All the focus is on 3D in the home theater space, but LG appears content to take a wait-and-see approach to the new 3D Blu-ray format.
Instead of getting on the bandwagon, LG has gone in a different direction with its new flagship Blu-ray player, the BD590, which includes all the features that made the BD390 a hit--like built-in Wi-Fi, tons of streaming services (Netflix, Vudu, Pandora)--plus a 250GB hard drive that can be used to rip your music collection and store photos.
The BD590 also has built-in Gracenote software to automatically add metadata to ripped digital music.
Along with the flagship BD590, LG also announced two standard Blu-ray players, the BD550 and BD570, which are largely similar to the company's Blu-ray offerings from 2009. The BD570 has essentially the same feature set as the step-up BD590, minus the 250GB hard drive.
Along with standalone Blu-ray players, LG also announced a trio of Blu-ray home-theater-in-a-box (HTIB) systems. The LHB975 is a 5.1 Blu-ray home theater system, built-in Wi-Fi, LG's NetCast suite of streaming media services, two HDMI inputs, and wireless rear speakers.
The LG LHB535 is the step-down to the LHB975, with largely the same feature set except it lacks wireless rear speakers and the tall-boy front speakers.
The LG LHB335 is the entry-level Blu-ray home theater system. It has a similar feature set to the step-up LHB535, except it only has one HDMI input, lacks built-in Wi-Fi and isn't DLNA compliant for media streaming.
We covered all of LG's major product announcements on Wednesday, but when we swung by the booth yesterday the LLB915 Blu-ray sound bar caught our eye. We're not quite sure why LG didn't mention it at the press conference, but the feature set is impressive. It has a built-in Blu-ray player, two HDMI inputs, built-in Wi-Fi, a wireless subwoofer, and LG's NetCast suite of streaming services.
