1080pMiniPlayer
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Kaleidescape's 1080p Player / Mini Player hands-on
Kaleidescape's booth was jammed packed with prospective buyers this year, evidently unaffected by a flagging economy and absurd prices flung from the mouths of on-hand representatives. All angst aside, we did stop by the outfit's CEDIA booth to see just what was crackin' and to snap a few photographs all the while. We'll admit, the 1080p Player / 1080p Mini Player are both beautiful pieces of equipment, and they certainly worked well when demonstrated. We'll refrain from commenting (again) on the value proposition here, but instead, we'll direct you to the gallery below with a forced grin.%Gallery-31279%
Kaleidescape's overpriced upscaling DVD players get reviewed
Let's get real honest with one another here: if folks are legitimately arguing that a $700 Profile 2.0 Blu-ray player is overpriced, there's absolutely no way a DVD player is worth over four times as much. That being said, the folks over at Sound & Vision put the pricey pair through the paces, and they were actually quite pleased with the results. In a nutshell, it seems that reviewers found the best upscaling DVD players this planet has to offer, and while all the fawning over their pristine reproduction of colors was fine and dandy, it's the value proposition here that's absurdly out of whack. In fairness, it's good to hear that the bundled Sigma Designs' Gennum VXP video processor chip lived up to the hype, but all the upconverting in the world won't make us believe these things are worthy of the stratospheric prices.
Kaleidescape claims new 1080p upscaling DVD players "rival Blu-ray"
And you thought Toshiba's super-resolution DVD player taking on Blu-ray was comical. Kaleidescape -- the company famous for selling grossly overpriced (albeit fanciful) DVD / BD archiving systems for wealthy home theater junkies -- has just announced two new standalone DVD players that "provide a viewing experience that rivals Blu-ray." The argument goes something like this: there are 170,000 titles on DVD, and "just 6,000" (wait, for real?) on BD -- why support the next-gen format when these two upscaling DVD players display content that is utterly indiscernible from Blu-ray. For starters, the outfit is launching the 1080p Player (pictured), which earns the "ultimate DVD player" label by featuring a Sigma Designs Gennum VXP chip, 10-bit processing and full support for Dolby Digital, DTS, MPEG and PCM audio formats. The 1080p Mini Player offers the same, but in a tinier package meant for inconspicuous installations. Granted, both units do have exclusive access to Kaleidescape's Movie Guide database, but that hardly justifies the $4,295 / $2,995 price tags (in addition to the required $10,000 Kaleidescape System). Full release after the jump. %Gallery-25395%
