Why wait for Black Friday when you can get the best deal on one of the best Blu-ray players on the market today? Sears.com has Panasonic's DMP-BD35 (DMPBD35K) Blu-ray Disc player today only for $149.99 (while supplies last, which probably won't be long!).
UPDATE: This deal has expired however Amazon now has the 2009 model available for pre-order:
You can also get two free Blu-ray Disc movies from Disney by mail with the purchase of the BD35 - "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and "Ratatouille" - both of which have been noted for exceptional audio and video performance.
In terms of features, the BD35 offers support for BonusView and BD-Live, using the integrated SD/SDHC card reader for storage of downloaded BD-Live content (requires an optional SD or SDHC card). It also supports all of the HBR (High Bit Rate) surround sound codecs including Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD High Resolution Audio and DTS-HD Master Audio.
Since the BD35 does not include a multi-channel analog output, support for the HBR codecs is strictly via HDMI output. It can pass the raw bistream or decode these advanced lossless codecs to multi-channel L-PCM. This means that any Audio/Video receiver with HDMI audio support will play nicely with the BD35.
If you have an older receiver or preamp/processor with no HDMI (but with multi-channel analog inputs), then you'd be better off ordering the BD55, but the rest of us can get a great deal on the BD35 and pick that up instead.
We've reviewed its big brother, the DMP-BD55 and it's a winner! The BD35 should offer comparable video performance. Check out our DMP-BD55 review.
DMP-BD35K Key Features
