Peter,
I assume that you're not looking to have any high-res DVD capability, right?
I started my search for a new DVD player recently and I'm pretty torn between the Oppo 981HD which should make regular DVD's look great on my HD TV or Toshiba's HD-A3 which might not look as good with standard DVD's but carries the bonus of HD DVD playback. Given that I rent most of the DVD's that I watch it doesn't make any sense to go Blu-Ray and all of those players are more expensive to boot.