Being a universal player, I dug through my collection of SACDs and DVD-As, as well as regular CDs and sat though some audiophile bliss. The multichannel music was gorgeous, but I was particularly impressed with the detail and imaging coming out of my Canton speakers when playing curmudgeon two-channel CD music.

I switched over to the USB input and hooked up a Seagate drive. The player handled my digital files well, but did get hung up once while navigating folders. That may have been the fault of the drive, because it never happened with a Western Digital external drive, only the older Seagate.

The headphone DAC on the Oppo is a curious addition. I listened Alison Krauss’ Down to the River to Pray on Yamaha’s new PRO 500 headphones. Upon first switching back and forth between the Oppo output and the one on my Onkyo receiver, I though the Oppo sounded a bit more subdued, but I believe the Oppo was just a few dB quieter. When I popped the Oppo’s volume up a bit it sounded at least as good as the output coming from the Onkyo, maybe slightly better. In a few instances the male vocals in the chorus were more discernible, but not by much.

A much bigger difference in audio could be heard when comparing Pandora on the Oppo against Pandora via my Roku player. The same channels played a bit cleaner on the Oppo.

Video streaming also looked better. I compared Netflix videos played over the Oppo to the same movies from the Roku and the differences in detail were obvious. Oppo’s video processing made streamed movies look better than I’d ever seen.

Overall, the Oppo BDP-105 seems to do most things better than any other player on the market. For $1,199 it ought to, but if you take your theater experience seriously, and don’t want to regret something down the road, this player is the one to check out.

Oppo BDP-105 Blu-ray Player
$1,119
http://www.oppodigital.com
Full specs here.

Match that Oppo Blu-ray player with a good projector, like the Epson 5020UB reviewed here.

Read about The World’s Loudest Home Theater.

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Grant Clauser - Technology and Web Editor, Electronic House

Grant Clauser has been covering home electronics for more than 10 years with editorial roles in several consumer and trade magazines. He's done ISF-level damage to hundreds of reviewed products and has had audio training from Home Acoustics Alliance and Sencore. He's also the author of the book The Trouble with Rivers. Follow him on Twitter @geclauser.