LG BH200 - Known Disc Issues - Page 3

I'm still waiting for Mitsubishi and JVC to put out players in the US. Sharp disappeared, too. (It looks like Sharp has a 2.0 player somewhere--I just haven't seen it on shelves.)

Thanks for looking into this. Entirely possible that customer service has misconstrued the path going forward. Looking forward to your update.

Have a good trip!

I was mostly just "thinking out loud" but the thought process was that I believe the majority of consumers think Sony, Panny, Sammy before LG for BR. The BD300 is LG's first true Blu player and now, the BH100 and 200 would probably be considered failures by LG themselves. Additonally, the other 3 mfgrs above have had more exposure as a Blu player mfgr with 2 previous generations in the marketplace. LG may just be unable to compete for a decent piece of the pie.

Also, (as mentioned by Gizmo) there will probably be additional Chinese (Funai?) 1.1 and 2.0 players by the turn of the new year and I believe that they will be available in the $99-149 price range in the very near future, depending on which profile. I believe Walmart's BF deal on their Profile 1.1 Magnavox for $128 is giving us a glimpse of what is to come for '09 player prices across the board.

So, if you factor in that the BD300 is probably not selling very well (just my guess, not fact) and the $400 million dollar hit that LG has taken with the price fix deal, LG may be unwilling to support an area that continues to be unprofitable for them. The BD300 started out at $399, then when Sony and Sammy dropped the list on their new players, it dropped to $349. Now, (as per Gizmo) Fry's is selling it for $299. How lo can you go??? LOL

Anyway, my two cents, I just don't believe that LG can be a significant player in the Blu market.

Mike T

I wouldn't say that. LG have never given official information before a firmware release. All they said before the BH200 was upgraded to Profile 1.1/DTS-HD was "that it's coming".

Unless I'm missing something and you've been told by LG they're not releasing any more upgrades?


Thanks. We appreciate your continuing posts.


True, the same will happen here. The Chinese/Small outfits are sure taking their time over it.

I don't think LG need to worry though. It's no different for the DVD/TV market and they comfortably sell in that arena. Their TVs over here are particularly popular (compared to their DVD Players).

I cannot speak about The USA but in The UK (which I imagine is pretty much the same) people think of Sony and Panasonic together, then LG and Samsung together.

They also think about cost more, which is where both LG and Samsung come in. They're not your dodgy Chinese make (where you've no idea what you're getting) but don't cost the earth like Sony or Panasonic. Although strangely Sony's HDD/DVD Recorders over here are some of the cheapest around.


True. An expensive Combo Player was always going to be a hard sell. Most people simply were happy to wait until one format died.


Maybe, which is why they released a Netflix capable player. Samsung's BD reputation isn't exactly good though.


Lets hope so. Expensive Players are really holding the format back. You an pick up Sony BD Players for a good price if you look around but if you walk into your local high street shop, expect to find them being sold for silly money.


Do they intend to be though? They've never been in the DVD market but it doesn't seem to have hurt them too much. In The UK anyway, they're a bigger player in TV and the computer market.

I'd wager LG (laptops aside) are bigger in the computer market to Sony.

Well, read the post I was responding to....and samsungmaster's response to look into it. Something is confused somewhere (perhaps just customer service reps). As I noted above:

Lucky for us, samsungmaster is around.

In case anyone else was wondering Band of Brothers seems to play great on the BH200. I've only played the first two disks, but didn't have any issues.

Quote:
Originally Posted by mike-tee
Anyway, my two cents, I just don't believe that LG can be a significant player in the Blu market.

Quote: originally posted by bradavon
Do they intend to be though? They've never been in the DVD market but it doesn't seem to have hurt them too much. In The UK anyway, they're a bigger player in TV and the computer market.

Good point...probably not. My perception of LG is cell phones, home appliances, computer drives, TVs and then various players. I purchased my 200(s) not on brand name but because I felt it was a superior piece of equipment and admirably suited my needs. Of course, it also helped that I purchased my units at a more rational price.

I suppose my underlying point was that because I don't believe LG can be significant in this area, their level of priority in providing fw updates for their Blu players will always be low. This makes it very difficult for me to want to purchase another product of this type from LG in the future. When all is said and done, I will repeat that I still really like this player for what it is and can do.

As an aside, I watched through Hellboy II on both BD and SD on the 200 without any issues at all. The PQ looked great on SD, outstanding on BD and the AQ was equally impressive on both! Unfortunately, I thought Hellboy I was a much better flick than II.

Mike T

Hi GizmoDVD, I want to confirm those same problem disks too; I have firmware BH02080620A - 2008-06-20 and driver 0702.

• La Vie En Rose (aka La Môme), French HD-DVD - Original Pressings: The BH200 tries to read it for about a minute then the Player shuts down.

• Enemy at the Gates (aka Stalingrad in France), French HD-DVD - The HD/BD lights flash trying to see which one it is, it's then spat out after 2 minutes

• Ghost Rider, French HD-DVD - Loops on menu background but no menu access, movie playing is impossible

• La Cité Interdite (aka Curse of the Golden Flower), French HD-DVD - Loops on menu background but no menu access, movie playing is impossible

• Underworld: Evolution, ++SPANISH++ HD-DVD - It is not possible to disable the Spanish subtitles.
  => although I have the same problem, I am not sure that one is properly a BH-200 "bug", since the disk behaves exactly has intended by its master...
  Note also that there is no German version of Underworld: Evolution, although there is one of Underworld.

GizmoDVD, thanks for maintening this list, hope LG finally corrects those.

I don't know if this is of any interest, Madagascar loads and plays fine when video was forced to 720p (June fw). 1080p (60 or 24) / i no.

Shyte, I was just thinking of buying that box. Can anybody confirm this issue?

Hi,
the German BD edition James Bond "For your eyes only" works without any problems (BH200/JuneFW). I have a dropout with BD "Die another day", shortly before Miss Berry comes out of the water : Time (min/sec):36.03, German edition, in all languages and all formats (DD, HD etc.), the PS3 showed no dropout with the same disk.

Andreas

At least it was before she came out of the water.

Mike T

Thanks for the info.

The folks at LG just called me about the rebate and we discussed the Madagascar playing issues with me. They said they have been unable to duplicate. Anyone heard this when reporting the issue to LG? They are going to send me firmware discs (I'm latest June 08 through their website). I dunno if they are just trying it just to try it (likely).

I might repurchase to try it in 720p mode. I suppose I could always set it before watching the movie until LG figures out what is going on. What is the likely hood LG tested in 720p mode only lol.

Hancock is a major problem with this player; there was a long audio dropout (reproducible at the exact same place) in chapter 2 using TrueHD audio. I did not test other audio formats. This is with April firmware. I gave up and played it on my playstation 3....

your first mistake was complaining about the problem with April firmware. It's really only applicable here if the latest firmware revision causes a problem (even if more recent firmware disables a feature that you like, them's the breaks).

April and June (latest) are virtually identical but Vinnie is right you should be running June so it's accurate.

Can someone tell me the exact difference between the april and june firmware?
What's important to me is bitstream option.

I'll do you one better.

I'll point you to the stickied link where Bravadon worked so hard to spell this out for everyone.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1009104

I also had the same issue with complete audio dropout with Hancock. I also gave up and watched it with the PS3. I am running the March firmware.

Sony is up to some funny bidness on their latest discs with unrated cuts of the movie included.

You can't complain about issues with the March firmware if it's working with the June firmware.

The Change Log (i.e - What's different) is provided in the link allargon posted . Yes it's vague but that's all we know.

Thanks for the kind words allargon.


The March firmware is Beta and also superceded by the April + June firmware. I suspect you'll find the same problem with these firmwares too but March is still Beta.

Hi bradavon, in reviewing your FAQ about these updates, I notice there isn't anything in the June update feature list that says AVCHD/BD-R/DVD-R support was removed; or at least, I *know* it was removed for "BD-5, BD-9" i.e. DVD (re) writeable media and believe that is also the case for BD-RE and AVCHD discs as well.

It doesn't appear that LG is going to restore these features in the future.

I am getting lots of audio dropouts with the Alien vs Predator Requiem.......all audio tracks to my Denon AVR-3808. I also tried the audio tracks on one of my old receivers.....a Yamaha RX-V2095 and the audio dropouts are the same.......and repeatible.