Not a RECORDER it is an UPCONVERT dvd player !

Before I bought this upconversion sony, I owned the previous progressive version. I was impressed even with the 480p progressive dvd player when using rgb component cables. I knew sony did such a great job with the 480p dvd player so I decided to upgrade to this dvd player for the 720p/1080i picture using the HDMI cable. Well I'm not that impressed but I'm not that disappointed either.

The color with the HDMI cable is brighter and richer. But the clarity isn't really any better. One may think the picture is better because the colors are brighter but the sharpness really isn't any different.

However I'm coming from a nice Sony 480p dvd player using rgb component cables which is a very nice pic to begin with. So I can't expect too much of a difference. I use a projector so I needed 25' of HDMI cable. I found it on ebay for $25; HDMI 1.3 version and 5 gigs per second transfer, which is what you're looking for. PC World has an article showing the generic cables are just as good as the expensive ones. Maybe I would get a better pic out of better cables but after all that I've read, I highly doubt it and I'm not going to pay $200 to find out!

FYI I previously bought a Toshiba upconverter but I didn't have the HDMI cable yet, so I played it just as a 480p progressive player and didn't like it as much as my Sony 480p; so I concluded that the HDMI picture wouldn't be as good either so I took it back and had this Sony shipped to me.

All in all good product for the money. If you have a nice pic with Red Green Blue Component cables and a good dvd player you will see a difference in color but not much in picture clarity. If you are using an old dvd player with composite cables (yellow video) you will see an incredible difference!! I paid $89.00