BD-UP5000 Universal Player Samsung [OFFICIAL OWNERS THREAD] & FAQ - Page 419

You can read all about it on my post in the problem discs thread. The Lion King cannot be played running 1.6, you must downgrade to 1.4 where it plays fine. Also the DVD will not load up under either 1.6 or 1.4 for me on my players. I need confirmation from someone else on that one since I only have one open package to compare to as I am selling the other online.

I have reported this to Samsung online and will be calling them tomorrow to update my ticket AND open up another one just to make myself feel better.

Play the sinister music... Dun... dun dunnnn!

I had picked this up tonight, and planned on trying later... but I guess we have the answer already!

Will this be the straw that breaks the back of the camel holding up the firmware updates?

One can hope, but the Disney issue has been around for quite a while, so I am not optimistic that there will ever be another update for the 5000 :-(

We could hope. TLK is a much more popular movie and probably a much stronger BD release than the other movies that won't play at all or need a work around. However I did not see the wild crowds (at least 2-3 other people buying the move with me) like I have seen in the past. Course some may not have been aware at the great deal at T-r-U since they advertised they would take the coupon on the 2-disc even-though it isn't really good for that. Once I became aware of the T-r-U deal and was able to get my grubby hands on a couple copies I canceled my B&N pre-order since it has not shipped yet and applied my eCert to The Extended lotR. Sadly T-r-U is not stocking the BD packaging release, only the DVD packaging and that is what I ordered from B&N since it was cheeper. I like to keep them all consistent, but I wasn't willing to fork over the extra $7 for the 3D 4-disc version.

I'm currently on hold for the 2nd or 3rd time while Samsung records this issue and the other movies that won't play. It's been a while since I called in and they now have a much more soothing voice on their IVR. I'm pretty sure I have spoke to this lady about a half-dozen times before, her voice is very distinctive.

It would help greatly for a chance at a fix if everyone on the thread calls this in. I would suspect that all of you are affected by at least one title or issue that has been reported.

I know we already know it works... but I watched Thor tonight... just to watch a movie that actually plays in this thing

The Fox and the Hound and The Fox and the Hound II load and play fine without the drama of other recent Disney animated titles (and a couple that are not). However the included DVD for FatH will not load getting rejected with the frustrating "Disc cannot be played. Please check the TV system". The DVD for FatH II however does load and work.

Also the DVD for Dumbo is rejected with the same message. I can't check the BD yet since the idiots that I ordered from sent me just the DVD and not the DVD/BD combo in DVD packaging like I ordered, so I have had to re-order it.

Last night I had problems with the movie "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest". The Blu Ray wouldn't even load at all. It would stay stuck on the loading screen where the blue circles move from side to side showing that it's working on loading. I had my player on 1.6 FW so then I went ahead and downgraded it the 1.4 with no luck at all. I went online to find out that Samsung has yet to release a new updated FW for the player. I'll be calling them to ask for a new fw update and let them know about this movie. Also will follow up with them on Tron not working correctly.

That is odd, since the other two in the series from Music Box have played fine. When I swap Pulp Fiction for something at the store, if I can't get Fast Five I will check that one out since I have not seen the film yet. I'm usually not too hot on those since they are dubbed and I am too lazy to listen in Swedish and read the subs and the audio is only DD5.1 anyhow.

No problems here. Loads up like a champ and very quickly. Movie played fine and I was able to do several chapter skips. Haven't watched it yet, but seems fine.

Bad disc? Bad loader?

Pulp fiction loads up and plays fine. I did not have time to check out the bonus features other than the first featurete, some of the deleted scenes and the trivia sub track. I have seen most if not all of that stuff before. Looks great and sounds better than any other version of this film I have seen at home. Trying to decide if I want to own it or not. I've seen the film way too many times.

I'm tempted now that I know it plays... It is $14.99 on the Best Buy Web site... and they are running their deal again where you can bring in any DVD and get $5 off certain Blu-rays... and Pulp Fiction is on that list of eligible titles... so $9.99 + an old DVD I don't want anymore makes it tempting.

If you do this please let me know the outcome. I read the fine print and it says that the markdown is taken from the "original" price and PF is on sale for $14.99 so I'm not sure if you can get the $5 with it on sale? The website does not indicate the original price, but Amazon claims it is a $19.99 list title.

I have a bunch of DVDs I have paid $1 or less for that I am tempted to trade in on this deal. There are many that are only $10, making them $5, but that seems too good to be true?

No problems at my store... in fact, despite what the "fine print" says... if you look at the Best Buy circular for this week they specifically talk about getting $4.99 and $9.99 Blu-rays after the coupon... so you can always point to the ad if your store's computer is goofy.

I picked up Pulp Fiction for $9.99, Halloween for $4.99 and True Grit (the new one) also for $4.99.

I realized that once I actually read the ad. I'm away from home this week, but was able to pick up Pulp..., Trainspotting and Good Will Hunting for $10 each the last two being against my better judgement since I wanted to get Hot Tub..., True Grit and Halloween along with Pulp... That would have been 4 for $25 rather than $30 for 3. The store near me this week was rather picked over as far as the $5 after coupon titles go. I might gather up some other DVDs I don't want anymore and try my more local to home stores before the deal ends and pick up the other 3. Not sure I really need the other 3 but it's been ages since I saw the original Halloween, Hot Tub is a fun movie, but not essential to own and I've seen the new True Grit 3 times since it released (once on the big screen, then a DVD screener before the DVD was officially out and again recently on BD).

This store also has a big bin of $7.99 movies and there are some good ones in there. They have several of the View Askewniverse movies (Clerks, Chasing Amy and Jay and Silent Bob...). I am tempted since those 3 would complete my collection since I already own Dogma on BD and Mallrats and Clerks II on HD. I already own the Criterion DVD of Amy, but I love that movie almost as much Dogma and Mallrats, so hmmm.... They also had like 20 copies of Finding Neverland. I remember searching all over town for a stupid used copy of that one not too long ago. Seems BD prices are going the way that DVD prices did now that the format has aged a little and the newness has worn off with many alternatives for folks to watch movies at home now.

I haven't even watched the original True Grit, but I have it on my DVR to watch... will probably try and watch both versions the same night in order to better compare. I couldn't pass up getting the new one for $4.99 while it still had the slipcover and the DVD + Digital Copy.

I got the View Askew stuff along with the Scream movies (not the one that just came out) the last time Best Buy had a bunch of $6 movies on sale. It ruined me from picking up Scream 4 this week, because I couldn't justify paying more for it than I paid for 1-3 combined!

I found Finding Neverland not too long back in one of my Blockbuster 5-for-$20 runs... was happy about that too!

Meanwhile... I finished up Fringe Season 3 without issues the other night... so next time I get some free non-DVR-time I'll be able to try out some more movies.

The original True Grit is very good since the Duke was in it, but it is not very true to the Portis novel, but good none the less. The new Coen brothers adaptation is much more true to the novel. I enjoyed both, but for different reasons. I wonder how good the original looks in BD? I guess I will have to rent it one of these days.

I dug through looking for the Scream movies, but they didn't have any of those for cheep that I could see. I guess I need to pay more attention to Best Buy and their sales. I have, for the most part, stayed away from them since their prices are usually higher than other places despite the name of the establishment (an oxymoron like the "speedy checkout" line at Wallymart).

On another note I have, what I hope is, encouraging news. Out of the blue after my last "official" report of issues with the new DVDs of Lion King not playing in either 1.4 or 1.6 and the report of The Fox and the Hound DVD (2011 version) not playing in 1.6 I got a note back from my contact at Samsung that they have been getting the reports and sending them on. It sill makes me wonder if the 40+ older reports that I have made over the past year-and-a-half actually got through, but they said they did. It's the 1st time (other than autobot replies) that I have had a human get back to me.

Perhaps they have read our gripes, or maybe they have gotten enough trouble reports on TLK that they are getting serious about it. Anyhow I have been assured that they will test all the titles that we have detected as having issues and if they are recreated that new firmware will be issued regardless of the age of the player. They have acknowledged that they have "many" players now so that would account for the delay. I have inquired as to why it has taken so long since I started sending in reports of new moves that don't play late summer/early fall '10 and things have been very bad with Disney titles since the release of Bambi in March.

My hope is that in addition to fixing the unplayable movies, which should be the #1 priority, that they also address the audio dropouts with DDTHD titles and thirdly that they address the audio dropouts with DTS-HD titles at 60fps. The audio dropouts have other workarounds, so not as critical for me. For those that can't do 24fps I would think you would want a priority placed on that, but I would think that would not affect too many of you. And of course the issues with WB titles not drawing the menu background/movie should be addressed as well, but will most likely be taken care of with an update for the movies that don't play if they implement all changes related to how WB is doing things now?

So keep your fingers crossed. Sounds like there will be an update, but might be closer to the 5th anniversary of this player, rather than the 4th which is coming up pretty soon now.

That does sound encouraging... to get an impromptu response that wasn't a form one...

I could also understand if they get bogged down over time as more and more players are on their schedule to go back and test/update... and I can see where they probably have to support newer players (especially ones in warranty) with firmware fixes before the older players.

I also agree with your priorities. The dead-in-the-water movies need to be playable first... then the Dolby TrueHD audio and DTS-HD 60fps audio issues... then stuff like menus that are drawn wrong but still work...

I really think they ought to be able to fix all of that in one shot, though, since it kind of seems like in order to fix the no-play movies they will be tinkering in areas of the code that might overlap with the other areas.

Fingers crossed for a fix soon, since we have passed 1 year since we started piling up unplayable movies now.

Hiya, Mr. K.

I haven't been affected by the problems you've been mentioning lately, as I don't have those discs. I just wanted to thank you again on behalf of all 5k owners for contacting Samsung and for keeping us informed via this thread.

Cheers,
Doug

I agree with Doug, Mr. K. Thanks for all your work on our behalf. We appreciate it.

Rick

Any early tests on Green Lantern? I might pick this up tomorrow... but I'm twitchy about new movies these days.

Meanwhile, on a tangential note... If you have Disney Movie Rewards points... you can "buy" a $20 Disney Store gift card for 750 points... limit one per account... but usable online or in a local Disney Store... and in addition to Disney movies they carry some of the Marvel movies like Thor and Captain America... so you can almost get a new free movie.

I checked... and Dumbo is $24.99 on their site... so is the original Tron. lots of $29.99 movies too... and if you view the gift card as free money, then there is a good deal to be found.

On a related note... I also redeemed another 775 points for Underdog on Blu... its silly, but better than I thought it would be.

Kludge - you are a warrior for the masses! Thank you!!

I know you are a realist about this, but I think The Lion King might light a fire under Samsung that they haven't felt before. I know that I will be dumping this player if it isn't fixed by the end of the year. With Cars 2 coming out, and the new Pirates movie, the Disney DRM issue will make this a boat anchor for me.

Thanks for the praise guys, but I'm really not doing anything that miraculous.

To be clear I don't think the recent Disney problems (other than the Lion King DVD lockup) is related to any kind or DRM (related to silly copy protection crap on the DVDs tough). Since these all (except for tLK DVD), both DVD and BD play just fine in 1.4 then this has to either be a bug in the code introduced with 1.5 and not fully corrected when Pirates 3 was fixed in 1.6 or possibly old bad code getting reintroduced. I don't recall there being any Disney issues in the past, so I would think this is simply a bug and could be related to the Disney fix put in there for 1.6 which may have also been a code snipit from another player etc.

I finally got the correct item sent to me. Bought it used, but it includes the slipcase with all stickers, all inserts, rewards card, and the discs look unused and were firmly attached to the spindles.

It loads up and plays just fine, however as reported before the DVD is rejected with that nasty TV system error.

Just FYI - It turns out that these newer Disney DVDs also lock up the LG BH200. Some play, others lock it up, but they are common titles, so this appears to be something new Disney is doing to their DVDs from the past couple years and for some strange reason they work (except for tLK) with 1.4. So possibly this was implemented at one point then the code was messed up or left out of 1.5 and 1.6? I am assuming on 1.5 I never run it, but I did try some of the bad DVDs and BDs on it a while back with the same results as 1.6.

I am curious. Does anyone out there NOT have the recent DDTHD drop issues or the DTS-HD MA issues while playing at 60fps? You will need to be bitstreaming the audio out HDMI to an AVR to test this.

Good titles to test are How to Train Your Dragon and Transformersark of the Moon for DDTHD and Iron Man 2 for the DTS-HD MA issues. There are many other Universal/Paramount titles that do this also, but I think I have some of the timestamps documented on Iron Man 2.

I have a theory that at least the DDTHD issue is an AVR decoder issue and not the fault of the Sammy. Reason why I think this is that if you have the player decode that it is fine, at least for me. Im my case the code on the Sammy is newer than the code on the AVR. The Sammy was born before my AVR, but it's had the most recent update.

All of the talk and issues with Starwars and Transformers has led me to this conclusion.

Basically the bitstream should be exactly what is on the disc, so I don't see how the Sammy can mess that up, except for the case with DTS-HD MA @ 60. That I think is a processing power or other code issue, but could also be a change with the encoding as well.

Might also explain why various issues related to bitstreaming persist since they would be very hard to duplicate.

If EVERYONE has the drops with How to Train... and Iron Man 2 or similar then this could be a player issue.

One difference in the TrueHD drops vs the DTS-MA drops...

On the DTS-MA drops, my audio receiver display blinks the re-identifying of the bitstream each time the audio drops... as if it is "seeing" actual dropout of the stream.

The TrueHD drops, however, do not register at my audio receiver... as if the receiver thinks it is getting a constant stream the whole time.

So... that lends some credibility to your theory on the DTS-MA that the Samsung is having trouble keeping up and is actually fragmenting the stream itself.

Not sure what it means for TrueHD problems though.

Halloween and Halloween II (originals not the remakes) on Blu played fine last night.

I mentioned earlier, if you have a no load happen the disc is ejected don't press play to reload just hit the off button, when the players fully off hit the on button turns the machine on goes to load. Everytime I do this with a no load it works the second time or at least the third time using the same proceeduce. That's all discs HD-DVD or Blu ray.

Fast Five played for me without any issues.