Onkyo BD-SP807 Blu Ray Player Review
Onkyo, which means “Sound Harmony” is a Japanese consumer electronics manufacturer, specialising in Home Cinema and Audio Equipment. Though not as famous as Sony or LG or Panasonic, Onkyo has its own loyal set of consumers for their exceptional quality and consumer service. Today, we review, Onkyo’s 600 pounds BD-SP807 Blu Ray Player.
In an era where you can get a decent Blu ray player for 100 pounds, you might ask us, why would anyone want to pay so much for a player from a not very popular brand like Onkyo? Well, the answer lies completely on the quality of Onkyo’s machine. The player promises outstanding video and audio quality; you must also keep in mind that the other major brands charge a good deal more when it comes to their high end players. So, let us see if the BD-SP807 Blu Ray Disc Player proves to be the high end equipment at a mid range price as Onkyo advertises.
Design:
Bulky but attractive:
If you are one of those who feel that you are getting more for your money when you buy chunky AV equipment, then this one is for you. Though the BD-SP807 looks quite bulky, it has an adorable appearance. It weighs a hefty 5kg due to the reinforced chassis construction designed to minimise vibrations. Its funky disc tray possesses a cool shape and the overall look of the player is classy. Its robust bodywork is topped off by an elegant, brushed black aluminium fascia that gracefully curls forward at the bottom. Buttons are minimal, while the display is large and easy to read. Some might ask if any of the just mentioned facts matter? not exactly, but when you are paying a premium price of 600 pounds, you might expect the device to possess some kind of visual impact and, without any reservations, we would say that the Onkyo BD-SP807 does have it.
Wise construction:
Despite the reservation in size, Onkyo has made some sensible decisions with the BD-SP807. One of those wise decisions being, mounting the Blu Ray drive in the centre of the machine, which is supposed to drive away the vibrations and even avoid any of the unwanted distortion that tends to creep into the machine’s digital signal. Though there have not been any noticeable issues with signal noise in any of the previous Blu Ray players, we must mention that the BD-SP807 has an exceptional built quality with high quality components.
Remote Control:
As with most of the other Blu Ray players we had reviewed recently, the BD-SP807 too sports a remote control with all the visual appeal for Miss Ugly universe. It is bulky, unsightly, flimsy and non-descript, and does not look as if it belongs to a player that costs about £600. It also bears a striking similarity to the equally detestable remote controls that Toshiba supplies with its Blu-ray players. Onkyo and Toshiba have always enjoyed a close relationship, and we cannot help but wonder if parts of this player are Toshiba inspired.
Connectivity:
The BD-SP807 offers plenty of outputs to keep the fans of connectivity happy. There is the 7.1 analogue audio outputs, which is for connecting the player to receivers that are not capable of dealing with HDMI audio or lossless codecs. Of course, the HDMI v1.3a output will do most of the donkey work, such as piping HD audio bitstreams to your receiver or passing on 1080p/24Hz pictures to your TV. It also sports gold plated terminals, both, component and composite video outputs and coaxial and optical digital outputs. Most consumers will be satisfies with these connectivity, and for those who are not, we think there are not many more options that Onkyo could have thrown in.
Interface:
The BD-SP807 Blu Ray DVD Player sports a breezy onscreen set up, with a main menu that has been split into Quick and Custom menus. There is a generic blue splash-screen and a setup menu reminiscent of the one found on Denon and Marantz players. Options for optimising the audio output and tweaking the all-important HDMI settings are easy to find and react swiftly to remote commands. A separate menu can be accessed during playback by depressing the Mode button. Hit the mode button on the remote and a banner at the top of the screen provides four memory presets, and for each one you can set the levels of colour, contrast, brightness, sharpness and gamma correction as the movie plays and stores the results in five memory positions. This is very handy for making presets that account for different viewing conditions or the demands of various displays.
Features:
On the Onkyo BD-SP807, you will get all the core features you can expect from a player whose major purpose is movie playback. For instance, the1080/24p output is present as is DVD upscaling to 1080p, courtesy of Anchor Bay’s superb ABT1030 chip, nothing less. The Source Direct mode outputs video without any tampering, plus the deck can also fire HD audio bitstreams to your amp via HDMI and even decode and output them from the 7.1channel analogue outputs. There is also a 297MHz/12-bit NSV digital-to-analogue converter (ADV7340) and 192kHz/24-bit audio DACs for all channels.
THX Certification:
Although we are used to seeing the THX logo emblazoned on the front of AV receivers and speaker systems, its appearance on a Blu-ray player is a lot more unusual. The Onkyo BD-SP807 is one of the first Blu-ray players bestowed with the THX badge. The THX certification of BD-SP807 assures High-quality playback of movies. Their tests ensure that the player’s deinterlacing, upscaling, colour accuracy, contrast and black and white reproduction are all up to scratch, and to our eyes it does a fantastic job in each of these areas. The player has left the edge cutting to the bigger boys and focused on offering pin sharp pictures and scintillating audio.
In order to get the best out of the BD-SP807, you might have to calibrate your TV with a THX demo disc, or, for even better results, the player has to be connected to a THX-certified TV. In that way, you will be able to watch movies as the director intended you to. Some might not trust if a good equipment will make any difference with the impact of the film, trust us, when it comes to movies, watching it on a perfectly calibrated equipment makes a world of difference.
Hits and Misses:
The Onkyo BD-SP807 is a Profile 2.0 player, and as such can access BD Live web content through its Ethernet port. Onkyo’s strong desire to offer the best possible picture and sound quality leaves no room for the sort of Wi-Fi wizardry and PC streaming found on the latest players from Panasonic, LG and Sony. Low end manufacturers such as Onkyo do not have the kind of resources in order to in features such as these, you we hope you also agree to the fact that you get a great deal for your money than what the other bigger brands offer.
Memory woes:
The Onkyo BD-SP807 Blu Ray Player does have a range of interactive features, but it must also have some decent storage space for you to play around with it and hold files in. While some Blu Ray players manage with the Built-in storage, some other cheeky ones like the Onkyo BD-SP807 have an SD card slot into which you can slip in your own SD card if you wish to make some real use of the available BD Live features.
This kind of an omission can be forgiven in a budget player, but on a 600 pound player, it will get both you and us really cross. Onkyo says that the inclusion of built-in memory will place constraints on its performance. On the positive side though, you can even use it to play AVCHD, MP3 and JPEG files. However, the BD Live feature still remains to be a piece of crap, so, feel free to ignore it. An additional bonus will be, the player can play DivX HD from discs.
Slow disc load:
The Onkyo BD-SP807 has a load time of just under two minutes. Since there are discs that load under 40 seconds, anything over a minute is slow. Hence, the BD-SP807 cannot be said to have a respectable load time. If you feel that speed is mandatory, this might prove to be a deal breaker and you are on search for LG or Samsung player. However, as we had mentioned earlier, once the disc loads and gets going, the menus work speed and slick.
Performance:
Video Performance:
Moving on to the business end of the product, we found that the BD-SP807 managed to exhibit fantastic picture quality. The movie was a feast for our eyes, and the scenes, that involved some black and white mockery, were nothing short of brilliant. The deliberate grain in such circumstances looked quite natural. The picture was neither excessively corrected nor left to go wild and unwatchable.
Audio Performance:
Here is where the Onkyo really distinguishes itself from the budget pack. On the very basic terms, the stereo downmix is appreciable, with a good deal of detail to make speech clean and clear to hear. The use of high-quality audio components and that sturdy, vibration-free bodywork result in remarkably sweet, detailed music playback and more importantly, breathtaking reproduction of HD movie soundtracks through the multi-channel analogue outputs.
You will be able to witness great deal of enhancements if you connect the BD-SP807, through HDMI, to AV receiver and speakers that are decent. Once that is done, you will be able to hear lossless soundtracks as the maker wanted, and, depending on the set-up of your speaker, you are likely to get detail you had not even noticed at the cinemas. It is well worth investing in your sound system, because, without a decent set-up, you are at risk of missing half of what makes this Blu-ray a great one.
Warranty:
Onkyo offers its BD-SP807 one year warranty for parts and labour.
Verdict:
The Onkyo BD-SP807 is a very likable Blu Ray player. Anyone looking for a beautifully made player that offers excellent picture and sound quality will consider the BD-SP807 money well spent, despite its relatively lofty price tag. When paired up with a decent amp and a good quality TV, you are in for a real treat. You must also that it has a wealth of high-quality video and audio outputs. That said, we are quite annoyed that the player does not have a quick load time. We also think that, given the machine’s price, Onkyo should have jolly well included some built-in storage. As far as performance is concerned, it is one of the best around. We give it a heartily recommendation.
Onkyo BD-SP807 Blu Ray Player – Technical Specification Table
| Manufacturer | Onkyo |
| Model Name | Onkyo BD-SP807 |
| Product Type | Blu Ray Player |
| Form Factor | Bulky |
| Dimensions W x H x D | 435 x 108 x 312 mm |
| Weight | 5 kg |
| Colour | Black and silver |
| BD Profile | 2.0 |
| Compatibility | BD-Video, BD-ROM (ver. 2.0), BD-R (ver. 1.1/1.2/1.3), BD-RE (ver. 2.1), DVD-Video, DVD-ROM/R/RW, Audio CD, CD-R/RW, DTS-CD, MP3 CD, WMA CD |
| Playable media | MP3, WMA, JPEG, CD-R, CD-RW, DivX, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, Blu-Ray |
| Upscaling | All Standard-Definition DVD Sources to 1080p (1080i, 720p, and 480p/576p) with Marvell Qdeo™ Video-Processing Chip |
| Picture features | HDMI 1.3a Output to Support 1080p, Deep Color, x.v.Color, and CEC |
| Disc playback | Fast Forward, Fast Reverse, Slow Forward, Step by Step, Repeat (Chapter/Title/Track/Group/All), A-B Repeat, Program, Random, Rapid, Angle |
| On-board decoding | Yes |
| Built-in decoders | Dolby Digital; DTS; Dolby TrueHD |
| Speaker outputs | 7.1 analogue RCA jacks |
| Digital audio format | Dolby Digital; DTS; Dolby TrueHD; DTS-HD Master Audio Essential |
| THX® Certified | Yes |
| BD Live | Yes |
| Menu flexibility | Preset Video Adjustments for Contrast, Brightness, Sharpness, Gamma Correction, ICR (Red/Blue/Green), Color, Hue, Black Level, Noise Reduction, MPEG NR, Edge Enhancer, Qdeo True Color, Progressive Mode |
| Features | Gold-Plated Audio and Video Outputs On-Screen Display for Settings and Playback Source Direct Display Dimmer (Auto/Bright/Dimmer) RS232 Port IR Input and Output Aluminum Front Panel Remote Control |
| Connectivity | Coaxial audio, Component video, HDMI, Optical audio |
| Warranty | One year |
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