Panasonic BD-BTT370 review

Upgrading your home cinema setup to surround sound is easy with all-in-one systems such as Panasonic’s BTT370. This mid-range kit includes a Blu-ray player that also doubles as an A/V receiver for a powerful 1,000W 5.1 speaker system, which should be more than enough power for any living room.

The Blu-ray player supports all the features we would expect, plus several more that make it much more useful. As well as support for 3D Blu-ray movies, Panasonic’s conversion algorithm can upscale 2D content into 3D; we still aren’t convinced that the option is worth using, as the effect is rarely prominent enough to notice, but you may enjoy the effect. DTS Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD audio are both supported for a cinema-quality audio experience.

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Like most all-in-one systems, connectivity on the BTT370 is fairly limited. The highlight is the two HDMI inputs that let you use the 5.1 speakers with a games console or set-top box, without having to reach behind the unit to change over cables. A standby pass-through mode will let you use any connected devices on a connected TV without having to turn on the speakers – audio will come through the TV’s speakers instead. Other connections include composite video out and optical S/PDIF and analogue audio inputs.

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Around the front of the unit, an SD Memory card slot and a further USB port both let you attach external storage for multimedia playback. All the major file types are supported, including DivX HD and MKV video. A slide-out iPod dock in the front of the main unit is another bonus; music plays through the speaker system and can be controlled using the remote control and on-screen menus.

Once you connect it to your local network using the built-in WiFi or Ethernet port the BTT370 becomes a whole lot more useful. DLNA media streaming lets you play multimedia files from a PC or network hard disk, or you can play content directly from the internet using VIERA Connect. When we first saw the internet TV service last year we weren’t overly impressed, but this latest version is a big improvement.

The interface is exactly the same as the one built into Panasonic’s TVs, so all the usual channels are present: YouTube video streaming, AceTrax on-demand movie rentals and catch-up TV courtesy of BBC’s iPlayer service. The High definition stream looked very sharp and even standard definition footage had a surprising amount of detail. If you don’t already have an Internet-enabled TV, the BTT370 is a cheaper way to get the same content without having to upgrade.