[Charm]

I can't decide between the panny rp-91 and denon dvd 1600 and I plan on using it for widescreen tv (probably mits 46809 model). I understand that both of these players are supposed to be chroma bug free and both can play dvd-audio. But from experts in here or from anyone that knows alot about dvds more than I do, please help answer my question. Which of the 2 players gives you better true like picture quality and also plays better on cds and dvd-a. Best picture and best sound is really my question here and ease of use. Share your opinions please. Thanks.

 

[daggerNC]

If you can wait a couple more weeks, I would add the Panny XP50 (maybe RP82) to your list. Also, the Philips units seem to be very competitive at these price points with the new DVD962SA, though that one does SACD vesus DVD-A. I'm in the same quandry as you - I'm hoping to buy within the next month.


I'm not positive, but I thought the Panny RP91 had a slight chroma bug, but provided scaling. Do a search with RP91 and Denon 1600 and you'll find a number of threads on these units.


Cheers,

dagger

 

[CKNA]

Quote:

I'm not positive, but I thought the Panny RP91 had a slight chroma bug

I do not know where this comes from but Panasonic DVD Players do not have or ever had chroma bug. As a matter of fact Panasonic makes the best Mpeg decoders on the market. It is just stupidity of many companies that use chroma bug infested decoders. The best example is Denon. DVD-1600 is pretty much Panasonic RP56 with DVD Audio which has no chroma bug. Their high end players use ESS decoder and have chroma bug. They should just buy Panasonuc Mpeg decoder and design their players around it.

 

[daggerNC]

CKNA,


It is my understanding that the RP91 uses the Genesis chipset, and the Denon 1600 uses the Sage/Faroudja. I might have confused the chroma bug with de-interlacing performance, though I saw a post that said the latest Genesis firmware does a much better job at de-interlacing?


dagger

 

[DevoX]

Quote:

Originally posted by daggerNC CKNA, It is my understanding that the RP91 uses the Genesis chipset, and the Denon 1600 uses the Sage/Faroudja. I might have confused the chroma bug with de-interlacing performance, though I saw a post that said the latest Genesis firmware does a much better job at de-interlacing? dagger

I think this whole Genesis issue is severely overhyped. I have very, very rarely watched material that combs due to it being improperly flagged. Even then, it's not a large concern of mine since the rest of the picture on the RP91 is simply spectacular! Reading some comments here it can sound as if the RP91 doesn't de-interlace at all, which is total nonsense. If it combs on a menu animation, why do I care? It's a menu for crying out loud!


The RP91 is, quite simply, the best DVD player I've ever had the opportunity to use. The added features and the sheer quality of the unit vastly outweigh any shortcomings created by the use of the Genesis chip, IMO.


-- Robert

 

[Waters_10]

I was considering both players a while ago.


I agree with DevoX that Genesis vs Faroudja may not be that important. I'm sure the RP-91 has a great picture.


In the end, it came down to apect ratio control on the RP-91 and DVD-Audio Bass management on the DVD-1600.


At that time, I was considering the RCA F38310, which locks in full mode. The RP-91 would be a perfect combo with that tv.


But, in my opinion, DVD-Audio without Bass Management is worse than non-anamorphic without aspect ratio control. That's because you can always turn off progressive scan with such DVD's, but the only solution to not having bass management is Outlaw ICBM, a costly (for me) solution.


So, I bought the DVD-1600 and I'm very happy with it. Specially because I ended up buying the JVC 48WP30, which does not lock in full mode.


My advice is to decide what's priority to you: Bass management for DVD-audio or aspect ratio control.

 

[greeno]

I know that this thread is a bit stale, but I'm still going back and forth between the Denon 1600 and the Panny RP91. The RP91 doesn't have bass management, but what does that really mean to me with my Onkyo 595X? The Onkyo has multi-channel input as well as speaker configuration. Won't that suffice for bass management? Also, do people seem to think that the audio section of the Denon is superior to the rp91?


I know that the denon begins life as an RP56, but the flickering issue I think would drive me crazy. Can anyone confirm that the denon 1600 does have the flickering issue?


Also, what about the RP82? No new news on this one?


Thanks,

jeff

 

[Aaron S]

Most AV receivers dont have bass management when selecting the multichannel audio inputs ( that you would you use to listen to multichannel DVD-Audio). You'll want to confirm if yours does or not.


I was comparing the 1600 and the 91 side by side at home last weekend and here's a few of my observations. ( FYI , I have a Sony 57" XBR2, and I was running both players in progressive scan mode.)


Both players looked very comparable in terms of color balance and picture detail. However, the 91 was able to portray lighting highlights/reflections more realistically. ( It is subtle , but my wife also made the same observation , lol).



I only noticed the flicker on the 1600 on one disk, Toy story. I switched out of progessive mode and it was fine.


The 91 struggles with shot-on-film TV show discs, it combs often on edits. You can force it into video mode to get rid of that. The test discs I used weren't incredibly detailed so I didnt notice any loss of detail. When I looked closely at panning detailed backgrounds, there was a little bit of moire. The 1600 handled these discs well without user intervention.


On shot-on-video disks ( e.g. concerts) , the 1600 does reduce "jaggies" but it only came to my attention when I was looking specifically for it.


I listened to two DVD-Audio discs on the '91 and they sounded fine. ( I am a two channel audio snob but am not yet enamored with multichannel audio, mostly due to the mixing style, so take that with a grain of salt.)



The '91s "letterbox-zoom" was more pleasing to watch than having my set due the zoom.



All that said, of the two I would recommend the 1600 as it does more things well and gives up very little in picture quality relative to the '91. Depending on the set and its state of calibration, its likely that you wont see any difference in picture quality at all.

 

[greeno]

I'll check what control I have on the reciever. for multi-channel input, the levels of each channel can be controlled. There is a separate config for speaker size (large or small and distance). It is my understanding that large or small controls the cross-over settings. I don't know if this has any effect for multi-channel input or not (note to self - query onkyo group). With the denon 1600, what does the bass management really control, i.e. how does it work.


thanks,

jeff