Sony UBP-X800 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[RageGamer]

Originally Posted by DavidF

I don’t think you’ll find any player that is guaranteed to play every disc. The two Icon movies that won’t play in my X800m2 didn’t work in my X700, nor my old Panasonic BMP-BD60 or my brother’s Oppo 203. It’s a disc issue.

I've had this Sony player nearly 2 years now and only had issues with 4K discs. It's getting old. I might as well start ripping them to PC.

[jibucha]

sorry :: to post this, but
such a player doesn't exist - and - doubtful ever will
this includes Panasonic and Pioneer, etc.
actually :: 'personally' what you have is the 'best balance' (unfortunately nowhere to go - regardless what 'some' might want you to believe)
we currently have two of the BDP-X800 and one BDP-1100ES ('very happy' with each)
worst case :: unplug from the AC outlet for ten minutes - restart)
unfortunate - yet the reality of things nowadays

Originally Posted by RageGamer

Yeah. This Sony player is pissing me off now. Froze on the Starship Troopers 4K disc now for no reason. I can't stand this garbage. All I want is a solid player that plays every disc thrown at it without choking. Everyone keeps mentioning Panasonic. So which player is the best? I only watch discs. I don't care about other features.

[CompleteCount]

Originally Posted by RageGamer

Yeah. This Sony player is pissing me off now. Froze on the Starship Troopers 4K disc now for no reason. I can't stand this garbage. All I want is a solid player that plays every disc thrown at it without choking. Everyone keeps mentioning Panasonic. So which player is the best? I only watch discs. I don't care about other features.

I am on my second Panasonic 4K player (the 150, followed by the 820, for Dolby Vision purposes) and neither of them have refused to play a disc or frozen whilst doing so - be it freezing or the dreaded 3rd-layer change.

I can't recommend them highly enough.

[goldenarm84]

Originally Posted by 2-J

Recently? I still have M36.R.0338 which according to the Sony site was released on 12th March 2019. And checking for updates doesn't give me a new firmware. Yes I do get the chance to 'update services' frequently still.

Yes you are correct I take that back, I mixed up what I was talking about, my Sony X850D tv just got an update to Android 8.0 recently. Yes the update services is frequently happening still.

[Matthew.H]

Originally Posted by RageGamer

I've had this Sony player nearly 2 years now and only had issues with 4K discs. It's getting old. I might as well start ripping them to PC.

The Panasonic UB820 is probably one of your best options. I only have about 30 4K titles but they have all played fine except for one freeze on Knives Out which is a well known issue that affects every 4K disc of the film.

[2-J]

As the owner of a UBP-X800, should I be worried that Sony only provided about 2 years' worth of firmware updates and there has not been one for over a year?

I thought that, at least for blu ray discs, player firmware needed to be updated semi regularly to play the latest discs. Is that correct?

If so, I consider only 2 years' worth of updates poor value for the price I paid on release.

[DavidF]

Originally Posted by 2-J

As the owner of a UBP-X800, should I be worried that Sony only provided about 2 years' worth of firmware updates and there has not been one for over a year?

I thought that, at least for blu ray discs, player firmware needed to be updated semi regularly to play the latest discs. Is that correct?

If so, I consider only 2 years' worth of updates poor value for the price I paid on release.

The majority of films don’t require any updates, particularly if it fits within the current playing standards of the player. But if one pushes the boundaries, that’s when an update is needed. It might be possible that a few need updates aren’t films you’re going to buy, but then again, they could be all the films you buy.

This was why Oppo were the best - their player models ran for years and years (not changed every 1-2 years), and they still provided updates for their older discontinued. It was a sad day when Oppo bowed out of making Bluray players.

[2-J]

Originally Posted by DavidF

The majority of films don’t require any updates, particularly if it fits within the current playing standards of the player. But if one pushes the boundaries, that’s when an update is needed. It might be possible that a few need updates aren’t films you’re going to buy, but then again, they could be all the films you buy.

This was why Oppo were the best - their player models ran for years and years (not changed every 1-2 years), and they still provided updates for their older discontinued. It was a sad day when Oppo bowed out of making Bluray players.

Thank you for the reply. Depressing reading! I had been insulated from this issue due to only using PS3s / PS4s to play blu rays before purchasing this dedicated player, my first (the PS3, for example, has had over 13 years of firmware updates and shows no signs of stopping)


I'll get a PS5 when that releases, hope my UBP-X800 doesn't give me a hiccup with a new disc before then. Still consider 2 years of updates very poor value if they don't update this player again.

[RageGamer]

Originally Posted by 2-J

Thank you for the reply. Depressing reading! I had been insulated from this issue due to only using PS3s / PS4s to play blu rays before purchasing this dedicated player, my first (the PS3, for example, has had over 13 years of firmware updates and shows no signs of stopping)


I'll get a PS5 when that releases, hope my UBP-X800 doesn't give me a hiccup with a new disc before then. Still consider 2 years of updates very poor value if they don't update this player again.

My first BD player was a fat PS3. I wore out that disc drive to the point it started scratching discs and barely ejecting. The super slim model was nowhere near as good. Felt less responsive to the remote. In any case, I don't like using game consoles for movies anymore. I prefer to save that disc drive for games. My X1X drive stopped reading discs even though I barely used it, and now I'm waiting for the new console so I can play some de-listed games I can't buy digital.

[mzupeman]

Originally Posted by Matthew.H

The Panasonic UB820 is probably one of your best options. I only have about 30 4K titles but they have all played fine except for one freeze on Knives Out which is a well known issue that affects every 4K disc of the film.

I second the UB820. Been a flawless player.

[Noremac Mij]

Originally Posted by The Admiral

Vinyls died 25 years ago too... So there's hope!

CDs and MP3s brought vinyl back. Audio became so horrible that masses got fed up and started going back to vinyl. Crazy, right? Same can happen to UHD. They just have to release something so horrible that it pisses off a good chunk of the population. DVD and Blu-ray made me watch more Laserdiscs as an example.

[sapiendut]

Vinyl is better than CD? You are kidding right? Every sound engineer on the planet agree that CD is better than vinyl. If you prefer vinyl over CD (I do too) that’s a different story. But vinyl is technically far inferior than CD.

[Marv Inc.]

Mines started skipping and Freezing with 4K discs and its just over two years old. I'am guessing there's no fix i've cleaned the laser.

[bhampton]

Originally Posted by Matthew.H

The Panasonic UB820 is probably one of your best options. I only have about 30 4K titles but they have all played fine except for one freeze on Knives Out which is a well known issue that affects every 4K disc of the film.

I have the ub420 and didn’t have any problem with Knives Out.

I should go watch it again to verify but I think my kids have watched it several times.

Maybe the PlayStation 5 will be the ultimate 4K player.... or maybe whatever Sony does after the X700/X800. Sony has always been my reliable player choice but neither of the X700s that I owned was reliable.

[Frank@Chicago]

After months of instability, my original X800 completely lost it's mind.

Couldn't get it to do anything anymore and finally just removed it from my setup.

Then I promoted my Xbox S to movie player due to UHD drive and Atmos support.

I had to buy the movie remote for Xbox, but all things considered I'm happy enough.

Xbox has fixed their color space problems and movie playback look good now.

[SpaceBlackKnight]

My X800 is still going quite fine for the most part. I did have issues with the 1st pressing of the German Rollerball UHD not reading and/or completely freezing up the player. The German remastered Blu played fine as does my other UHDs, so it's not an issue with the X800. It then it turned out to a dud disc as my PC's UHD drives would ether load it up and then have it not show up, or spend minutes trying to read it and completely lock up the drives. The 2nd pressing UHD I got as a replacement after contacting the Amazon seller played fine.

[gregmtl92]

Originally Posted by mzupeman

Now that they've fixed the macroblocking issue on Fox titles, it most certainly is.

First of all, I know I'm quoting a 3+ years old post , I'd never heard of this problem related to Fox titles but I was watching a Fox BD this morning (Laura) and noticed some horrible macroblocking towards the end of the film. I hit the pause button and read the review on here and they say "No compression or encode concerns either.". I decided to try it in my PS4 and it looked a lot better, I suspected the problem might have been the HDMI cable so I put the disc back in my UBP-X800 but using a new high-speed HDMI cable, unfortunately the macroblocking was still evident, I then tried with my PS4 HDMI cable, same results.

I've noticed this with other discs too and not just Fox titles, same thing happened with Jerry Maguire 4K, there was some pretty bad macroblocking whenever the camera moved quickly.

I'm guessing something's wrong with the settings? Almost everything is set to "auto", which I suppose is not optimal.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by gregmtl92

First of all, I know I'm quoting a 3+ years old post , I'd never heard of this problem related to Fox titles but I was watching a Fox BD this morning (Laura) and noticed some horrible macroblocking towards the end of the film. I hit the pause button and read the review on here and they say "No compression or encode concerns either.". I decided to try it in my PS4 and it looked a lot better, I suspected the problem might have been the HDMI cable so I put the disc back in my UBP-X800 but using a new high-speed HDMI cable, unfortunately the macroblocking was still evident, I then tried with my PS4 HDMI cable, same results.

I've noticed this with other discs too and not just Fox titles, same thing happened with Jerry Maguire 4K, there was some pretty bad macroblocking whenever the camera moved quickly.

I'm guessing something's wrong with the settings? Almost everything is set to "auto", which I suppose is not optimal.

Switch to 'Direct' under 'Video Settings' when you press Options on the remote during playback. If you've got it set to 'Auto' then it's been applying noise reduction on BD and DVD playback for all this time.

[gregmtl92]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Switch to 'Direct' under 'Video Settings' when you press Options on the remote during playback. If you've got it set to 'Auto' then it's been applying noise reduction on BD and DVD playback for all this time.

Thanks, it was indeed set to auto (for 2.5 years ).

It's not helped with the macroblocking though, do you think it has something to do with the settings or is it just that this particular player has issues with Fox titles like that other guy mentioned?

[Geoff D]

I dunno, I've never had any issues like that with my X800 though.