lately I've found myself living at least 2 lives:
1 - as a BDP1- user, being rather underwhelmed because of the limiting factor the hardware forces upon my library, (not helped by the firmware getting bigger, probably heavier on the processor, and too cumbersome to use all functionality )
2 - as a Bryston enthousiast (wouldn't call myself a cultist) trying to help in finding obstacles in MM and reporting back about that. Considered by some being a beta-tester. Enjoying the imperfections ;=)
all of the above has led me to want for upgrading the BDP1, but also to fearing the upgrade won't be a BDP. At or below the price point the bdp3 is going for, there's a lot of competition. And though i believe James with my eye closed and would trust the man with my house keys, without ever having met him, the result of MM thus far forces me back to my hesitation described above.
Playing around with a 60 RaspberryPi setup just about compares to the BDP-Pi, give or take an extra quality power supply, though even that is prone for discussion. Never understood this device, and couldn't imagine buying it. Same goes for the BOT. Very well built maybe, but very very overpriced. Not even talking import taxes et all.
A BDP3 is very necessary for anyone with a medium to larger library, especially when using it for more than what I've been forced to do: only use default view, browsing the file-library. I don't mind that, even like it that way. Miss that functionality in Roon to be honest. But buying a BDP3 without several modernizations being described in this thread would be solely bought for the larger memory and processor capacity. (and dsd, and better and more usb 2 out, and ..... ). Which wouldn't justify the tremendous cost compared to the competition...
Imho.
Please prove me wrong here. a bit of a cultist after all..
Cheers,
Marius