Samsung BD-C6900

Samsung won the best innovation award in its category at this year's CES for the BD-C6900, a Blu-ray player that's compatible with Blu-ray 3D discs.  According to the manufacturer, it's very fast and can start playing a DVD or Blu-ray disc in just 30 seconds: 15 to warm up and 15 to load the disc.

Hardware

The BD-C6900 sports a much less generic design than its predecessors.  It's finished in glossy black plastic, and the disc mechanism is visible through a transparent section lit up in blue.  There's a small LCD screen at the front and a USB port hidden behind a flap.

You can connect peripherals formatted as NTFS, which is something that not all of the previous models offered.  During our tests, the majority of HD AVC (x 264 videos) encapsulated as MKV worked without a problem.  On the other hand, the M2TS and MTS still aren't handled. Subtitles work fine if they're in a separate file to the video itself.  If you put them in a container, though, you won't get them on screen.



The connectivity available at the back includes a digital audio output, an Ethernet port, an HDMI 1.4 output, analogue audio and video outputs (component and composite) and a 7.1 analogue audio output.  Inside, there's a built-in WiFi card for accessing online content and firmware updates, plus 1 GB of memory for BD Live services.

3D Quality

To test its performance in 3D, Samsung sent us a Blu-ray 3D and its UE-46C8000 along with the BD-C6900.  As with Panasonic's DMP-BDT300, the effects are excellent.  Items jump out of the screen and there's a real impression of depth-of-field.  For more details on 3D, we suggest you take a look at our recent tests of 3D TVs, including the Panasonic TX-P50VT20, Sony Bravia KDL-46HX803, Samsung UE46C7000 and the UE46C8000.

Image Quality

We've recently updated our test procedure to use the Sony KDL-32CX520 as our TV of reference thanks to its excellent colour fidelity. This makes it easier to identify any inaccuracies in colour reproduction caused by the Blu-ray player:

The BD-C6900 plays Blu-ray discs with incredible sharpness and excellent colour fidelity.

Upscaling of SD sources is a little rough for our liking.  As the extracts below show, aliasing is clearly visible.  The Sony PS3 does much better, with a softer, smoother result:



Audio Formats

The BD-C6900 can handle every HD audio format.  Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS HD HR and DTS HD MA are available as bitstreams or PCM via the HDMI output.  If you don't have a HDMI on your amp, then you can also you the analogue audio output which goes up to 7.1.

Energy Consumption

Like the Panasonic DMP-BDT300, the Samsung BD-C6900 has very minimal power needs.  With less than 0.1 W on standby and 14.3 W while playing a Blu-ray or DVD, the BD-C6900 is one of the cheapest Blu-ray players to run.