Oppo BDP-83SE vs Cambridge Azur 650 BD Universal Players

Has anyone compared these two units? Looking for the best audiophile grade Universal BD player out there. Any suggestions?

 

The Cambridge Audio 650 BD is apparently a rebranded Oppo BDP-80.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1171570&page=4

 

The best one? Arguably the Marantz UD9004, but as that's around £5000, I'd lean towards the Cambridge. Depends on price though; near identical spec would make the Oppo a contender if it's much cheaper than the £400 650BD.

 

The Oppo BDP-80 is approximately $500 cheaper than the Cambridge Audio 650 BD. The Cambridge unit seems to be a rebranded Oppo BDP-80, with identical boards. It has one small addition--a small IR remote board, probably to allow integration with other Cambridge Audio products so they can be controlled with the same remote.

So, you are basically paying an extra $500 for the Cambridge Audio name and styling and the added feature of being able to control the Oppo with your Cambridge Audio remote. That's not worth the extra $500 to me, but YMMV.

In any event, the Oppo BDP-83 and BDP-83SE machines are superior to the Oppo BDP-80 and by extension the Cambridge Audio 650 BD.

This "rebrand and jack up the price" game is getting old. I understand why it is done (see my comments in the Lexicon/Oppo comparison thread), but now that it is increasingly de rigueur, I am growing less tolerant of it.

 

If you read further in the thread, it is not the same as BDP 80, there have been several changes to it, including the power supply. While this may not justify the increase in price, we can not that its not the same thing as the oppo

 

In the UK:-

CA 650 BD - £400 (Richer Sounds)
Oppo BDP-83 - £500+ (depending on retailer)
Oppo BDP-83SE - £750+
Oppo BDP-80 - £350+

Not such a big difference between the 80 and the 650, the other two higher end Oppos would need to deliver something pretty special to justify the additional outlay I think.

 

If you look at the boards, they are the same. If you look at the specs and the parts used (DAC's, etc.), they are the same. The only thing different that I can see is the color of the circuit boards.

As was observed on that forum,

Like I said above, this is getting old.

 

In the U.S., the difference in price between the Cambridge Audio unit and the Oppo BDP-80 is around $500.00.

The Cambridge Audio BD 650 is $779.

The Oppo with the identical hardware is $289.

A $500 increase for what is, for all intents and purposes, the same player? Ridiculous.

 

In the U.S., the Oppo BDP-83 is $499.

Remember, the Cambridge Audio 650 BD is apparently a rebranded Oppo BDP-80, which is inferior to the Oppo BDP-83.

The superior Oppo is almost $300 cheaper than the Cambridge Audio 650 BD.

To top it all off, the top-of-the-line Oppo BDP-83SE is only $100 more than the Cambridge Audio 650 BD, which appears to be merely a rebranded bottom-of-the-line Oppo BDP-80, with very minor changes.

 

Quote from the president of AIX Records "Hands down the Oppo...I have several of them and used it as the front end to my $250,000 demo room at the AXPONA show in Florida."

 

Billy, now you understand how I feel when the situation is very often reversed...!

Note the price I quoted for the Oppo gear is that which is available in the UK, I understand the US values will differ and it is not, as may seem to be the case when it is reversed here, that the currency symbol has just been changed!

 

Are the Oppos even available in the UK?

 

Yes, you can pick them up off the web and they have a deal with a firm in East Anglia I think.

http://www.crtprojectors.co.uk/index.htm

 

I've read all the threads I could find in the Cambridge Audio 650BD. I've been interested in this for some time, because I wanted a "universal" audio/video player, and in terms of styling, it fit the bill and wasn't a ridiculous high price. As a point of comparison, about 6 years ago I bought a "universal" player (sans blu-ray, of course), a Marantz DV8300, for about 1200.00 and, IIRC, I don't think it handles HDCD.

So the 700 for the Cambridge Audio 650BD seems like a fair price. However, I'm beginning to "feel the force" (as they would say in a Star Wars movie) of the Oppo faction.

Some there is "speculation" that Cambridge Audio has upgraded the analog section of its player. If so, why doesn't Cambridge Audio just come right out and say so? Hello?

Maybe some of the debate will finally be laid to rest by Kal Rubinstein's review of the Cambridge Audio unit, in comparision to the Oppo, in the July issue of Stereophile. Not sure I'm willing to wait that long . . .

The Cambridge Audio 650BD at 700.00 has a hard time matching the Oppo BDP-83 at 500.00. At the same time, one poster mentions a list of "quibbles" about the Oppo BDP-83--assuming these are valid, have they been addressed in an update? (Yes, I need to wade through the Oppo BDP-83 thread).

I guess I am wondering if others feel as I do, or am I all alone? I might pay 200.00 more for a unit if I like the looks of it, but if Oppo outperforms the Cambridge in audio and video playback . . . well, then looks ain't enough.

N.B. I don't think this situation is comparable to the Oppo/Lexicon issue, so let's not go there.

 

Is the Oppo BDP-80 a region free player? Must be if you say they are identical. The Cambridge seems to play everything I throw at it and very well. No need for an after market alteration affecting warranty.

 

Not wanting to turn this into an Oppo v. Cambridge thing (tiresome really), but I like the CA styling more than the Oppo and the £30 difference in the UK makes no odds. The CA is multi-region here at the point of purchase for no extra cost (i.e. Richer Sounds - the exclusive dealer on the high street - does the change inhouse), so £400 all in. The Oppo I have to wait for mail-order to arrive, but I can walk-in to RS in Edinburgh and buy the CA off the shelf. Easier for me to deal with a problem if one develops too.

Incidentally, to the poster who mentioned buying a "universal" player three years ago and it not handling HDCD, he's probably not the first one on here to notice that such a player didn't exist until a couple of years ago when Arcam, NAD and Denon at long last introduced high end players that covered the (then) four main audio sources: CD, SACD, DVD-A and HDCD. Until then, that capability wasn't covered in one box by anyone.

Now, there are only two manufacturers it seems who cover all five, i.e. the other four and the Blu-Ray/HD Audio variants.

 

If you buy the CA, I will make fun of you.

 

I must admit, I am edging towards buying the Cambridge, simply because I live in the UK and for me it is much easier to get hold of than the Oppo (I have a Richer Sounds on the same street as my office).

But I have a couple of questions re it and other Universal players:-

- do they play HD-DVDs in addition to BDs/DVDs?

- do any of the Universals upscale CDs to SACD/DSD (I know some dedicated SACD machines can do this)?

Thank you!

 

In the UK, it's worth considering the warranty issue. CA can be returned to any branch of Richer, who have a presence in most major cities and towns. There is no service backup for Oppo at all in the UK. Probably the reverse applies in the USA. At this end of the AV budget scale, that would greatly ease my decision making.

 

I just find it amazing that the Oppo price differences are so great vis a vis the UK and the US. Oppo is priced as a "value brand" (in high end, at least) in the U.S., while it appears to be more of a premium-priced product in the UK. In other words, what is a great bargain in the US is meh in the UK.

I agree with your comments above about the UK pricing--with the Cambridge unit and the lower end Oppo unit at almost price parity, it's not really an issue which one you go with. However, with Oppo's higher end models, the price increase in the UK is steep.

The thing is, the original poster is in the US and was comparing the Cambridge Audio unit to the higher-end Oppo units, where the prices are similar--and the Cambridge unit's price is much higher than the lower-end Oppo that it appears to be based on.

 

Agreed, the Cambridge unit seems to be the better deal in the UK. Quite the opposite of the situation in the US.

 

No universal players on the market support HD-DVD.

All universal players on the market offer some form of upsampling for CD playback. The only players that I am aware of that convert the 16-bit/44.1kHz PCM encoded in the CD's to DSD are dCS and Meitner units. There may be a few others, but I think they are at the ultra-high end as dCS and Meitner are.

 

Do you mean no universal players support upsampling?

 

No, I mean all support it. At least, that is my understanding, as in the past almost all non-Blu-ray universal players did. For example, almost every universal player on the market could upsample 16/44.1 to 24/96 or 24/192.

Upsampling is different than conversion of PCM to DSD. As far as I know, the only universal players that do this specific conversion are the Meitner and dCS units.

I guess I could have been a little more clear in my comments. I hope this post clarifies what I said in my past above.