The Official Sony BDP-S550 Owner's Thread - Page 124

I use the Dlink and it works great.

Thanks for the help, guys. I went ahead and purchased one but haven't hooked it up yet. I'll let you know how it goes.

Any tips or tricky spots on installation and set up?

Make sure you are in bridge mode when you set it up.

I've been running my S550 through a ZyXel NBG-419N router in bridge mode connecting with my Linksys WRT54G wirelessly - and it works very well.

Well it did not work for me. I have had a problem for some time now with the player not wanting to load java rich movies. I had to insert them several times to get them to play and sometimes I had to just give up. Now it is starting to show up on non java loaded films as well. I was hoping this trick might work but it made no difference at all. I gave up and bought a S1000ES today from Van's for $179, no tax or shipping. I don't know what I will do with the 550. Maybe trash it. I hate that I spent $30 at BB for the DRdvr cleaner.

"Well it did not work for me. I have had a problem for some time now with the player not wanting to load java rich movies. I had to insert them several times to get them to play and sometimes I had to just give up. Now it is starting to show up on non java loaded films as well. I was hoping this trick might work but it made no difference at all. I gave up and bought a S1000ES today from Van's for $179, no tax or shipping. I don't know what I will do with the 550. Maybe trash it. I hate that I spent $30 at BB for the DRdvr cleaner."

1: You should be able to return DRdvr to bb.
2: The cleaner solved my problems with "9", "Coraline" "Ing...Bastards"...But I still have problems with some Netflix rentals....let me be specific.

"Diary of a Wimpy Kid".....would not 'bite' after numerous attempts..On my last attempt the disc progressed to a "Red" message that implied I needed some kind of firmware update. A search on the net shows a number of people with different players experienced the same..May be a authoring problem...

"THX 1138"....Ouch!!!! Went past the studio logo and 'spun-out' on the loading icon endlessly...This too has been experienced by Panny(!) owners and some have fixed this by inserting SD memory card..I do no have mine inserted, but do not have the disc to see if this could work for me.

I'v had a couple of other turkeys, but these are the two I remember off the top of my head..

Don't trash your player yet! It may not the culprit! Please list any titles you couldn't play and let's see if something can be done to save your Sony!

For what it is worth . . .
I am finding problems with newly released Universal titles that initiate BD-Live connections up front to run trailers at you before the disc fully loads up. Some of these actually modify the menu being displayed also based upon a BD-Live connection and insert little advertising blurbs in the upper right hand corner of the menu screen. Examples include "The Wolfman" and "American Pie Presents: Book of Love". Sometimes these titles just lock up the menu operations on the screen. I am confident it is the opening BD-Live based programming because if I disable BD-Live in the player and clear out anything previously written to the player memory for these titles - then they work just fine (but without any of the internet/BD-Live features, of course). This is true for my Sony players (S550 & S1000ES).

I will say that I have been extremely pleased with my S550 - and only picked up a S1000ES because they were so cheap on closeout at BestBuy recently. The S1000ES is a terrific player - but basically behaves the same as the S550 with these problematic Universal titles. They both have the latest Sony firmware installed (S550 = v.21, S1000ES = v.8).

Welcome to the wacky world BD-Live and Java! The Sonys aren't the only players that have this problem. I know for a fact that Oppos will act up unless you turn of the BD-Live feature and empty persistent storage. I have a 550 (now in my bedroom) and and Oppo BDP-83 and neither has ever had Live turned on and both perform perfectly. Many people think that until the BD Java guys and at the studios figure out to actually use the program correctly, there will always be problems.

Sorry to bump an old thread, but does anyone find that this player is extremely sensitive to tiny scratches, even fingerprints? I had a disc that simply wouldn't load past the video company's logo. When I examined the surface, there was one partial finger print on the edge, and when I wiped it off, it played just fine! Is there some software update or something that I could do to make it less sensitive to surface issues? Thanks.

I've never noticed the S550 being any more or less sensitive to dirt, scratches, oily fingerprints, etc. than any other player. I suggest getting yourself a nice disc cleaner device and using it when you see scuffs, dirt or fingerprints on your discs. I use an old Discwasher CD cleaner that looks something like the attached picture. It does a nice job of cleaning a disc - always going from the inner hub to the outside or vice versa (ie. never in a circular direction like the data is written on the media).

The only blu-ray I've EVER had a problem with on my 550 was the Terminator Skynet edition (what a surprise!) Of course, it wouldn't play but I think, after hearing what other people have said about the disc, I just didn't wait long enough for the disc to load (Never did find out since it was a rental). So for the last 2.5 years, the 550 hasn't missed a beat. It has become my bedroom player on which I play most of my Netflix regular dvds and never a problem there either.

I concur: 20 months and running perfectly...Only 2 hiccups and both were Netflix abused rentals...store-bought versions worked perfectly. my bd-live is off...Love this solid-as-a-brick player.

I have determined, much to my chagrin, that I have been doomed by the God of Electronics to fail in all my home theater efforts. I can tell because as I drive towards Fry's a small cloud begins to form over my head. As I approach the store, it enlarges and coalesces and darkens . When I walk in, the Greeter says, "Hello, welccome to Fry's.", but you can see it in their eyes, a reflection of my cloud - they, too, perceive my doom.

I went there to buy a wireless bridge to bring internet access to my BDP-S550 which enables Bluray Live functionality and to convert my Ethernet printer to a wirelss printer. After appropriate consultation with the appropriate sales person, I bought a D-Link DAP-1522 wireless bridge. I showed this unit in a picture, above.

After working with the D-Link all weekend, ALL WEEKEND!, I could not get it to function properly. Did I mention that it rained all last weekend? So, on Monday, I went back to Fry's and bought another D-Link because, clearly, I screwed up the first one, right? This time out I also bought a Buffalo NFiniti wireless bridge, as well.

Alas, the second D-Link unit also failed to function properly. I was exasperated but I still had one unit to try, the Buffalo, and I was hopeful. I plugged it in, configured the wireless settings, plugged it in and BAM!, the printer worked perfectly the very first time. I went back to Fry's to return the two failed D-Links and bought a second Buffalo for use with my BDP-S550.

On my way in the door, I looked in the eyes of the Greeters and I noticed the cloud had dissipated, ... a bit.

Rented Iron Man 2 and the stupid remote won't work... Can't navigate menus without the darn thing! I tried two receiver remotes and one older universal and none of them will work. Maybe it's not the remote? Except even the light button doesn't work. This sucks.

How about changing the batteries in the remote

Yeah, that's not it.

I was lucky in my bad luck. I was hunting the web late last night to find the cheapest universal remote that would control the Sony, and as I was looking at the haymony 300 at Futureshop.ca, it's price dropped from $50 to $35 for a one-day sale (today). I went to the store this morning and I'm watching Iron Man 2 now (paused it to check this tread and hit the fridge).

I set up the Buffalo NFinit and hooked it up to my 550. I now have a fully functional wireless ethernet link and am able to use Bluray Live. So, it worked! I am satisfied.

I have yet to find a disk this unit would not play or had issues with. I bought the 550 about 18 months ago, been a great unit.

...wUrd...

Have had the 550 since the day it came out and no real issues. Don't need the multi-channel out because my AVR does the HD audio decoding. I'm thinking of getting the Sony BDP-S470 to take advantage of Netflix and other streaming capabilities. I have other issues in my setup (no HDMI ins left on my AVR, plus I have a custom programmed universal remote that won't need to be touched if I go from Sony to Sony) that make swapping the BR player preferable to getting say a Roku. Seems like it may offer faster loading time as well. I know the 470 doesn't have built in memory for BD Live but not a big deal for me. The 3D ready is not necessary but probably can't hurt.

Any downsides that anyone can see in going from the 550 to 470 (obviously the 550 was a "high-end" model when I bought it whereas the 470 is more of mid-line model)? Think I can sell the 550 on eBay to someone who needs the multi-channel outs to more or less cover the cost of the new one?

I have the BDP-S770 on my holiday wish list. Do some research as this model has even faster load times & built in memory.

i have 2 550's but have to upgrade to 3d when 60lx900 arrives. wish sony could have developed a unit with dual hdmi as my elite avr is only v1.3. still wondering if the avr will pass-through 3d via hdmi; don't think this is possible but have read that it depends on the avr?

i doubt if you will see any advantage going to 470 other than streaming. based on the performance of the 550 you should be able to sell easily

Thanks. The reason I am looking to switch is precisely for the streaming. I'm not expecting the Blu-Ray performance to be better than the 550 but just don't want it to be worse.

Sounds like you are suggesting that it shouldn't be.

My only "complaint" w/ the 550 are the slow load times (I put it in quotes b/c I don't think any of the players from back then loaded quickly).

Thanks. Really don't want to spend that much and have no need for the built-in wifi....my house is all wired for gigabit ethernet so I plan to use the wired connection. I can get a cheap 1GB thumb drive to overcome the lack of internal memory issue (and I can count on one hand the number of times I've used BD Live anyway).

So based on that - the 470 seems like a reasonable choice, right?

loading time seems to be (and has been) an issue with bd players since inception. doesn't surprise me that this is an area of great improvement. some complaints of reduced size and "flimsy" feel (470, 570, 770 models); personally, I have held the 470 and 570 in my hands and do not concur. the smaller size will also retrofit my MA rack better. based on the performance of my 550's, i see no reason to change mfg although i would like to have seen x2 hdmi out.

So has anyone else bought Highlander...the origianal movie today on blu Ray? have you had issues playing it or is it just me? First it came back with your player can not operate this disc. So i opened it and closed the drawer and it to started to play some lions gate promo about the expendables and when that finished and it was still being really slow so i opened the drawer blasted it with a can of compressed air and now im back to it not reading it at all. Now it only took Sony 9-10 months to put out a firmware fix so i could watch the first season of Highlander the tv show on blu ray....is highlander and the sony 550 just a matched made in hell or is my player just crapping out on me or is this just a bad disc? My player plays everything else just fine???

So anyone else out there having issues with the first highlander movie???

I don't have the Highlander disc but I just discovered that I'm having the same error message - "Cannot Operate This Disc" with The Fifth Element blu ray.

Is it possible Sony have screwed something with their latest firmware?

This is soooooooooo annoying. Some one Blu-ray.com told me he was having the "exact" same issue as me. He did the firstware update and now it works fine. My problem is I already have the latest firmware update. I did the update over the Internet. Maybe I need to try burning it to a disc and doing it. Of corse the player would proably tell me i was already up to date.

Yeah I did my firmware update over the net as well and I gave it another go but was told it was already updated.

Tried the disc on my old BDP-S300 and same result. Thought I might have won there but nooooo. Sony disc/sony player and they don't get on...

I was researching Sony's website and became confused on the specs published. I emailed Sony requesting clarification as follow.

Question : On the Specifications tab under Recording it states Video Resolution: HD: 1920 x 1080/60i but on the Features tab under 1920 x 1080 HD video recording: it states 1920 x 1080 high definition resolution lets you record your memories in exceptional Sony Full High Definition quality. Capable of 1080/60p playback via HDMI ect. How is this so if can it record in interlace but playback 1080/60p progressive scan?

Response from Sony: I apologize for any inconvenience you've experienced with our website and have confirmed your concern. This has been forwarded to the webmaster of the site for review.

Could someone explain if the HDR-CX550V records in progressive and plays back in progressive. They advertise Full HD.