I bought the USA hardware modded version of the Oppo BD-83 Blu Ray player just over three months ago. This edition will playback Blu Ray and DVD discs from any region in the world.

The quality of sound and image is very good. I hook up via the analog outputs to my AV Receiver and the sound quality on lossless Blu Ray movie discs impresses me a lot. It's far better than the old lossy sound of DVD but of course much also depends on the actual sound mix on each disc.

Video quality is superb. I have found the default settings are mostly good for this player but i like to have the detail enhancement set at +2. If the disc has no edge enhancement ( sharpening ) applied then +2 will be great and will not add any sharpening to the image. I recommend not setting higher than this as it will add slight edge halo's to the image.

If you are not careful or if the disc already has sharpening applied ( and of course edge enhancement should not be on any disc but the sad fact of life is that many discs do contain it ) be careful about how you set the detail enhancement and avoid using the edge enhancement controls on this player.

The player itself has a nice look to it and feels like a quality player should. It's a profile 2.0 player which means it is BD-Live ready and fully up to date for whatever is on each disc. Firmware updates can be carried out via a thumb drive or by hooking the player up to the internet. It's not got wireless internet capabilities which is a pity but i find the thumb drive is the best way to update firmware so for me that's not a problem.

You can put your pictures from a digital camera onto a disc or the thumb drive and view them via the Oppo.

Blu Ray playback is fast and very responsive. One of the quickest players out there and practically as quick as a Playstation 3 which i have also owned.

There is not much difference between image quality of most blu ray players and that is also true of this player. The difference comes with the analog audio playback. If your receiver is an older model without HDMI but with at least 6 channel input then this player will allow you lossless audio using the analog outputs and the difference in sound quality is well worth the investment.

I am able to play discs from anywhere in the world and it's fantastic to be able to purchase a disc knowing regional restrictions will not stop me playing it. In a free market world economy this is how it should be and some of these Hollywood studio's needs to get into the 21st century and stop restricting freedom of movement with these region coded discs. Warner and Sony ( Columbia ) are fine examples of studio's that does not restrict or region code their discs.

I actually started a Reference list of Blu Ray titles at my site here. http://www.darkrealmfox.com/film_reviews/ - I did this as i wanted to highlight film like titles no matter whether they were eye candy or not. The Oppo Blu Ray player with the region free modification allows me to rent UK discs and purchase American or Japanese discs without fear they will not play on my player and i view on a very large 104 inch projection screen so it's easy for me to judge image quality.

I feel this blu ray player not only has class and looks good on the outside but the quality of the Anchor Bay chip means you are able to see every bit of detail a disc holds and hear every bit of the sound without compromise. Some players unfortunately exaggerate edges or boost contrast to try and make the image look better but on large screens you will just see a less film like and more artificial image. The Oppo neither boosts nor cuts anything and just gives you exactly what is on the disc be that good or bad. It cannot make a bad disc better but it has some features which can at least make it more presentable and less ugly to view.

DVD's played back on this player through the HDMI output actually can look remarkably good but do not fall into the hype generated by some people that a DVD can look as good as any high definition title. DVD's will never compete with Blu Ray for image quality and even the worst Blu Ray title looks better than it's DVD counterpart. Having said all that i think the scaler within this player is one of the best and DVD's played back via the HDMI output look very good as far as taking into account they are DVD's.

I do recommend this player without reservation as it's one of the best on the marketplace at this moment in time.