Why do people keep obsessing with decoding at the receiver???

As Joe T points out, it just doesn’t matter where the decoding takes place. Yes, there is theoretical jitter issues when decoding at the player, but in practice, I seriously doubt anyone can tell the difference in a DBT. Also, if you want to watch special features and such, you have to switch back to decoding at the player, or you won’t hear any sound!

As for the Sony changer, I hope it’s more reliable than their past models.

When I first purchased a Sony 300 DVD cartridge several years ago, in a matter of 5 years I exceeded slots. Thanks to an Easy Play slot but the suffling of the discs became a choir to index them.
If the price of blu-ray’s drops even 400 slots will be maxed.
Why not do what KODAK did to their photo slides projector cartrige. Give the consumer the ability to exchange a new cartridge. With a little programing indexing each cartridge could be a hit.
DAN.

Sorry, that should read, “many AVRs don’t have the processing power…”

The PS3 decodes all of the new hi-res codecs and transmits them as pcm via hdmi.  In theory, it doesn’t make any difference where the codec are decoded—it’s like unzipping a file.  In practice, it’s more preferable to decode in the player as many players don’t have the processing power to overlay PLIIx over a 5.1 sountrack if they have to decode bitstreamed hi-res audio.

As for “mediocre SD-DVD playback,” I don’t see a difference between my PS3 and my HD-DVD player on SD-DVDs.

I think the best endorsement the PS3 has as a Blu-Ray player is that it’s the reference player at Criterion.

Why do people keep obsessing over the george forman grill PS3??? I wouldnt be caught dead using a PS3 as a player - mediocre SD-DVD playback and no bitstreaming of HD audio formats, not to mention the amount of electricity it uses!!