In 2012, Sony did a remarkable job with their Blu-ray players. They initially launched with an RGB bug, but that was quickly remedied and they offered very good performance for the price. Now they’ve updated them for 2013 with their new “Quartz” styling. What hasn’t changed is that they manage to consistently put out an image that is accurate and detailed without the flaws of many other manufacturers. With the Sony BDP-S5100 Blu-ray player, Sony has released a player that manages to out-perform everyone else at its price point.

While many other vendors seem to struggle with bugs that creep into their firmware, or strange playback flaws that should have been fixed ages ago, Sony stays clear of these issues. Anyone can playback a Blu-ray movie correctly, but many struggle when it comes to Blu-ray concerts and documentaries, or older DVD movies. The Sony BDP-S5100 Blu-ray player manages to play back all of these materials without much of an issue, and with superior performance than other players.

For many people streaming content can make or break a player. The Sony BDP-S5100 does well here as well, offering a larger array of Blu-ray content than most other companies. Sony also has their exclusive Music Unlimited and Video Unlimited streaming services that no one else can offer on their players. The interface on the Sony BDP-S5100 isn’t quite as nice as players from Samsung and LG, and certainly not a Roku, but it is very usable and provides access to all the major streaming providers. That is more than most other vendors can claim today.