All-Region DVD and Blu-ray Player Advice

[nsps]

Isn't profile 2.0 supposed to be the end of the "update for all features" BS? Unless you need to due to problems, I'd say don't update the Momitsu.

[gordonovitch]

You should have bought an Oppo or a modded player!

Yes, the Oppo players have an excellent rep. But what confuses me is that, in their specs, they state their PAL to NTSC conversion is subject to one's Region restrictions. It sounds to me that, if one lives in North America, one could only play PAL Region 0 discs on their currently available players.

[gordonovitch]

Anybody heard of the Faroudja DCDi processing chipset?

A company called regionfreedvd.com offers a Yamaha DVD-S1800 player ($399.00) with this chipset, explaining one of its benefits thusly:

DCDi TM (Directional Correlational Deinterlacing)
Invented and patented by Faroudja, Directional Correlational De interlacing (DCDi), virtually alleviates jagged oblique lines that appear when standard interlaced video is viewed on progressive scan displays, enabling the reproduction of beautiful, natural-looking moving images
(http://regioncodefreedvd.com/yamaha1800.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;)

[Zot!]

Faroudja has been around for decades, line-doublers and the like, and have their technology in a lot of stuff. If I'm not mistaken, nearly all recent DVD players have this or other chips that adjust for interlacing, and provide a progressive image to your monitor. The problem with interlacing is that if it is inherited in the transfer rather than the material (like during a poor PAL to NTSC transfer), the artifacting is random and unpredictable, and your machine will typically not attempt to adjust for this.

[perkizitore]

They are good but not fantastic. Fork out 100$ more and you can buy the best, Oppo BDP-83 with the Anchor Bay chip!

[gordonovitch]

They are good but not fantastic. Fork out 100$ more and you can buy the best, Oppo BDP-83 with the Anchor Bay chip!

So this chip has something to do with the upconverting feature (which all DVD players do these days)? Does it actually make a noticeable difference over the BDP-80?

[Svevan]

They are good but not fantastic. Fork out 100$ more and you can buy the best, Oppo BDP-83 with the Anchor Bay chip!

Hey friend: that's the second time in a week that you have promoted the Oppo for absolutely no reason. Neither of these posters were asking "which player should I get?" and comments like "you should have bought the Oppo!" do nothing for those who have actual problems with their current hardware. This isn't a place for you to shill your favorite player. So cool it, eh?

[mfunk9786]

Holy shit, I smell a conspiracy! His inconsequential posts must have sold hundreds of Oppo players by now.

[perkizitore]

If you are not aware that the Anchor Bay 2010 chip is the best in the sub 500$ player market, it's not my fault. Find a cheaper player with a better chipset and company support in the same price range and i will be happy to recommend it!

[gordonovitch]

They are good but not fantastic. Fork out 100$ more and you can buy the best, Oppo BDP-83 with the Anchor Bay chip!

Hey friend: that's the second time in a week that you have promoted the Oppo for absolutely no reason. Neither of these posters were asking "which player should I get?" and comments like "you should have bought the Oppo!" do nothing for those who have actual problems with their current hardware. This isn't a place for you to shill your favorite player. So cool it, eh?

I was one of the posters, if not the single one, that perkizitore was responding to in the posting quoted above, and, actually, part of my original post was seeking advice on a new player. I took perkizitore's enthusiastic billboarding of the Oppo BDP-83 as just such a recommendation, and I appreciated it.

[Svevan]

So the goddamned Sherwood BDP-5004 is a great player - when it works. Mine is freezing at the System Start-Up screen for no reason. Tray won't open either (there's a NETFLIX RENTAL inside that I can't get out).

Once before I had the system start up screen freeze and look glitchy, which seems to be a similar problem. After powering on and off twice, I just let it sit while I researched online - eventually (10 minutes) the disc inside began to play. NOW I don't have a glitchy screen, it looks normal, but it won't progress past the Start-Up screen at all. One customer review on Amazon had a similar problem (that user waited FOUR HOURS for his tray to open), but there aren't enough of these players out there to diagnose if it's a bad batch, a fixable problem, or what. It seems to only happen while there's a disc inside. I've had the thing for a week and a half now, and other than the aforementioned glitchy start up screen problem, I have had no issues (well, the thing did stop playing in the middle of a movie once, required a full shut down I think).

So fuck. This thing works very well when it's not being a total piece of shit. Anyone else with similar problems is encouraged to commiserate (or solve my problem).

edit: took a half hour and repeated unpluggings and a few minutes on standby, then it randomly decided to load the disc. This is the second time my player has given me a heart attack. Very frustrated but I retract half of the mean things I said earlier.

[denti alligator]

This happened to me once, but not since. I'm crossing my fingers it just won't be a problem, and I use the player several times daily.

[Svevan]

My problem is now recurring - disconnecting the ethernet and reconnecting it has done the trick three times, but each time it only wanted to play the disc (Criterion DVD of Early Summer) for 15 minutes before crashing. I'm giving the player a day away from the power outlet.

[denti alligator]

If you got it from amazon just ask for a replacement. You can even wait till it arrives to ship back the one you have now.

[Perkins Cobb]

Friend of mine had his Sherwood 5004 crash and burn basically out of the box a couple of months ago. I think he had to get a replacement directly from Sherwood instead of Amazon, but I forget why. Haven't had mine freak out yet, but I don't use it all that often.

To the Oppo zealot(s): Yes, I wish I had one. But recommending that I buy a $500 player instead of a $200 player is kind of unhelpful, since most people (including me) who buy a $200 player do it because they can't afford a $500 player. Not because they size up the situation and decide, oh, that $200 player must be a much better piece of machinery than the $500 player. Tell you what, somebody else wants to kick in the extra $300, and I'll happily toss my Sherwood into the Hudson and give the Oppo a try!

[perkizitore]

There are 2 Oppo blu-ray players now, a 300$ and a 500$ one!

[What A Disgrace]

So...my Momitsu BDP-899, which otherwise works great, now has two very fatal flaws. First of all, it does *not* play my Criterion Blu-ray of 8 1/2. This initially prompted me to download firmware update for the player...of course, this didn't help. I got an exchanged disc from Criterion, as I ordered it direct from their store, and that, too, does not work, and to the same effect. Thankfully, it seems to play fine on our PlayStation 3. But still. Lame.

But even worse; and more importantly, I can no longer enter the region free code. Whenever I enter it, I get the "Prohibited" message, which means I can no longer play The Bed Sitting Room (found out this morning), or the upcoming Blu's of The Leopard, Privilege, and what have you. I suspect that the firmware update might have been responsible for this. Has anybody else had this problem?

[ccfixx]

I suspect that the firmware update might have been responsible for this. Has anybody else had this problem?

I've read countless posts across other forums that the firmware update for the BDP-899 is, indeed, the culprit for not allowing region-free playback. So, if you're still wanting that option, you'll need to find a previous firmware update and re-install it. Maybe, you still have a previous version lying around?

CC

[What A Disgrace]

Oh, well, fortunately, I do have one. I guess that's one problem I can solve, thank goodness.

[Awesome Welles]

I am going to buy a blu-ray player this week and as I stupidly passed up/missed the opportunities to buy in the Aldi/HMV deals can anyone advise on a cheap multi-region player? I haven't done any research so have absolutely no knowledge of what's available. Thanks in advance!

[med]

Where on the menu screen do I enter the region-free code for Sherwood 5004? I have one that arrived at my house today and I've yet to have any hands-on experience with it. Or any other region-free player, for that matter; this one is my first, so pardon my ignorance.

(And yes, perkizitore, should I end up unsatisfied with the Sherwood, I'll end up getting an Oppo.)

[ccfixx]

Where on the menu screen do I enter the region-free code for Sherwood 5004? I have one that arrived at my house today and I've yet to have any hands-on experience with it. Or any other region-free player, for that matter; this one is my first, so pardon my ignorance.

(And yes, perkizitore, should I end up unsatisfied with the Sherwood, I'll end up getting an Oppo.)

If the Sherwood is supposed to be similar to the Momitsu, then there is no menu screen. You simply enter the code on the remote while there is no disc inside the player. When I enter the code on my Momitsu, I enter the code with the tray open. And if I entered the code correctly, the movie will start up fine after I've closed the tray.

CC

[brunosh]

I am going to buy a blu-ray player this week and as I stupidly passed up/missed the opportunities to buy in the Aldi/HMV deals can anyone advise on a cheap multi-region player? I haven't done any research so have absolutely no knowledge of what's available. Thanks in advance!

Having also missed Aldi/HMV and not being able to justify spending more since I have no BDs at all yet, I bought this one after Nothing linked to it elsewhere on the board, referring to it, as I recall, as a "Limit by another name". Although I have no other region BDs to try yet, it's so far done the biz for DVDs and Region B rental BD, so in gratitude I take back all my unspoken reactions to Nothing's other posts and will henceforth assign to them only the positive value of comedic relief, however unintended.

[ifear]

Tesco have another Momitsu clone, cheaper: http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.208-1392.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[perkizitore]

Curtis doesn't have all the features of the Momitsu player, so isn't an exact clone but it still works.