I'm in the Official Hardware Double Dip Club!

[Sehnzeleid]

I just ordered the Toshiba HD-A35 from Crutchfield for $250!

[Derb]

Originally Posted by Sehnzeleid

I just ordered the Toshiba HD-A35 from Crutchfield for $250!

[Sehnzeleid]

Yep, the A3 and A30 are $150!

[Sehnzeleid]

Looks like these prices were a glitch in the system, they're back up $100 more each.

I called them and they agreed to honor $249 anyway.

[Sehnzeleid]

Shipped!

Toshiba HD-A35 HD DVD Player Single Disc High Definition DVD Player

What's Included:
DVD Hook-up Guide
Crutchfield Cable Labels
Toshiba 5 Free HD-DVDs Rebate
Current Home Catalog Bounceback

Sub Total: $249.99
Shipping: FREE
Total: $249.99

[Sehnzeleid]

Wow, that was fast!!!

[Iguana Man]

Fast is an understatement. Congrats! You will be reviewing this for us?

[Sehnzeleid]

Originally Posted by Iguana Man

Fast is an understatement. Congrats! You will be reviewing this for us?

Okay, so my new Toshiba HD-A35 is hooked up and running.



General Impressions:

- It's heck of a lot slimmer and weights much less, the physical depth of the player seems the same, about the same size as my Denon DVD player.
- It boots up much faster, I didn't time it yet, but it seems about half of the A1.
- The tray is definitely less "shaky", the A1's drive (made by NEC as opposed to Toshiba in the A35) makes noticeably more "excess" noise while opening/closing. The A35's drive is also nearly dead silent while accessing data, with the A1 you can hear the drive lurching around the disc from 3 or 4 feet away.
- The tray does seem a little shallow, forcing you to make sure the disc is seated properly.
- The fan noise is noticeably less.
- Loading HD DVDs and DVDs is definitely faster. The A35 like the A1 recognizes discs faster when loading another after loading a disc prior, only this time it's much faster, like 10 seconds.
- When loading once "HD DVD" or "DVD" appears on the front display "PLAY" appears instantly afterwards and the disc plays. The A1 really lags between all these steps.
- The "Stop" command and entering the Setup menu are instantaneous.
- HD DVD menu navigation seems more smooth.
- The front display is brighter and more condensed, only displaying minutes and little icons like "HD DVD" and "1080i". The A1 reads out much stuff like chapter and subchapter.
- The A35's remote is much, much better, its basic layout like the PS3's BD remote. No backlight, but the remote has glow-in-the-dark lettering.
- I really don't like the cheapish detachable 2-prong power cord (it's like the one on Motorola HD cable boxes), the A1 has a heavy gauge grounded 3-prong cord.
- The player came pre-loaded the newest firmware, ver. 1.3.

Picture Quality Impressions (keep in mind I have a 720p set):



- It might be just the placebo effect, but the HD DVD picture quality via HDMI on both 720p and 1080i seems better than the A1 with more concise detail and better black levels on the titles I've looked through so far, even releases I watched very recently.
- Progressive DVD video upscaling looks as good as A1, which is very good.
- Interlaced DVD video, like many TV shows and music videos, still exhibits combing artifacts with quick camera shot changes like the A1. I used the DVDs Metallica - The Videos and the ultra torture test, Rob Zombie: Past, Present, and Future. My Denon 2910 exhibits none of this, but the Faroudja chipset in the Denon is known to have superb deinterlacing of such video.
- The HDMI and Component video outputs work simultaneously.
- 720p output doesn't cause Universal's newer HD DVDs to have jagged stair-stepping artifacts during playback unlike the A1.

Audio Quality Impressions (keep in mind I don't have an HDMI receiver):



- The sound from the 5.1 analog outputs sounds just as great as the A1.
- The low subwoofer volume problem of the A1 seems either fixed or greatly reduced with the A35. Bass response certainly sounds punchier.
- I don't like the vertical arrangement of the 5.1 analogs, a little more of a pain to initially set-up correctly.

Conclusion:

Certainly a big upgrade over the A1, all these small tweaks really led themselves well to noticeably better HD DVD experience. The A1 is going back into its box after about a year and a half of service. Also the future-proofing with 1080p/24 output and 7.1 TrueHD/Master Audio audio bitstreaming is another very desirable aspect of this model. The A35 is great so far.

[Derb]

Congrats.

I don't want a 5th HD DVD player.

btw, keep the A1 & the box. They'll be collector's items down the road. First HD optical media playback devise.

[Sehnzeleid]

Here's my stop clocking tests:

Toshiba HD-A1 - Firmware 2.4:

Power On to "NO DISC": 41 seconds

Close Tray to "HD DVD": 37 seconds
Close Tray to "HD DVD" to "PLAY" to time indicator: 1 minute, 10 seconds

-----------------------

Toshiba HD-A35 - Firmware 1.3:

Using "Open Tray" to power on, time until tray opens: 34 seconds

Close Tray to "HD DVD": 31 seconds
Close Tray to "HD DVD" to "PLAY" to time indicator: 35 seconds

[ganthc]

I would double dip on the a35 if it was $250.