Panasonic lowered the retail price of its upcoming DMP-BD35 Blu-ray player, matching the price of the currently available BD-Live players from Samsung and Sony.

Panasonic's latest BD Live model, the DMP-BD35, will be available next month for $399. Samsung is currently offering the 399$ BDP-S350 and Samsung the $399 BD-P1500 BD-Live players.

The Japanese company is aggressively promoting the new player in an effort to top its Sony and Samsung rivals. Panasonic is trying to attract more buyers touting better reproduction of colors and image motion control over Sony?s BDP-S350 and Samsung?s BD-P1500, an "advantage" attributed to the included Panasonic PHL Reference Chroma Processor with advanced P4HD (Pixel Precision Progressive Processing) imaging technology, UniPhier.

In addition, Panasonic underlines the DMP-BD35's ability to playback BD Live software title features without the need for additional firmware. Sony?s BDP-S350 and Samsung?s BD-P1500 still require additional firmware upgrades before they can handle BD Live interactivity. However, Panasonic?s DMP-BD35 will still require an extra SD memory card in order to allow buyers experience all the available BD Live software features.

Samsung is expected to rollout another BD Live player, the $499 BD-P2500, this October. This will not require any firmware update for BD-Live. Panasonic's answer to the new offering will be the higher end model DMP-BD55, also expected to street at $499 next month. The player will be distinguished by 7.1 surround sound analog output, so even receivers that are not compatible with HDMI could produce the newest 7.1-channel surround sound by connecting to the player.