Toshiba HD-A1 HD-DVD Player
Great picture, great sound, improved menu system
I purchased this player from Amazon and quickly received it the next day. After hooking it up, I immediately ran the 2.0 firmware update to enable 5.1 TruHD sound.  <br /> <br />The first HD-DVD I played was Troy. First thing that impressed me was the menu system. It's very smooth in that you can change settings on the fly and access special features while the movie is playing. This is different than DVDs, where you have to hit 'menu' to bring up special features.  <br /> <br />Now on to the really good stuff... the picture quality is astounding. It's just as clear and as colorful as watching Discovery HD, with a couple extra advantages. There is no 'macroblocking' where you see squares during quick movement. The other advantage is that the video is very smooth during panning shots. Usually with broadcast HD you get jitter during slow moving shots. You can really see a lot of detail in your movies and it's just a pleasure to see.  <br /> <br />The sound is improved as well. How can you beat 5.1 lossless sound?  <br /> <br />Lastly, I was expecting this player to be very slow since that's about the only complaint I've heard. Maybe it's because I immediately updated to 2.0, but I really didn't think the player was as slow as I thought it was going to be. <br /> <br />I'm very excited about HD-DVD and hope the good movies keep rolling out. I'm picking up Batman Begins soon and have heard it looks great.