What's "right" changes every six months or so these days. (At this rate there will be a tiny BR player the size of thick DVD case before too long.) I still remember when Pioneer kept the same models in their product lines for 18 months or longer.

The refresh rate is only an issue if you like sports, play lots of videogames, or want all your movies with the "soap opera effect" turned on. (Most sets have it turned on out of the box.) Your eyeballs will tell you more than any spec sheet. Watching a scene from a movie you know like the back of your hand helps too.

Most properly mastered DVD's look good upscaled. Some older discs can look a bit ragged, especially if you sit close to the screen. It's also important a set have proper zoom modes for letterboxed material, especially if you still have a lot of old video formats lying around. My Panasonic players can zoom letterbox on the fly, not sure about the other brands.