Oppo’s first ever 4K Blu-ray player finally gets a price and release date
4K Blu-ray is set to become a big deal in 2017, and Oppo is readying its own addition to the, currently very limited, line-up of UHD Blu-ray players.
And now it seems we have a price and release date for the company’s first 4K Blu-ray player, as Oppo has confirmed to What Hi-Fi that the UDP-203 will arrive in the UK this week.
But the new device won’t come cheap. Oppo says it will launch the player with a £649 price tag, which is a tad more expensive than the Panasonic DMP-UB900.
Related: What is Ultra HD Blu-ray?
What do you get for shelling out that much? Well, the UDP-203 supports UHD Blu-rays, standard Blu-rays, 3D, DVDs, DVD-Audio discs, SACDs, and CDs.
There’s also HDR support, so your £650 will at least ensure you can take advantage of what is set to be the next big thing in TV tech.
HDR, or High Dynamic Range, is a term used to refer to several picture enhancements that make for brighter whites, deeper blacks, and more natural colours.
Oppo’s player will also play hi-res audio files, such as FLAC, WAV, two-channel DSD256, and multichannel DSD64/128, with a 7.1 multichannel analogue output and two USB ports round the back.
A spokesperson for Oppo told What Hi-Fi the company was dispatching UDP-203 units to retailers today, so we’re expecting to see the player available before the end of the week.
The company’s site says the UDP-203 will be available for pre-order this Friday, but for US customers only, however, so we’re not entirely sure what Oppo’s plans are.
Related: What is HDR?
The latest generation of Blu-ray discs, 4K Blu-ray, as the name suggests, supports Ultra HD – aka 4K – and requires higher capacity discs than standard Blu-ray.
That means Ultra HD discs won’t play on a normal Blu-ray player, but you’ll be able to use standard Blu-rays with a UHD Blu-ray player.
The cheapest UHD Blu-ray player available is the Xbox One S, which can be picked up for around the £240 mark, while Panasonic’s DMP-UB900 is currently on sale at Amazon for around £440.
WATCH: Trusted Explains: All you need to know about TVs
Let us know if you’ll be buying Oppo’s player in the comments.