Home > Consumer Reviews > Panasonic DMP-BD60 Blu-ray Disc Player, Black

Quick free shipping from Amazon - I received the player in two days after ordering with Amazon Prime.

I purchased the BD60 because of prior great experience with other Panasonic Blu Ray players which I own - the BD30 and BD55. I also didn't want to learn new setup menus with a new brand and could go to single site for firmware downloads.

The player I received was mfg in Feb 2009 and shipped with firmware version 1.1. Using a CD-R, I manually updated the firmware to version 1.7 (as of 6/5/09). (Note the player is capable of updating the firmware using an Ethernet connection to your Internet.)

As I have with my other Panasonic players, I use freeware Express Burn (nch.com.au) to create an ISO compliant CD-R data disk to update the firmware. However, after I put the CD-R in the BD60, I got a flashing message L DRV. About a few minutes later it ejected the disc and displayed a message UPD NG. In short the firmware update had failed due to the player not correctly reading the update disk and I was essentially stuck with a non-operable player in the firmware update mode. This error has been reported by others... Google BD60 UPD NG.

I was ultimately able to resolve the problem with creating a new firmware update data disk on a different PC using Roxio Creator DE. Roxio has been suggested by others. My Roxio CD write settings were TAO Open, Mode 1, ISO+Juliet, and Use Disc for Only One Recording.

Once I got past the firmware update snafu, the player operated flawlessly. Like my BD55 it plays standard DVDs with very good picture quality. The player appears to have good DVD up conversion to 1080p. It has all the capabilities of a good Blu Ray player for HDMI, 24p output, Dolby/DTS HD decoding, etc.

The player has some differences from the BD55. The BD60 has a quick start feature which provides power to the internal unit even when it's turned off (standby mode). Using this feature I noticed a startup time of about 8 seconds compared to 15 seconds. Note the player draws about 5W of power (so much for being Green) in standby mode with the quick start feature enabled, compared to 0.5W when you disable the quick start feature and 22W when it is operating.

The BD60 also has a USB port in addition to the SD card slot. The BD60 lacks the analog 5.1ch analog audio out connectors. I doubt if many people used the 5.1ch analog connectors and Panasonic eliminated them to reduce COGS. The BD60 also has some features (Viera Cast) to access content on the Internet, which I have not used.

The first thing I need to say in this review is that I'm not a hardcore techie and will not be able to provide you with all of the megachip or spins per second kinda data you might be interested in. All I am is an average person who wanted to get the most out of my plasma tv. Naturally Blu ray seemed the only way to go for the best home movie experience.

With that being said I'm not a complete newb either, I have done some homework. So here's what I think about this player without having much experience with any others:

LOAD TIME: I've noticed many customers are interested in how fast the blu rays load.. I can't really compare this player with many others, but I know I'm an impatient person and have yet to feel annoyed by any loading times. So even if it's not the best, it's certainly good enough.

PICTURE & SOUND: Of course this is what it's all about, and I must say the quality is very good. The blu rays look and sound amazing and though it's less noticeable, when I play a regular DVD there is for sure a sound improvement, but the picture is a little harder to notice... maybe it's just my untrained eye.

SETUP: As I said, I'm not a techie, but this was a breeze to setup. Plug and chug, you barely even need to consult the instruction booklet. Having had a Panasonic dvd player before, I was delighted to see the remote was nearly identical to my old one, and wasn't confusing at all.

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Overall analysis: The truth is, Blu Ray is still a new technology. There's going to be improvements, there's going to be price drops (a certain "W" retailer is currently selling one for $98). At $200 the price has already dropped enough to make it an affordable splurge, and even though this system is nice I've been increasingly jealous of some of the other amenities more fancy players come with. For example, the Netflix and Amazon streaming ability is something I'm really wanting, although you CAN stream youtube with this player. Some players also include built in wi-fi which sounds like a much easier way to access the internet through the player.

So.. should you get this one? Well, I can't say no, because I love it and think it works great. Is it the best value right now? Well.. I dunno. Maybe if you just want to try blu ray out it'd be worth going as cheap as you can get until they master all the cool gadgets and add-ons. Is blu ray in general worth it? Absolutely. If you have an HD tv, you have to have blu ray. It's the only way to watch a movie.

it does not recognize or play any copy dvds or vcds. everything you want to play has to be an original dvd or a bluray

I am having the same freezing issue as other reviewers here. While watching a Blue-Ray movie, the image freezes and the whole machine reboots. The freezes do not occur in the exact same place, but roughly in the same spot which makes me wonder if it isn't a memory problem (perhaps it fails to "flush-out" images as they go by, and eventually fills-up?).

The video quality is actually quite good, and if not for this one issue, I'd love the thing. However, this one thing is enough to ruin a movie entirely, and thus defeats the entire purpose of it, good image or no.

I have contacted Panasonic, who claims that this problem is unknown to them.
I will try to exchange this for another brand, though I hate to lose the link with my Panasonic TV, as it seems both this and the Panasonic DMP-BD80 High Clarity Audio Blu-ray Disc Player, Blackhave the same problem.

I've had this bluray player for a few weeks now, I'd have bought it sooner, but was waiting for the price to fall a bit. It works well along with my Panasonic HDTV and Panasonic receiver via Viera link. It displays a great picture using bluray discs, but the upconverted picture (while viewing regular DVD discs) isn't all it's cracked up to be. I wish the player had more than one HDMI input/output as well. The delay in loading a bluray disc isn't that bad. Heck, why not grab another soda or beer from the fridge while you wait for it to load? I love the fact that it has a USB input and an SD input on the front of the player. This makes it easy to pop in a usb flash drive with mp3 files and an SD card with digital photos on it. I highly recommend purchase of this Panasonic bluray disc player.