Marantz BD7003 Playing MP3s or WMA

[kinda]

Hello,

All my players have broken, (except my Sagem Freeview+), so I'm looking for replacements.

to cut a long story short, having looked at various options, I'm thinking of abandoning my network storage of video and lossless music, (I don't use it for mutli-room currently and 320 MP3 should be OK), and get a BlueRay player, maybe the BD7003. Plus I'll add proper CD playback.

While I expect a drop-down in usability, I'm wondering how the MP3 playing works? I'm assuming playlists are out, but would I be able to browse to albums, and also random play everything on an SD card or folder, and without turning on the TV?

If anyone has experience I'd be very grateful. I don't really want to do a demo just to find out that the interface is not for me.

 

[kinda]

While the BD7003 sounds like fantastic BlueRay player from various reviews and comments, I decided that having a BlueRay for playing a music library was always going to be a bit of a compromise, and that I'd ultimately be looking for another solution.

I don't really need BlueRay right now as I've no HD display, so I've ordered a Sonos ZP90, (I've already got an iPod touch to control it), and got an XDE500 to be going on with, which can also double as a convenience CD player as well. When I'm ready for BlueRay there will probably be better machines available, and I can focus on just BlueRay performance, (new Marantz BD7004 sounds very good).

I'm very impressed with the XDE500. CD replay was very good to my ears via digital coax to the Marantz, and a lot better than Flac from XBMC via optical was. The DVD perfomance via Scart is also great. I think the detail is a lot better than my old Marantz DV4100OSE, which I's always thought was very good.

Colours seem slightly more reserved, and I'd always liked the lush colours the Marantz presented, but I think it might actually just be more realism from the XDE500. However I've also changed cables to a more normal one as the heavy end on the IXOS seemed to be causing problems to the TV board, so that may have affected colours.

 

[kinda]

Also to add the film sound is very good via the XDE as well.