a preview article for the featured product. A formal review may or may not follow in the future.