Thanks highfigh.....
I just was looking at the 85 online at panny's site, its discounted to $137.50 seems to be a good deal right now direct.
Its $180 on Amazon.....
Buy it. Now. Trust Me.
As long as he doesn't care about extra streaming features, where you may look towards other brands like LG.
The 85 uses the same VP as the 65, but it still does better with SD upconversion because it deinterlaces before doing the chroma upsampling.
The preouts are a nice bonus just in case he lands some great deal on a high quality legacy processor/receiver. Yeah, the 85 doesn't have the greatest BM, but it's still well worth at least* $5 more to have.
I may be very similar to your friend in not caring at all about upconversion nor mch analogs, but even I would happily splurge the extra $10-15 or whatever it is, over the 65, right now.
Tell your buddy that meat gives him the go ahead and stamp of approval.
@highfigh, sorry if you did or wanted to carry Pana. I have bought Pana from both zon and direct, but I have given much of my money to dealers too. The way I look at it, I'd rather them buy the value player and get better speakers, processors, amps, which I'm sure you have plenty of. What I don't like is when someone gets entry level speakers coupled to a $500-700 Oppo.
