March 2006 Reviewed by Randall Smith	Onkyo DV-SP502 Universal Audio/Video Player

Description Model: DV-SP502 Price: $300 USD Dimensions: 17.13"W x 3.19"H x 12.19"D Weight: 7.5 pounds Warranty: One year parts and labor	Features Dolby Digital and DTS decoding DVD-Audio/Video, SACD, CD, CD-R, CD-RW, Video CD, MP3, WMA, JPEG, Super VCD 5.1-channel analog audio output Coaxial and TosLink digital outputs Component-video output (1) S-video and composite-video outputs 24-bit/192kHz audio D/A converters 12-bit/108MHz video D/A converters Full-function remote control

In today’s electronics world, consumers are faced with many tough issues. The choices of home-theater enthusiasts are complicated by the new high-definition displays on the horizon, and now, with HD-DVD and Blu-ray starting to battle for supremacy, the picture gets even murkier. With costs and dates of launch of all of these still to be determined, what sort of DVD player is the one to buy?

To the average person, still happy with his or her VCR and basic cable service, spending hundreds of dollars on a DVD player sounds excessive -- a simple $59 player from a local retail store will serve their video needs just fine. But those who enjoy quality video, and like to hear their movies and music in surround sound, are more likely to need a universal disc player. For those folks -- and until the hi-def DVD formats arrive -- Onkyo offers the DV-SP502 universal audio/video player ($300).

What is a universal audio/video player?

What makes a disc player "universal"? Basic DVD and universal players both provide DVD-Video and digital sound for movies and music, but universal players can also play the two main high-resolution audio formats, DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD. These formats offer better sound quality than your basic audio CD, and through a variety of speaker arrays, from 2.0 to 5.1 channels. DVD-A and SACD output their signals through six-channel analog outputs, which in turn feed the multichannel inputs of your A/V receiver or processor. (First, make sure your receiver has this capability.) It may seem obvious that you’ll have to buy six RCA cables to connect the player to the receiver, but the first time I bought a universal player, I had to make a second trip to the store to get the extra cables I now needed. Make sure to include the cost of these cables in your universal-player budget.

Technical details

The Onkyo DV-SP502 weighs 7.5 pounds and measures 17.13" wide, 3.19" tall, and 12.19" deep. My review sample was black, and its rugged frame easily fit into my equipment rack. The progressive-scan player’s high-quality parts include 12-bit/108MHz video DACs and 24-bit/192kHz audio DACs. Build quality should be a consideration in any purchase you make for your home-theater system, as it often means longevity, and many of us buy for the long term. The DV-SP502’s build quality is outstanding for its price point -- it doesn’t look cheap or flimsy, as many other $300 players do. Other universal players may cost a few bucks less, but when you pull them out of the box, they resemble a credit card.

Easy to set up

To enter the Onkyo DV-SP502’s main menu, I pressed the Setup button on the player’s simple, compact remote control and navigated to Initial Setup. The audio setup was easy. I quickly adjusted the Digital Audio Out settings to On. (It’s important to remember to assign the digital input of your A/V receiver or processor to the DVD player.) I then assigned the player’s RCA digital output to a digital audio coax input on my Anthem AVM 20 processor. Next I made my way to the Onkyo’s Video Output section, then to Component Out. Check your video display’s manual for compatibility when choosing between Progressive and Interlaced scan for the component-video outputs. If your display doesn’t accept progressive scan, choosing Progressive may cause your picture to disappear. If this happens, consult the Onkyo’s manual, which will guide you through resetting the player to its factory defaults, then go through the setup process again.

What really matters

Now that the audio and video connections were made, I was ready to take the Onkyo DV-SP502 for a spin. Nothing tests a DVD player’s worth more than a good Pixar movie, all of which have stunning visuals and the some of the most impressive soundtracks around. If you don’t already own one of these computer-animated features, I advise you to add at least one to your demo list. (So far, Pixar has made the two Toy Story films, A Bug’s Life, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, and the soon-to-be-released Cars.) My first selection was chapter 23 of The Incredibles. This is a reference scene for many reasons, including its dazzling color and a dynamic soundtrack that will test every facet of your system’s sound.

The Onkyo DV-SP502 did not disappoint. The colors of the jungle were rich and deep, and the speed with which the characters raced across the screen was impressively rendered, with no artifacts during their motion. The amount of detail in the picture was so impressive that I paused the scene to confirm and appreciate the detail. It was amazing to note all of the shadows and intricate backdrops; everything came through vividly. Watch this scene on your DVD player, press Pause, and judge for yourself: Does your picture match the description above?

The soundtrack of The Incredibles is a mix of dynamic explosions and ambient music, all of which the DV-SP502 presented with precision. The bullets from the evil guards whizzed by my ears as the accompanying music filled the room. The surround channels were alive and distinct with activity. Passing tree limbs and explosions panned seamlessly from front to back during a chase scene, while the subwoofer continually thumped my chest with deep bass.

I see many films in theaters just to take in the theater sound experience, which I then compare with my home theater’s performance when those films are released on DVD. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World was one of those films, and chapter 4, accurately titled "Under Attack," will wake the dead. Through the Onkyo, the ambient sounds and the dark, gloomy visuals set an ominous mood, and the sound of wind blowing through the sails as the ship slipped through the fog brought me into the moment. Then, when the first shot was fired, the ensuing action drew me into the heat of battle. The booming cannons, dynamic and anchored to the video, tested the structural stability of my home. The crew’s footsteps raced over my head, so lifelike that a child might have mistaken them for Santa and his reindeer. I play this scene often at home; through the Onkyo, it left me shaking in my seat and picking splinters out of my hair. If you don’t feel like that when you demo this scene with your player, maybe it’s time to upgrade.

After all the explosions, I needed to unwind and treat myself to a little two-channel music. I settled on Alison Krauss and Union Station’s Lonely Runs Both Ways [CD, Rounder 11661-0525-2]. The first track, "Gravity," displays great musicianship and Krauss’s unmistakable voice. Wow! Her soft voice cast a solid, precise image between my Aerial 10T loudspeakers; that and the detail of the acoustic instruments were pure delights to my ears. About a minute into the track, a deep bass line thumps in to blend all of the instruments into a coherent mix. I switched back and forth between the Onkyo’s digital audio output (using the Anthem’s DACs) and the analog audio out (using the Onkyo’s DACs) to my processor several times to detect differences in sound. The Onkyo’s analog audio out delivered sharper imaging, while the digital out seemed to provide a slightly livelier sound. I preferred the analog, which seemed to create a more neutral sonic environment.

Next I played a compilation disc of MP3 tracks ripped from various CDs in my collection. (Yes, the Onkyo DV-SP502 plays MP3s, too.) I recently upgraded from a five-disc to a single-disc DVD player, and the only thing I miss is the ability to play multiple discs without having to manually change them. But a single DVD+R disc burned with MP3 songs can take dozens of hours to play through once. Due to the lossy data compression used, the sound quality of MP3 can’t match that of CD, but in this case, what little loss of audio quality there was was a small tradeoff for being able to store so many tracks so efficiently. Such tradeoffs are often made when buying audio equipment -- they’re part of the dilemma of budget vs. performance faced each time we upgrade our system -- but there’s no tradeoff when your player can play back MP3s when you ask it to.

The Onkyo DV-SP502’s real highlight was its playback of multichannel music. In fact, if you haven’t enjoyed a good multichannel experience before, you have no idea what you’re missing -- it’s a completely different experience from two-channel. One of my favorite DVD-Audio discs is Beck’s Sea Change [Interscope B0001840-19], and "The Golden Age" is an acoustic number that demonstrates the benefits of multichannel music. The guitar strings were sharp and present in my room, bringing me into the song. Different instruments and layers of sound enveloped me from all directions until they were one in the soundstage. This disc is full of beautiful songs that fill every channel with musical information that combines to dazzle the listener. In the end, I realized how many layers of each song I’d been missing by listening to the two-channel version.

Listening to Seal’s Best: 1991-2004 [DVD-A, Warner Bros. 47947-9], I again appreciated the differences between multichannel and two-channel music recordings. "Love’s Divine" begins with the sounds of raindrops and thunder in the surround and subwoofer channels. The front soundstage then comes alive, bringing into focus Seal’s powerful voice, which casts the most expansive image of any DVD-A I own. I could almost feel the words coming out of his mouth, such was the vocal prowess displayed by the Onkyo DV-SP502. This was a great song made even better by the use of six separate channels.

In SACD mode, the DV-SP502 lets you preset the playback default to the two-channel, multichannel, or CD tracks. I chose two-channel and popped Norah Jones’ Come Away with Me [Blue Note 5 41747 2] into the disc tray. "Cold, Cold Heart" begins with a methodical bass line that runs throughout the song. Tight and defined, the bass line provided the framework for Jones to paint the words with her expressive voice.

Comparison

The quality of SACD playback was close to that of my reference universal player, the Denon DVD-2910. The most noticeable difference was that the Denon’s low bass was stronger, but it also provided airier highs. At $739, however, the DVD-2910 costs more than twice as much as the Onkyo DV-SP502. Does it deliver twice the performance? In SACD playback, I wasn’t sure. The Onkyo’s detailed sound and the size of its soundstage were comparable, so it really wasn’t a night-and-day difference. In most respects, the Onkyo held its own compared to the Denon.

Through their component-video outputs, the video differences between the players were too close to call. The Denon DVD-2910 does have an HDMI output, through which can upconvert a video signal to 1080i, a feature that I enjoy and use in my reference system -- but HDMI isn’t available in any universal player costing as little as $300. The Onkyo provided a crystal-clear picture, vivid and bright, and its darker colors were smooth and clean, never drawing attention away from the action or the sound.

Who is this DVD player for?

If you still have only basic cable service, then you probably can’t imagine paying a few hundred dollars for a DVD player. That’s fine. There are players available at almost any price you could name, and they’re getting better and better. However, the Onkyo DV-SP502 isn’t just a DVD player -- it’s a capable universal player whose quality and features far outweigh its price. The Onkyo DV-SP502’s target buyer is the home-theater enthusiast who seeks a real movie experience at home, especially from movie soundtracks -- someone who wants to play SACDs and DVD-As but doesn’t want to pay silly money to do so. In short, a person like me. Until HD DVD and Blu-ray hit the market, the Onkyo DV-SP502 offers plenty of flexibility, and lets you keep just a little more money in your pocket. It’s a well-rounded addition to my system.

Manufacturer contact information:

Onkyo USA
18 Park Way
Upper Saddle River, NJ 07450
Phone: (800) 229-1687

E-mail: onkyo@onkyousa.com
Website: www.onkyousa.com

• Go Back