AVS Discussions
Video Source Devices => 4K UltraHD Blu-ray => Topic started by: flyinion on July 09, 2020, 03:02:49 AM
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Hey guys looking for recommendations for a Dolby Vision capable UHD player, hopefully around 250-300 max. My X800 is the original version that didn't do Dolby Vision (didn't understand about the formats at the time and didn't have a 4K TV 2 years ago when I bought it). I was looking at the X700 or maybe the LG UBK90 but it seems like the X700 you have to toggle Dolby Vision on and off which seems like a bad call because then I have to try to figure out if the disc has it or not. The UBK90 seemed good but I read about an issue which may or may not have been a firmware bug (vs intended behavior) where you had to toggle between 60 and 24p manually.
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Well, I've been poking around and it seems neither of those are really great choices between the Sony needing DV manually toggled, and the LG still having a 60/24p manual toggle. Apparently I should be targeting the Panasonic 820. Kind of a shame, a local Best Buy has an open box on sale for like 299 (normal retail is 499, current new price is 399) but I blew all my money on the TV this month so it will have to wait. Not even sure it's worth it just to get Dolby Vision. Couldn't see a ton of difference in some scenes of Infinity War testing HDR10 on my X800 with the TV's dynamic tone mapping turned on (LG's version of what Dolby Vision does) and the DV stream from Disney+ of the same scenes.
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Did some more reading especially on the tech differences between Dolby Vision and HDR10 modes especially the bit depth, nit mastering, and amount of colors they're capable of displaying. Decided I do want to get a DV capable player, so it's looking like it will be the 820. Guess I should have spent the extra 150 for an Oppo 203 back at the time instead of getting the x800 1st gen oh well. I get to pay for it now.
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Did some more reading especially on the tech differences between Dolby Vision and HDR10 modes especially the bit depth, nit mastering, and amount of colors they're capable of displaying. Decided I do want to get a DV capable player, so it's looking like it will be the 820. Guess I should have spent the extra 150 for an Oppo 203 back at the time instead of getting the x800 1st gen oh well. I get to pay for it now.
I sold my Oppo to get the 820 because of the tone mapping...I regret my decision. The 820 isn't a bad player, but it doesn't have the built quality of the Oppo. I'd be concerned about long-term support from Oppo though...at some point, firmware updates will no longer come. Then again, the Panasonic has needed a firmware update for a while due to some minor disc issues, but they don't seem to be interested.
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I did the same - sold my Oppo 203 for $400 more than I paid after Oppo killed their BD players, and got the 820 due to the tone mapping. That has been really helpful for my projection setup, until I get a projector with it built in.
The 820 is not built the way you'd like a $500 disk player to be and I'm also disappointed in the lack of features compared to the Oppo, and the ergonomics - the eject/load button being on top in particular. But that one feature - for projectors - makes up for a LOT. For the OP it doesn't matter though b/c he's using a TV.
You have to go into the $1k range now to get the build quality and close to the features of the Oppo. The Pioneer UDP-LX500 seems to be the closest.
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I did the same - sold my Oppo 203 for $400 more than I paid after Oppo killed their BD players, and got the 820 due to the tone mapping. That has been really helpful for my projection setup, until I get a projector with it built in.
The 820 is not built the way you'd like a $500 disk player to be and I'm also disappointed in the lack of features compared to the Oppo, and the ergonomics - the eject/load button being on top in particular. But that one feature - for projectors - makes up for a LOT. For the OP it doesn't matter though b/c he's using a TV.
You have to go into the $1k range now to get the build quality and close to the features of the Oppo. The Pioneer UDP-LX500 seems to be the closest.
Well, hopefully the 820 will last long enough for me to benefit from the tone mapping via getting a projector. We don't plan to live in this house forever and I definitely want to be able to add a projector into the mix in the next house. The current house just doesn't really work for something like that.
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I sold my Oppo to get the 820 because of the tone mapping...I regret my decision. The 820 isn't a bad player, but it doesn't have the built quality of the Oppo. I'd be concerned about long-term support from Oppo though...at some point, firmware updates will no longer come. Then again, the Panasonic has needed a firmware update for a while due to some minor disc issues, but they don't seem to be interested.
Yeah it's too bad Sony didn't allow the X700/x800m2 to auto switch dolby vision. The X800 is actually built pretty well other than the buttons being a bit flimsy. The overall box is solid.
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I sold my Oppo to get the 820 because of the tone mapping...I regret my decision. The 820 isn't a bad player, but it doesn't have the built quality of the Oppo. I'd be concerned about long-term support from Oppo though...at some point, firmware updates will no longer come. Then again, the Panasonic has needed a firmware update for a while due to some minor disc issues, but they don't seem to be interested.
I think Oppo said they would offer support on the players for 7 years, that would leave a little under 6 years of support available. Not a forever solution by any means but still offers a decent bit of coverage.
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Well, hopefully the 820 will last long enough for me to benefit from the tone mapping via getting a projector. We don't plan to live in this house forever and I definitely want to be able to add a projector into the mix in the next house. The current house just doesn't really work for something like that.
Might depend on the budget you set for a projector. More projectors now have some kind of TM built in and that's really where you want it so that it works with all sources, but I'm not sure what the "entry level" for that is in current projectors. (Obviously Craig & Mike can speak to that more.)
I end up watching a lot of movies on my AppleTV from a streaming source these days* and sometimes it's noticeably an issue without TM. I have a JVC RS-500 which is 3 generations behind the current 4k lineup. Won't have budget to upgrade for a while yet so the 820 helps some.
*I was buying a fair number of 4K BDs but ran out of space so I need to get rid of some, but as streaming quality has increased significantly my desire to own all but the most cherished movies in physical form has waned.
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I think Oppo said they would offer support on the players for 7 years, that would leave a little under 6 years of support available. Not a forever solution by any means but still offers a decent bit of coverage.
It's not like Oppo is out of business, seeing as they are one of the largest cell phone makers in the world.
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Might depend on the budget you set for a projector. More projectors now have some kind of TM built in and that's really where you want it so that it works with all sources, but I'm not sure what the "entry level" for that is in current projectors. (Obviously Craig & Mike can speak to that more.)
I end up watching a lot of movies on my AppleTV from a streaming source these days* and sometimes it's noticeably an issue without TM. I have a JVC RS-500 which is 3 generations behind the current 4k lineup. Won't have budget to upgrade for a while yet so the 820 helps some.
*I was buying a fair number of 4K BDs but ran out of space so I need to get rid of some, but as streaming quality has increased significantly my desire to own all but the most cherished movies in physical form has waned.
Yeah I do stream a lot, but some movies it's totally worth it. Stuff like the hi res audio codecs just can't be matched by streaming. Or maybe it could, but they chop off the sound when encoding them for their servers. Just one of many examples, Cloverfield Paradox. Sounds really good on bass in streaming through Netflix in Atmos. The lossless Atmos on the blu-ray is on another level though.
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Might depend on the budget you set for a projector. More projectors now have some kind of TM built in and that's really where you want it so that it works with all sources, but I'm not sure what the "entry level" for that is in current projectors. (Obviously Craig & Mike can speak to that more.)
I end up watching a lot of movies on my AppleTV from a streaming source these days* and sometimes it's noticeably an issue without TM. I have a JVC RS-500 which is 3 generations behind the current 4k lineup. Won't have budget to upgrade for a while yet so the 820 helps some.
*I was buying a fair number of 4K BDs but ran out of space so I need to get rid of some, but as streaming quality has increased significantly my desire to own all but the most cherished movies in physical form has waned.
The biggest drop off for me with streaming is the audio quality....whenever I do direct A-B comparisons for people they always pick out the streaming due to the drop off in audio depth. Videophiles can see a difference but it has gotten a lot harder over the years, that's for sure.
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The biggest drop off for me with streaming is the audio quality....whenever I do direct A-B comparisons for people they always pick out the streaming due to the drop off in audio depth. Videophiles can see a difference but it has gotten a lot harder over the years, that's for sure.
Yeah I have a hard time picking out the video differences, but the audio can be really obvious as in my Cloverfield Paradox example above. I also watched the Episode IV disc from the Star Wars 4K box set the other night and compared to the 4K/Atmos streaming version on Disney+ you could hear the difference there as well. Especially some of the bass in the early scenes boarding the vessel. Streaming was a more hollow/boomy sound and didn't reach as low. Though I just remembered I do run with Audyssey's Dynamic EQ on for most of my inputs except discs with a -10 offset. However, while that might account for some of the boomy bass, if the really low end frequencies were there those would have been boosted as well. That wasn't the case so they were just missing. On that old of a track even with the remixing, it was subtle but if you've listened to both versions it's definitely obvious.
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Yeah I have a hard time picking out the video differences, but the audio can be really obvious as in my Cloverfield Paradox example above. I also watched the Episode IV disc from the Star Wars 4K box set the other night and compared to the 4K/Atmos streaming version on Disney+ you could hear the difference there as well. Especially some of the bass in the early scenes boarding the vessel. Streaming was a more hollow/boomy sound and didn't reach as low. Though I just remembered I do run with Audyssey's Dynamic EQ on for most of my inputs except discs with a -10 offset. However, while that might account for some of the boomy bass, if the really low end frequencies were there those would have been boosted as well. That wasn't the case so they were just missing. On that old of a track even with the remixing, it was subtle but if you've listened to both versions it's definitely obvious.
Agreed...if you listen to the streaming version first you'd say..."damn, that sounds pretty good." Then you go to the disc and it's a definite "ah ha" moment (at least for me). For dramas and light comedies, I don't really care, but for action/adventure and musicals, the better audio is definitely missed.
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So now that I'm looking at the ~$500 Panasonic UB-820, I'm wondering if maybe I should just wait and buy an XBox Series X in a few months. Anyone have any thoughts on that? I had thought about getting a new console anyway though I have been gaming on PC some of my friends also game on Xbox and are planning to get it. I know it will support 4k UHD discs and I assume it would support Dolby Vision playback. Of course it will also probably cost around 500 as well.
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I bought the Oppo 203 and then turned around and bought the Panasonic UB9000 for the tone mapping. Considered selling the Oppo, but decided to hold onto it. Ended up selling the Panasonic. Glad I hung onto the Oppo 203. :)
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Man I have a tough decision today. A local Best Buy has an open box Pansonic 820 for $325 instead of $499. They have a Magnolia Design Center there and I ended up calling them since nobody from the main store line picked up. He went and dug it up for me and said it's actually in great shape and has documentation even though the box notes said "residue" and "missing documentation". Just have to drive 20 miles to go get it. I usually hesitate to buy open box electronics especially something like this, but man is this tempting for 35% off.
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Man I have a tough decision today. A local Best Buy has an open box Pansonic 820 for $325 instead of $499. They have a Magnolia Design Center there and I ended up calling them since nobody from the main store line picked up. He went and dug it up for me and said it's actually in great shape and has documentation even though the box notes said "residue" and "missing documentation". Just have to drive 20 miles to go get it. I usually hesitate to buy open box electronics especially something like this, but man is this tempting for 35% off.
I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
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I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
Yeah that's my thought too. Was just a bit unsure about open box electronics for something like this. Heading out now to go pick it up :)
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I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
So I picked it up. Still have to connect it up, but looks like the only thing wrong with it was the box was ripped open and one edge of the box was smashed a bit in the middle where there's no styrofoam. Maybe a shipping issue when it was sent to the store. Inside everything looked perfect and they plugged it in and it fired up and ejected the tray properly etc. I have 15 days to return of course and because I like their plans, I grabbed one of the Best Buy warranty things for it as well. Basically it looks like I saved $175 by having a bashed up box that's going to go in the recycle bin anyway.
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So I got it set up. I have to say, I wasn't sure before after testing a disc in HDR10 with Dynamic Tone Mapping on my CX vs the same title in DV on Disney+. However, playing the Spears & Munsil demo disc the 10K nit HDR10 vs 10K nit DV there was a very very noticeable difference and I'm now very glad I have DV playback capability
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So I got it set up. I have to say, I wasn't sure before after testing a disc in HDR10 with Dynamic Tone Mapping on my CX vs the same title in DV on Disney+. However, playing the Spears & Munsil demo disc the 10K nit HDR10 vs 10K nit DV there was a very very noticeable difference and I'm now very glad I have DV playback capability
Awesome! That was a great deal you got. Congrats!
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Awesome! That was a great deal you got. Congrats!
Thanks :) I have to say though I had a moment of extreme disappointment when I popped in one of the 4K discs from the Star Wars 9 movie collection. Apparently Disney decided only the streaming version on Disney+ should get Dolby Vision. The discs are in standard HDR10 :( I just assumed otherwise since they were in Dolby Vision in the app.
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Thanks :) I have to say though I had a moment of extreme disappointment when I popped in one of the 4K discs from the Star Wars 9 movie collection. Apparently Disney decided only the streaming version on Disney+ should get Dolby Vision. The discs are in standard HDR10 :( I just assumed otherwise since they were in Dolby Vision in the app.
This might be Disney's plan to get people to use Disney+ streaming instead of discs. You want Dolby Vision? Then sign up for Disney+.
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So I picked it up. Still have to connect it up, but looks like the only thing wrong with it was the box was ripped open and one edge of the box was smashed a bit in the middle where there's no styrofoam. Maybe a shipping issue when it was sent to the store. Inside everything looked perfect and they plugged it in and it fired up and ejected the tray properly etc. I have 15 days to return of course and because I like their plans, I grabbed one of the Best Buy warranty things for it as well. Basically it looks like I saved $175 by having a bashed up box that's going to go in the recycle bin anyway.
I purchased my UB820 from Best Buy on day of release as an in-store purchase. The box was crumpled on both ends. As it was day one it was the last one in stock.
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This might be Disney's plan to get people to use Disney+ streaming instead of discs. You want Dolby Vision? Then sign up for Disney+.
Just get a Lumagen Radiance Pro. Those of us with projectors don't have Dolby Vision anyway, but with the Lumagen's dynamic tone mapping for HDR, everything looks great.
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Thanks :) I have to say though I had a moment of extreme disappointment when I popped in one of the 4K discs from the Star Wars 9 movie collection. Apparently Disney decided only the streaming version on Disney+ should get Dolby Vision. The discs are in standard HDR10 :( I just assumed otherwise since they were in Dolby Vision in the app.
I had a similar reaction when I was testing the HD Fury Dolby Vision trick with my projector. I threw in Captain Marvel thinking it was Dolby Vision and it ended up not working....it's only HDR10 as well.
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I had a similar reaction when I was testing the HD Fury Dolby Vision trick with my projector. I threw in Captain Marvel thinking it was Dolby Vision and it ended up not working....it's only HDR10 as well.
Yeah I did some looking and apparently about if not the only Marvel movie to use it was Black Panther.
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Congrats on the great deal, @flyinion. Really nice find.
On the Disney movies, it's really annoying to buy 4K UHD discs and redeem 4K codes, but not get the ability to stream 4K from certain sources like Apple. For these movies I won't be clearing out the 4K disc anyway but it's still a cheesy situation on Disney's part.
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Congrats on the great deal, @flyinion. Really nice find.
On the Disney movies, it's really annoying to buy 4K UHD discs and redeem 4K codes, but not get the ability to stream 4K from certain sources like Apple. For these movies I won't be clearing out the 4K disc anyway but it's still a cheesy situation on Disney's part.
Thanks :) Normally I'm hesitant to buy open box for "big" ticket items, but in this case it seemed to just be the box was damaged in shipping and it wasn't actually return that went back on the shelf. I've been burned before buying open box. Bought a video card once for my PC and when I went to register it for example it was denied because someone had already registered it. I ended up sending it back and getting something else at the time.
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Congrats on the great deal, @flyinion. Really nice find.
On the Disney movies, it's really annoying to buy 4K UHD discs and redeem 4K codes, but not get the ability to stream 4K from certain sources like Apple. For these movies I won't be clearing out the 4K disc anyway but it's still a cheesy situation on Disney's part.
I just experienced this myself. Never set up a Movies Anywhere or similar account before to redeem any of my codes. Figured why bother I have the disc lol. Finally did it and linked my iTunes account and some other stuff to it. Added the code for Endgame and it shows in MA as Dolby Vision, but it also now shows in iTunes. I think it was actually 4K in iTunes (I'll have to go look again later), but it was NOT in HDR (so probably actually wasn't 4K either). Kind of a shame too since apparently at least on an AppleTV box, iTunes has the highest bitrate for streaming of any of the streaming apps.
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iTunes movies will have a 4K symbol if they have it (and you have the rights) in 4K.
The thing is with iTunes/Apple - they upgrade pretty much anything you have rights to, to 4K if they have it. I have Blu-rays I've turned codes in for, that got a free upgrade to 4K in iTunes. When I started turning in digital codes somewhere around a year or so ago and realized that, it pushed me toward accepting that streaming is going to be the future and physical disks are going away. That was inevitable anyway but the quality upgrade completely changed my mindset. Before I was like Craig and others who wouldn't move away from physical media. That was kind of an epiphany. If a big company like Apple is going to not require me to double dip (or triple or whatever) to get that upgrade, it's a big win. I think streaming will at some point surpass physical in quality.
Obviously there may be some question about the provenance of some of the 4K content in Apple's library for movies that don't have a UHD release. I haven't researched what that means - is there some kind of cheap up-res being done just to have a "4K" version? Maybe. But at some point if that movie gets a proper 4K rescan/remaster done I bet Apple has it.
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iTunes movies will have a 4K symbol if they have it (and you have the rights) in 4K.
The thing is with iTunes/Apple - they upgrade pretty much anything you have rights to, to 4K if they have it. I have Blu-rays I've turned codes in for, that got a free upgrade to 4K in iTunes. When I started turning in digital codes somewhere around a year or so ago and realized that, it pushed me toward accepting that streaming is going to be the future and physical disks are going away. That was inevitable anyway but the quality upgrade completely changed my mindset. Before I was like Craig and others who wouldn't move away from physical media. That was kind of an epiphany. If a big company like Apple is going to not require me to double dip (or triple or whatever) to get that upgrade, it's a big win. I think streaming will at some point surpass physical in quality.
Obviously there may be some question about the provenance of some of the 4K content in Apple's library for movies that don't have a UHD release. I haven't researched what that means - is there some kind of cheap up-res being done just to have a "4K" version? Maybe. But at some point if that movie gets a proper 4K rescan/remaster done I bet Apple has it.
I've been redeeming the codes for years now and have well over 700 in my Vudu account (slightly less in Movies Anywhere because they don't support all studios). I mainly use them when I'm travelling and want to watch something on my tablet on the airplane, but now that Netflix and Amazon let you download shows, I rarely watch movies when flying anymore (before Covid I flew 35 weeks a year). I used that time to catch up on TV shows I didn't catch when they were on years ago. So many shows, so little time :)