Off topic (a little) buying a Samsung Blu-ray BDP-100 at Incheon airport in Seoul
 

Thinking about about making the jump, despite the bad reviews the early Blu-ray release are getting (I have heard that most of the first releases were actually encoded using MPEG-2, and have dissapointing PQ compared with the MPEG-4 H.264 releases that are coming down the pipe).

No dount I'll get flamed by the HD-DVD crowd for that one.

Anyway, is there anyone reading this who is Korean, or routinely travels through Incheon? I'm meeting my Mom in Austrlia this December. She's asking me what I want Santa to bring this year, and as she has a 4 hour lay-over at Incheon on her way down-under, I was thinking she might be able to pick one of these up for a steal at the airport (made locally, duty-free and the UKP/Won exchange rate is favorable).

What I'm trying to find is whether there is a duty-free consumer electronics concession in the transit area at Incheon - anyone know - anyone shop there, know the name, perhaps you might even have an old receipt with the name/number?

Also, on a more appropriate technical for this forum, I hear that the whole region-code schema changed with the switch to these new Hi-Def formats, and now North America and East Asia (including South Korea) are bundled up together? If true that is very cool, as I live in California right now.

TIA for any feedback.

Unless you get a real good deal, I wouldn't buy the Samsung BDP-1000. And by good deal, I mean like (US)$250 or less. The thing is a complete turd, lots of bugs - more than the Toshiba HD-[X]A1 HD-DVD players, half of the picture quality complaints with BluRay are due to the MPEG2 authoring, and about half of the bad reviews come from the horrible PQ of the Sammy player. If you can hold out for the next players to come to market - Panasonic and Sony ship their players next month (supposedly) - you'll be better off.

As for the region coding, it has not changed in terms of which countries are associated with which codes vs. DVD. But both HD-DVD and BluRay now support multi-region discs. This is different than a region-0 or region-free DVD. An example would be a disc with region allowances for 1 and 4, allowing it to be playable in N. America and Japan. In the end, it's up to both the studios to set region restrictions on the titles they release and up to hardware manufacturers to provide various region support. Somewhere down the road, I'm sure we'll see multi-region or region-free players just as we have with the DVD format.

Thanks for the info on region codes
 

That is very good to know.

Any thoughts on this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blu_ray#Region_codes

Just FUD maybe, I for one certainly don't treat Wiki as Gospel.

Another comment I have read in reponse to this same post over at AVS Forum, is that the current BD and HD-DVD players are *currently* shipping region free for HD disks but enforce the old region schema when palying back SD DVDs.

Lots of people are telling me the early Sammy BD player is a total dog, maybe I'll wait for that combo BD/HD-DVD/DVD payer and burner I've heard rumored.

Mom definitely needs to prove her love for me this Xmas ;)

More info on the new region schema
 

No flames necesary. If you're a movie lover you may have to purchase both to have a the full selection of movies.

So I think it comes down to the current and planned movie availability right now. There are 60 HD DVD movies and about 35 BD. I'd go with the player that has the right amount of movies you like that are high quality.

One thing that is drawing raves is the new 2.0 Firmware update on HD DVD which gives you 5.0 Dolby TrueHD.

But if you get a Sammy BD player enjoy that as well. There are more good movies coming out (Warners BD foray has been good) and great HD is great HD when all things are done well.