Official Panasonic DMP-BDT 220/320/500 Owners Thread - Page 53

Originally Posted by Mr. Cinema

Has anyone bought the 500 yet? It looks like a solid build.

Originally Posted by mdavej

Yes

Originally Posted by Mr. Cinema

Oh, I thought this was the official 500 owners thread since that is in the title.

Originally Posted by Mr. Cinema

Oh, I thought this was the official 500 owners thread since that is in the title.

Originally Posted by luigionlsd

Thanks for the input! BD performance was my main concern, and since I upgraded my receiver, I no longer need the 2nd HDMI.

I'll "stick it out" with the 110 then!

Originally Posted by BillP

I have the 110, and it works great for my purposes. I'm definitely waiting another year before upgrading. I can't justify upgrading every year, and there seem to be bugs with the 2012 models as well, including audio lag when streaming Netflix with the Panny models, or missing features (no Vudu 3D with the Sony models).

Originally Posted by joeltbay

I think I have finally nailed down the problem I have been having with judder / skipped frames with the Star Wars Episode IV Blu Ray. It seems it may not be an HDMI problem at all.

I rarely use my wireless connection in my home, so I usually have it turned off. Today, I turned it on to install the recent firmware upgrade for the 320 (went from 1.22 to 1.31). Then I thought, well, they only mentioned a couple of fixes, but it's worth testing the disc again. As the disc was loading, I received the message "Network connection established.". I watched the first 15 minutes or so - no problems. Perfect playback. I then skipped to chapter 19 (Mos Eisley Spaceport) which has always been problematic and again smooth video. I thought I should try with my wireless turned off, so I shut down the 320 and my wireless. Restarted, and the problems were back! The 320 is constantly in a state of "Connecting..." which seems to cause problems with this disc. Switching BD Live to "Prohibit" did not help. However, I switched the 320 back to the default for BD Live and a wired connection (the 320 immediately knows it is not connected). All video problems went away again!

Turning my wireless back on and setting the 320 back to "Wireless" immediately allowed the connection to be re-established (thankfully, my wireless settings were not lost switching back to "Wireless" from "Wired"). Again, no video problems.

So, for some reason, if the 320 is in a constant state of "Connecting..." and the wireless connection is unavailable, however Star Wars is coded, it's just too much, and I get judder and skipped frames again. On the BDT-100, there is no wireless connection... just wired. So I am guessing this is why I did not encounter problems with this disc on the 100.

For me, setting the 320 to "Wired", or making sure my Wireless is on if I set the unit to "Wireless" is an acceptable work around. At least to me it reassures me that there is not something wrong with the video processing on the 320 let alone my HDMI.

Does this seem like a logical conclusion / explanation for the problem?

(Oh, and on a side note, I tested my Star Trek Nemesis DVD for judder, I found it played fine - both before and after the latest firmware update).

Originally Posted by Nethawk

I don't have the blu-ray copy of the Star Wars series, but out of curiosity do you have BD-Live enabled? Your problem remains a mystery. While it's great you have resolved the issue, I can't imagine why network connectivity (unless associated with a feature within the player and/or disk) would have an effect.

Just a thought, and again - congrats on your perseverance!

Originally Posted by PINKTULIPS7

I was not able to connect through Netgear WNDR3800 5GHZ Network...Panasonic only see 2.4GHZ but not 5GHZ....

Originally Posted by ignign0t

Expected. It only has a 2.4 GHz radio in it. There aren't a whole lot of A/V devices that speak 5 GHz. The WNDR3800 should be doing both G and N over 2.4 GHz, so it should work fine, plus you'll have longer range.

Originally Posted by mdavej

I guess this thread isn't "official" enough for the 500 owners

But seriously, I like Michael's idea of just changing the title. The high end model discussion won't have much overlap with the low end models in this thread and the low end sony thread.

Originally Posted by michaeltscott

All BD players shipping after 12 February this year required Cinavia detection to qualify for AACS licensing, said licensing required for playing probably 99.9% of commercial BDs. I'm pretty sure that these Panasonics shipped with Cinavia detection (the Cinavia Notice is in the BDT220's paper pack-in User's Guide), though I recall that the Sonys got it in an immediate firmware upgrade.

Originally Posted by mdavej

You don't have to spend a lot to get a good universal. I have over 30 activities among 15 devices on my $5 JP1 remote. It does a lot more than harmony ever dreamed of (nested macros, recursion, variables, branching, custom protocols, hex import, signal analysis, unlimited devices). I tried harmony for a while but found them severely lacking in terms of macros (5 step sequences is just a cruel joke).

Originally Posted by Muse

I have to consider this. My MX-700 is great but I could use another remote for the bedroom and if I like this enough, at $5 it might be a good substitute for the MX-700 in the HT. Where do you get it for $5?

Did you post about a different universal remote a week or so ago? I thought I saw a post you made about a $30 remote, but I may be mistaken, maybe it was the post quoted above. I don't remember which thread, almost for sure this one, the Sony S590/S390 Official or the Help Me Find a Remote thread.

Originally Posted by Muse


I have to consider this. My MX-700 is great but I could use another remote for the bedroom and if I like this enough, at $5 it might be a good substitute for the MX-700 in the HT. Where do you get it for $5?

Did you post about a different universal remote a week or so ago? I thought I saw a post you made about a $30 remote, but I may be mistaken, maybe it was the post quoted above. I don't remember which thread, almost for sure this one, the Sony S590/S390 Official or the Help Me Find a Remote thread.

Originally Posted by thebland

2. When streaming Netflix, should all movies be in hi def or just select titles (or is their a setting)? Watched a few films and they were SD.

Thanks!

Originally Posted by thebland

2. When streaming Netflix, should all movies be in hi def or just select titles (or is their a setting)? Watched a few films and they were SD.

Originally Posted by hayatiakbas

Guys can someone who had both players can tell me if there is actually picture quality difference between 500 and 320?
With all the enhancements off I don't know why should there be one. I turn off all the contrast, resolution and chroma process off. I let my projector Epson 8700 do the tricks.
Some people were saying black levels and contrast is better with 500, but I don't understand how it would be possible

Originally Posted by dpippel

Look at it this way - if the player controls allow YOU to affect the quality of digital video on the HDMI output, why can't internal hard-coded tweaks designed into the player do the same thing?

Originally Posted by dpippel


Look at it this way - if the player controls allow YOU to affect the quality of digital video on the HDMI output, why can't internal hard-coded tweaks designed into the player do the same thing?

Originally Posted by htwaits

That's possible or even probable with DVD material, but very hard to do with Blu-ray other than deinterlacing 1080i to 1080p.

Originally Posted by dpippel

If that were the case then none of the built in video "enhancement" controls would have any effect on Blu-ray playback.

Originally Posted by hayatiakbas

You may be right actually. He is also right with the above response. But I can see Panasonic doing further enhancements coded into the blu ray part of it as well that's not user selectable. that kind of means though the blu ray should look faithful with the lower end 220 and 320 as well. Since all the review people say there is no really difference between players when it comes to blu ray PQ. 500 might add extra tweaks which is not important to me. I read reviews between Sony and Panasonic lower end 320 vs 590 and no one mentioned Panasonic has less contrast or black levels. So if 500 has it, it is artificial. No professional review said Panasonic 220 or 320 isn't faithfully showing blu ray content.(that is one way of looking at my purchase of 320 so I don't have to spend extra money for a little improvement)

Originally Posted by htwaits

Of course they have an effect. The question is how desirable are those effects.

They don't have any effect if they are turned off. People who want to see the film as intended by the director turn such controls off for Blu-ray. If you want to use them, that's fine.

The place that professional calibrators recommend for picture quality adjustments is in the display. If a display has problems making those adjustments, then a more expensive Blu-ray player may have the controls to make the needed adjustments. This shouldn't be a right or wrong discussion, because it depends on the individuals making the choice.

If someone ask the question, "I only watch Blu-ray disks. Is player "A" worth 2x the price of player "B"?", then the advise I give is probably not. If you haven't ask that question, then there shouldn't be a problem no matter what player you pick.

Originally Posted by dpippel

You're missing my point. If the user accessible player controls can affect the quality of Blu-ray output, then player manufacturers are certainly able to tweak "direct" output modes internally to make their product more appealing than a competitors offering. This renders the whole "Blu-ray playback will be identical from player to player" and "bit-perfect BD video is bit-perfect BD video" argument invalid. As consumers we have no idea what Panasonic or Sony or Oppo may be doing internally before that HD goodness gets to your display.