Sony launches two "Bonus View" Blu-ray players

New models catch up with HD DVD's interactivity

26 February 2008 12:59 GMT / By Amy-Mae Elliott

Sony has updated its standalone Blu-ray offerings in the States with the launch of two new models that will be capable of accessing advanced interactive features such as Bonus View and BD-Live.

The BDP-S350 and BDP-S550 models both support Bonus View (Picture-in-Picture) as featured on some new Blu-ray disc movies releases.

Both models are also BD-Live ready with an Ethernet port for firmware updates and access to internet-based interactive content features.

The players feature 1080/60p and 24p True Cinema output. They are compatible with "most" standard DVDs and feature 1080p upscaling through an HDMI connection to capable HDTV sets.

Sound-wise, the models offer 7.1 channel Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Digital Plus decoding and bit-stream output, as well as DTS-HD High Resolution Audio and Master Audio bit-stream output.

In addition, the BDP-S550 adds DTS-HD High Resolution Audio and DTS-HD Master Audio decoding as well as 7.1 channel analogue audio output.

Both models feature an external port for local storage, while the BDP-S550 ships with a 1GB storage device.

The new BDP-S350 will ship in the summer for about $400 and BDP-S550 will be available in the "fall" for about $500.