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A search of the internet will quickly reveal many in the audiophile community bashing "home theater in a box" (htib) systems like this, and many of their entirely valid criticisms of such systems apply to this unit, but it has a lot of redeeming qualities too that make me overall convinced that this is a good buy for anyone whose needs match what it provides.Also it is a pretty high end htib so the sound quality will exceed what many would expect.A quick word on settings: This unit comes with a number of effects such as surround enhancement and some pre set EQ settings.Don't use them.Maybe turn down the sub a bit and turn up the center channel, but your goal with movies is to ACCURATELY reproduce the sound as it was intended to be heard.Keep everything flat and you will hear how the movie was meant to sound.That's how I know this is a quality htib: It sounds good with everything flat)
This is a good system for what it is, namely a way to get both blu-ray and 5.1 surround in one convenient and affordable package.The rear speakers are wireless, as in there is a second amp that connects wirelessly to the main amp so you don't have to run cables from the front to back of the room although you do have to run cables from the second amp to the rear speakers.The rears are very light and thus easy to mount on the wall, and I don't worry about that lack of weight too much because surrounds really don't need much power as they just add effects.The fronts and center are much beefier and are two-ways with what appears to be real crossovers so that's pretty good for a home theater in a box.The subwoofer is (unfortunately) passive but its driver is bamboo so I don't think it has the paper-driver problems of other htibs.It seems to cross over at a decent point as the bass stays properly nondirectional.All in all, in my fairly small room it sounds really great for me, and it's pretty cool how it has all the latest surround decoders including Dolby trueHD and DTS HD.
All that said, this system definitely has some typical htib limitations: It has proprietary speaker connections so you can't use other wire without splicing.You can, however, use other speakers because the speakers themselves use standard connections (only the amp-end connection is proprietary).You can also expand to 7.1 sound either by another proprietary (and wireless) panasonic amp or the unit actually does have wired surround outputs so that you can plug in other amps and speakers for the front and back surrounds.However, the proprietary wire is permanently implanted in the subwoofer and naturally there's no way to get a nonamplified subwoofer signal out of this amp so even with some wire splicing ability I doubt you could add a powered sub.So you could upgrade the speakers but not the sub.But again all the included stuff sounds very good so I don't regard this as a dealbreaker.
In addition to a passive, nonupgradeable subwoofer and the inability to use your own speaker wire (although you can use your own speakers), the unit is VERY skimpy on inputs.No HDMI passthru, and only ONE toslink/SPDIF in, and one conventional component audio in.This means that, unless you get a switch or are willing to swap out, you can only use one source other than blu-ray with which there will be "true" surround sound.This is a problem for me because my TV does not allow the SPDIF out to output any audio except for the ATSC tuner (copyright issue) and I have both a cable set top box and an xbox 360 that I want to get surround sound from.Remember, if you plug standard RCA stereo plugs into this thing you will not get real surround, just pro logic type matrix encoded stuff.
All in all, this is still a good buy.These days you can get a 42 inch lcd 1080p tv for about $1000, and you can get this system for about $1000, and you'll have a complete home theater with display, sound, and blu ray player (which is a good final standard profile player which will support all special features except bd live), all for about $2000 and no hassles.As usual with htib, you will sacrifice upgradeability and connectivity for this convenience, and you will have a passive subwoofer.But trust me, this sounds very good for htib and at this pricepoint I recommend it highly for anyone who wants the modern high def home theater experience on a limited budget, because on that, it delivers.You will really enjoy watching movies on this thing and in the end, that's all that really matters.
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Product Description:
With your Panasonic SC-BT100 Blu-ray home theater system staying in just got more exciting than going out. Take your favorite movies to the next level with the Panasonic full-HD Blu-ray Disc- home theater system. Blu-ray discs give you superior sound, stunning HD-quality images, and exciting new interactive capabilities like Final Standard Profile for enhanced commentary, audio mixing and picture-in-picture features previously unthinkable in the DVD format. With Blu-ray, you'll never have to leave the couch for a big-screen quality movie experience.
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