Official 2012 Sony BDP-S790 Thread - Page 33

Sorry. Just responding to the process of resetting. If you want to start fresh for whatever reason, I'm just saying resetting the player won't do it.

The few times I've had players that stopped working with Netflix, I had to return them.

That's not how a Reviewer is supposed to view new items. Plus he was knocking it without ever seeing it. Now at least he can "see" for himself.

Ugh




[EDIT]
Well I got it back working. All I had to do was deactivate all in order to accomplish it (granted that's really Netflix's fault)

Hopefully this doesn't happen again. Filling out your credentials is pretty annoying with a remote. I don't understand why they can't use the activation code scheme products like Roku use for Netflix activations?

Hi Raistlin, I'm having weird issue with Slacker (not linking to S590). Pandora, Amazon, NetFlix all working. Even add or change things in these three apps and it show up fine. So I don't know what the problem is with Slacker and the S590.

I have already try resetting Initialize Personal Information, removing product from my account, register S590, relink Slacker to S590, refresh and still no go.

Thinking about return and exchange or just give up on Slacker.

That stinks

Slacker actually has been working okay for me ... once I realized you have to link it via Sony's site instead of in the app itself.

I own both. The S780 would lock at times with certain Blu Ray movies, the picture when it worked was good. The S790 so far doesn't lock however I had one skip with 2 BD movies. The picture quality appears to be better than the S780. I never had my Panasonic BD player ever skip.

Joerod posted this comment earlier in this thread.

I will say that if you use Netflix, it might be worth the upgrade. Netflix on the 790 is significantly better than on the 780, because the 790 can playback the 1080p streams and DD+. Also the UI is improved greatly.

Yeah it now has the same feature-set and UI as the PS3's Netflix app for those familiar with it.

Someone also reported that the S790 was able to playback a very high bit rate MKV that their PC/and or network streamer wasn't able to playback without stuttering. They suggested that this might be, because the 790 has a "dual core processor" ...

I've owned the SMP-N200, 580, 390, 590 and 790. I've tested each player with pretty much the same MKV file-set. Some of those files have high-ish bit rates (39Mbs). All players seemed to playback the content fine, so I'm yet to be convinced that this "dual core" processor help's out ... but you never know.

I'm hoping at some point Sony also port over the PS3 HULU+ and the new Amazon VOD app to the BDPs. That would make for an impressive set of 4 core streaming services, with all great UIs. Right now the HULU+ and Amazon VOD UIs let things down a bit.

- Keyboards -

I hooked up my Logitech Unifying K400 via USB and it works. Of course the problem is that's meant as a traditional PC keyboard/touchpad and doesn't have a dedicated directional pad, etc. Using the arrows doesn't work, so unless there are some hotkeys I'm not aware of to simulate it, you can't actually move around the UI, click enter, etc. It's purely for entering in text once you've selected a text box using the remote.


This weekend I'm going to test my Logitech Unifying K700 (keyboard that shipped with the Revue). I'll have to hook up the receiver from my K400 to my PC and instead pair it to the K700. Hopefully this won't hose up the dedicated pairing to the Revue and will instead work for both. Assuming it does work for both though, it will be interesting to see how easy it is to separately control the devices. I don't want to power them both on


The other thing I'll be testing is a USB hub. My hope is that I can have both the keyboard receiver and a thumbdrive hooked up at the same time. A secondary test I'm going to do is see what happens if I then hook up a second thumbdrive with media on it. What I want to see is, first, does it work ... and second, will the player know to default to the 1st thumbdrive when storing bookmarks, etc. Obviously one wouldn't want bookmarks, BD-Live data, Gracenote info, etc. spread across multiple thumbdrives.




- Secondary HDMI Output -

I decided to do a test by using this HDMI->VGA converter I ordered on ebay.


When I hooked up the tiny old Dell LCD I had, I got an unsupported format message on the screen. It seems the converter can't figure out really low-res monitors (1024x768) and send the right EDID info to force the 790 to output 480p? Hard to diagnose without the right equipment.


No matter, I also had an old Samsung SyncMaster 914v laying around (1280x1024) and that worked great. Well ... mostly. There's a few things you'll need to consider. First off, if you have the 790 set to 16:9, hooking up to a 4:3 monitor means your content will be stretched. So unless you want to keep switching the aspect ratio in the settings, be aware that you'll want both displays to have the same configuration. For me personally, that's not a problem at all since the only reason I'm using the monitor is as a head when streaming audio. Having stretched graphics on Pandora is obviously something I can live with if it means I'm not constantly turning on my 60 SXRD just to listen to music. It's a small price to pay


The second 'issue' is slightly more annoying, though I believe I have a workaround. The HDMI outputs are synched together such that they both want to output the same resolution and bit-depth. Which means it will drop down to the best that the lesser display supports. So in my case if I turn on my TV in this configuration, it will receive 720p ... and amazing, 20-bit color (what the heck is that? 7/7/6??? ). Regardless I figured as long as I turned off the monitor it would switch back? Unfortunately no. Then I figured maybe if I reset the 790? No. Reset my video processor (effectively the same as resetting the TV)? No. Unplug power to the monitor or disconnect the VGA? No.


Unless I've missed a permutation, what I've deduced is that the 2nd HDMI output is actually still sending power to the converter and therefore syncing to it even though no display is connected ... and apparently it has memory of its last setting. If you actually disconnect the converter from the 790's 2nd HDMI output, it will automatically hot-sync to whatever the capability is of the main display (in my case, 1080p / 36-bit color). My planned work around is to get a longish HDMI extender cable and the shortest VGA cable I can find. That way I can easy disconnect the converter's HDMI input from the monitor side instead of having to go behind my AV cabinet to disconnect it from the back of the 790 (which is obviously far from optimal). Certainly a bit of a kluge, but it's worth it to get the capability of a 'free' secondary display for audio. Maybe I should have ordered the black version to match my monitor since it may be harder to hide now




I'll update my testing once I get the hub, extender cables, etc.

Actually that's not how you choose to review items. As I review them, and for most of our readers, they care above all else if a player performs to spec and does exactly what it should do. Fancy special filter and other things that cause detrimental effects to image quality are something they don't care about, unless it it mentioned what they do and how to avoid sending an improperly processes signal.

I said nothing bad about the S790 as I haven't reviewed it, go back and see. I made two clear points:

- the Oppo players are still bit perfect and if you want objectively perfect playback (not subjective) they work perfectly
- all those image processing features in all players have some sort of drawback.

Now we will find out what the drawbacks on the S790 features are next week. I posted images showing what they are on the S590: incorrect colors, crushed shadows, missing highlights, and a flat looking image.

Wow, now that's what I call an informative post!

It's great having a professional reviewer here!

Where can I find this review? Or, are you referring to an earlier post? If so, which post?

Fantastic! That means the Harmony 800 QWERTY remote should be able to send text to the S790. Infrared controls on the Harmony 800 should work for the directional pad and enter commands if they can't be sent with the unifying receiver.



I was under the impression that unifying receiver can only pair to one device but I am interested in hearing what you find out.

The review should be up at Secrets next week. I've talked in the S590 thread about it some and mentioned relevant items here as well.

Smackrabbit,

I don't mean to pester you, but I was wondering if you could clarify what you stated here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...1#post22081041

When you say Standard, etc mode, I assume you're are referring to the 'Preset' option when setting the options for Custom1 and Custom2?


I agree, and in most cases that's a bad thing. Just remember to consider the intent though. For example, I'd expect Clear Black to 'screw up' the grey scale ... but that's actually the point of it.






I hope that's not the case. I know a given receiver can pair with several devices. Obviously the question is whether a given device can pair with more than one receiver.

I'm guessing here, but I suspect it can. My understanding is that all of the pairing information is stored on the receiver - the devices have no logic beyond broadcasting their signature. When you pair to a receiver, I believe you are simply storing what signatures are registered to it - on the receiver. So if you pair a device to more than one receiver, I think it should work.

I thought you said the player output the correct colors in standard mode?

It is ... but you need to also select the correct color space .... use either YCbCr 4:2:2 or 4:4:4. It's RGB that causes the problem apparently.

There's quite a big difference between the S590 and S790 video options.

On the S590, you only get a choice out of 3 or 4 different modes for what Sony called Picture quality mode for different "lighting levels" ... Standard, theater, etc.

These are the same that are buried in the S790's custom1 and custom2 settings ....

There's no notion of Direct, or Auto mode on the S590.

I was specifically referring to the special features, which in this case would be using Theater mode on the S590 instead of Standard (Bright Mode is also horrible). In YCbCr output with Standard mode, the S590 works great.

I'm looking forward to what you learn about these additional settings on the S790 .... "Auto" particularly. Its the one I use, and I like .. however ..... I'm expecting you to go to town on it and tell us all, it destroys the image.

Also, I'm curious to know if "direct" really switches everything off .... does it automatically disabled SBM for example? That is a separate setting in its own right after all, ... so probably not.

I think the communications are two-way so having a single device connect with two unifying receivers may not be possible. I hope I am wrong because extra unifying receivers are around $10 on ebay and you could plug receivers into a bunch of things like a S790, set-top box, HTPC, laptop.

Since up to six devices can communicate with a unifying reciever you should be able to have a wireless keyboard, wireless mouse and Harmony 800 work with the S790 at the same time. Grab whatever is most useful.

Yep that's my hope ... have a number of devices usable on all my PC's, the 790, etc. I'll report back the results of my testing (I have some more equipment showing up in the next week).

I'll find out soon and run a lot of tests as quickly as I can. I'll be doing a lot of the testing with a Sony 46HX929, and with how well that display calibrated today, it should show off any flaws in the processing. I can't use the JVC X70 for it since the eShift causes issues with test patterns and doesn't give me reliable results.

Can this size screen show details and flaws?

Almost all the testing is done with a QD882 that doesn't need a screen. Sitting 1' away from the Sony is no different than being 2' away from a 92" projected screen. I'll have a BenQ W7000 around as well, but any inherent flaws can easily be spotted on a 50" plasma once you've looked at enough players. For certain things I use a projector as a second point of reference, but it is by no means necessary.

What is necessary is having a display that can resolve all 1080 lines at all colorspaces correctly, with the chroma correct. The plasma does that perfectly, the Sony is here currently and will be used for a lot of testing as well, but I always have standby units, and most of the data is read from the HDMI bitstream and needs no monitor anyway.

I have the Sony 929. If you can, please also post your settings after calibrated.
I had my 929 calibrated by K. Miller, so I am really looking forward to reading your test results.

Kevin is a much better calibrator than I am. I don't post settings for displays I review for a variety of reasons but I can PM them to you once I do. Compared to the last LCD that was here it is a ton better. I really prefer plasma but this one I could easily live with I think. I wish there was a CMS and 10-point grayscale. I'm starting to target Rec 1886 for gamma for reviews and you just can't do that without a 10 point system really.