Sony BDPS6500 3D 4K Upscaling Blu-ray Player with Wi-Fi (2015 Model)

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Product Specifications

Inputs/Outputs: 1 HMDI, 1 USB, 1 Coaxial, 1 Ethernet
Smart Functionality: With built-in Wi-Fi you can wirelessly access popular streaming apps and services including Netflix, YouTube, Hulu Plus, Amazon Instant Video, PlayStation Now & more.
4K Upscaling: Get the most out of your 4K Ultra HD TV by upscaling the quality of your Blu-ray movies to near 4K quality. The upscaling chip also improves the quality of online content, and upconverts DVD’s to near HD quality for an improved viewing experience
Sound: Experience HD sound with Dolby and dts-Master Audio
Screen Mirroring: View your Android mobile devices’ content on your TV with Miracast screen mirroring technology.
Front USB Port: Enjoy your videos, photos and digital music with USB connectivity.

Product Description

Style:Blu-ray Enjoy 300+ streaming entertainment services, including Netflix, YouTube, Hulu Plus and more. Upscale your favorite Blu-rays, DVDs and photos to near-4K quality, and get stunning resolution thanks to TRILUMINOS technology, making your favorite 3D Blu-ray movies look better than ever. You can even bring your mobile media to the big screen with Miracast screen mirroring, or play select PS3 games with PlayStation Now-no game console required.

Product Reviews

A minimalist looking unit that is Packed with features! .. and a few minor quirks

One thing that I can say about Sony’s BDPS6500 Blu-ray Player is that the picture quality is absolutely stunning. The Triluminos technology lives up to the hype. Although I currently don’t own a 4K television, I would imagine the 4K upscaling would be excellent as well, but I will have leave that analysis for someone else. The audio quality is also pretty spectacular. I am using the coax digital output rather than HDMI, since my receiver is a little bit dated and does not have any inputs of that type. One quick note, this device lacks optical audio output and composite (analog) jacks, make sure your audio system will accept HDMI or digital in if you plan on connecting it to surround sound.Sony has gone to a minimalist style following their diamond cut series of Blu-Ray players. There are only two buttons (power and open/close), a green power LED and a USB port on the front of the unit – no display at all. The unit sure packs a lot of features into a box that is smaller than my recently upgraded cable set top box (in fact it rests on top of it - making sure I am not covering up any vent holes of course). Sony has created a nice flagship Blu-Ray player here, although it does have a few quirks.One of the quirks of the BDPS6500 has to do with self-burned data discs containing .mp4 files. The player had no problem seeing the files on the disc and then no problem playing them for about a minute or less. After that, the machine mysteriously just stops playing the file, reboots showing the Blu-Ray splash screen, and then shuts off (The LED goes out). It did not seem to matter what data disc I put in, every one did exactly the same thing. Strangely enough, the exact same files are on a home media server and play fine while streaming (More on that later). For the minute that I was able to play the data discs, the playback quality was superb. The video was crystal clear, the colors were vibrant but accurate and the audio was crisp. Any self-burned disc in DVD format did not have this issue, they played just fine - looking and sounding great.Another quirk I found had to do with DNLA and my media server. When I chose my server, then Videos >> TV Shows >> All Shows >> (Folder With TV Shows name) many of the folders would display “No Playable File In This Category”, but when I selected “By Folder” and a few other categories, the program played just fine, with no problems. I usually use a Plex client (I currently use it with Roku and my iPhone) and everything works fine through that wonderful system. For this device, Plex is still in Preview through the Opera store. Once it is out of preview I will solely be using it for local streaming, so this will be a non-issue fairly soon. Since there is a workaround to play these files, it’s really not much of a problem anyway.Finally, the last quirk I will mention is that after a couple of days of not being used the Blu-Ray player has the tendency to lose its internet connection and give itself a self-assigned IP address. When this happens, the only way to resolve that issue is unplug the unit for about thirty seconds and plug it back in. At that point, your home network’s DHCP server will assign it a legitimate IP address on your network and re-establish the internet connection. No matter how many times I tried to reconnect from the network settings on the unit I could not get rid of the bogus self- assigned IP. Unplugging it is the only thing that did the trick. Perhaps this has to do with a power saving feature, or needs to be addressed with the next firmware issue, I don’t know.The BDP6500 plays DVD’s and Blu-Rays just great, I couldn’t be happier with the playback from them. It streams Netflix with stunning clarity. The colors were vivid and audio clarity was excellent. The Wi-Fi connection is rock solid (when it does not have a self-assigned IP), Netflix did not buffer once while watching a movie, of course a decent router helps here as well. One thing that puzzles me is why Sony did not put a 5.0 GHz Wi-Fi radio or Gigabit Ethernet in this brand new player. You would think that they would be outfitting the latest 5.0 GHz AC band technology rather than relying on the old 2.4 GHz n band. The same goes with the Ethernet. Most people have Gigabit routers installed these days, so why wouldn’t this player come with that. It certainly can’t cost that much more for these components.Besides Netflix, Sony has pre-installed several apps to the intuitive home page including Hulu, Amazon Instant Video, Pandora, YouTube, and a few more, with the ability to add many apps of your choice. Several of the apps require an account or a paid subscription. The Pandora app had a flat boring look to it and for some reason it took several minutes to load the next song providing long gaps of silence between tunes. On some stations the next song never did load, and I had to go back to the home screen and re-launch the app. My six year old Panasonic Blu-Ray player does a better job at Pandora playback, with much quicker song loading. The You Tube app was a much better experience. It loaded quickly, is laid out nicely, and is easy to search for videos. The picture and audio quality varies based on the quality of the original video, but the BDP6500 does its absolute best to upscale and provide the greatest experience possible. 1080p videos look awesome, and there is no buffering. Many of the other apps are for international viewers or of specific interests – gadgets, kids, sports, etc. The apps vary in quality and content, some are done well, while others are terrible. The Flixster app does not allow the user to log in and watch the Ultraviolet content they may have on their account, so to me that is disappointing. The Opera web browser app can be slow and clunky. It is sometimes very hard to read and many videos won’t play on it. You will inevitable reach for your phone’s browser over this one, but I guess it’s ok.Speaking of your phone, Sony has a really nice iOS or Andorid app called TV Sideview, which will turn your phone into a nice multifunctional remote for the BDP6500 that has a trackpad and keyboard, and all of the physical remote functions as well. TV Sideview also incorporates a nice TV Guide with recommended programming and a DNLA controller that will even turn on the player if it is shut off. Since we are talking remotes, the physical remote that comes with this unit is pretty nice. It’s small but fits nice in your hand and everything is within easy reach of your thumb. There is a dedicated Netflix button that brings you right to that app and a Favorites button for which you can assign favorite apps. There are controls to turn your TV on and off, change the volume and input. You don’t have to have a Sony TV; you can enter a specific code based on the brand.One thing I am not, and that is a gamer by any means, but Sony’s BDP6500 IS! Sony provided my with a Dualshock 4 Game Controller and a month’s subscription to Playstation Now to test out the gaming aspect of the device and all I can say is WOW! All of the games that I played streamed like a charm with 1080p graphics and what appeared to me to be full surround sound. They were smooth and so detailed! Too bad I stunk at everything that I played except maybe Wheel Of Fortune. I’m going to have to let a gamer discuss Playstation Now in more detail, but as far as I can see it works great. One thing I don’t like about it is that the controller cannot be used wirelessly. It must physically be connected via USB cable to the Blu-Ray player. That may turn off some true gamers.One final word on the BDP6500, and that is Sony got the CD player right! When you insert a CD into this machine it searches the Gracenote database, correctly finds the CD and retrieves the track names and cover art and plays the CD just like a streaming player would. This is much better than some older players, which just gave “CD Track 1” as the information on the screen. The audio from the CD also sounds great. Well done Sony.Pros:Nice Picture QualityGreat Audio QualitySmall FootprintDVD’s and Blu-Ray playback is fast and flawlessNetflix plays back with stunning quality (when in HD) – no bufferingNice You Tube appOpera Store App adds the possibility of many more apps including PLEX media player (currently in PlexPass Preview)Excellent iOS and Android remote app with DNLA controller and Program GuideNice Remote control – feels good in the hand, and has on/off volume and input controls for multiple TV brands (not only Sony).Playstation Now streams games without a Playstation console (game controller not included)Excellent CD playback with cover art and track names – looks like a streaming playerCons:Problems playing .mp4 files on data discsDNLA is temperamentalSometimes loses internet connection when not used for daysLacks 5.0 GHz WiFi and AC Protocol – only has 2.4 GHz n bandLacks Gigabit EthernetThe Grey, flat Pandora app sometimes leaves long gaps of silence between songs.Opera Web Browser is slow and clunkyGames Controller needs to be attached to unit by USB cable – cannot connect wirelessly

Lots to love, some things to hate: A Blu-Ray player that will likely leave you with mixed feelings.

SONY BDPS6500 purchased June 11. I need to get the cosmetic issues out of the way first. This player has the aesthetic appeal of a scotch-tape dispenser. Small, light-weight, bland plastic, no display at all, and a generally cheap feel. It’s hard to imagine sophisticated technology having less visual appeal. Ugh. I also previously owned a SONY S6200 with occasional issues including its odd design. Worse, my Pioneer AVR wouldn’t properly recognize the 6200 video input without fussing with both units. Getting a good DVD display was difficult and streaming was ordinary on a good day.Now, on to more important issues for this new S6500: performance is very high for Blu-Ray (regular and 3D), for older DVDs as well as for streaming (Amazon Prime). [I popped in my older Video Essentials DVD test disk which has great images of a wind blown flag, bridge cables and stadium seats, all of which create havoc for poorly designed players. It also has great night scenes. All were wonderfully displayed.] The images from all modern Blu-Rays, projected onto a 120” screen using a JVC X500r projector, are spectacular. [For Blu-ray I use Disney’s WOW calibration disk, sold here on Amazon, to help identify the effect of various settings.] All images are colorful, finely detailed, without any artifacts, and accompanied by great sound. Details jump out of shadows making darkly lit sci-fi really fun to watch. This is an exceptional quality player by any image and sound quality measure.Initial setup has its issues. DO NOT try to use this player without first connecting it to the internet and installing the firmware updates. My unit hung on its 1st Blu-ray and I needed to convince it to restart and eject. After the upgrade, most glitches were corrected. Setting are also a potential source of frustration. My first DVDs had no menus at all and a variety of glitches. A few changes in the settings (screen format NORMAL) corrected lost menus and (forced 1080/24p resolution) fixed my HDMI recognition issues. Not at all intuitive, but I had been ready to return my player until I stumbled onto these fixes.Video streaming from Amazon was interesting. I’ve had problems getting high quality video. Low resolution, soft blurry images all made my experience very poor. With this player, I thought it was as bad or even worse. BUT WAIT … WAIT … WAIT … and before your eyes, like magic, the image visibly improves over the next 40-60 seconds until it is extremely close to the highest resolution I’ve seen from a streaming service. Go figure. I’ve not tested any other service, but something odd … but great … is going on here. And it happened with absolute repeatability. I wish the experience was perfect from the get-go, but I’m now a fan of streaming.The remote is cute, small, but easy to use despite not being back-lit. I like the very useful submenu under OPTIONS on the remote. Here you can select to adjust your 3D effects and depth. I also use this feature to modify my VIDEO settings for special situations. Here I can brighten my image (especially useful when displaying 3D images which are darkened by 3D shutter glasses) or modify brightness and contrast on older, low quality DVDs. Changes can be stored under Custom1&2 settings (as long as you DO NOT have 4K resolution output set when you initially set-up your player).Bottom line: If you can get passed the least attractive AV design to come out of SONY, a very problematic startup/setup process, the S6500 is a very high performing Blu-Ray player.[Update: July 16. I sent it back. Purchased an Oppo 103D to replace it. Why? I had a persistent problem with the Sony S6500. My system has a fairly new Pioneer SC-71 that sits between the Sony and my JVC x500r projector. Probably 25% of the time I could not get ANYthing to appear on the screen when I started up my system … either a green screen or pink/green stripes appear. I then had to cycle the receiver on/off and/or cycle the projector inputs and/or cycle the Sony on/off until an image would appear. When this occurs, I enter into a 10 minute ritual. I couldn’t prove which device was at fault. My guess? HDMI connection issues between the Pioneer and SONY. Can’t exchange the Pioneer, so I traded into the OPPO, I have had no similar issues. Reach your own conclusions. And, no, the OPPO, for 4X the price doesn’t provide 4X the image quality. But it’s prettier, rugged like a Jeep, loaded with nice features … and my blood pressure has dropped.

After one month problems/ now freezes

After one month started having some issues when streaming. Consistently snowy when streaming and playing DVDs. I have to switch to another device to stream clearly. Now after few a few months, it freezes all together and has to be unplugged to reboot. My worst Amazon purchase yet!

Great player, with a great amount of extras, cheaper to purchase a player than a add on box for other channels.

Great player and at a great price

Good value

I’m not a big fan of Sony and there remote is just OK. However, for the price it was a good buy

not even a year old and doesn’t want to work right

Ordered at the beginning of the year (2017) everything was working great but about June it started not playing my blu-ray and 3D movies. Bery frustrating.