The Sony BDP-S300/301 Review Thread

[divemaster]

Originally Posted by GodofBlu

Did you try powering down your S300 by pulling the plug for a few hours? Sometimes they need a hard reset.

did it all, with no luck. I'm getting ready to pack it up and send it back to Sony's repair department. I just find it an odd coincidence that certain blu-ray discs stopped playing as the firmware changed. About the only ones that still play are four of the five that came with the player when I bought it through a mail-in promotion. As much as I like Flight of the Phoenix and Stir of Echoes, I would really like to watch some new movies that used to run on the 300 but no longer do.

As I said, I just wish there was a way to wipe the firmware, reinstall the old version, test, and then I'd have the answer to my question. If they still didn't run under the old firmware [like they used to] then I'd know the laser is awry.

I also see that Sony put up a notice that a new version will be out in January because of the problems with Wall-E.

[fighthefutureofhd]

what problems with wall-e?

[shadesph]

How come some standard dvds fill the entire screen in the blu ray player but in my regular dvd player they are letterboxed? is this normal?

[tek101]

Originally Posted by divemaster

did it all, with no luck. I'm getting ready to pack it up and send it back to Sony's repair department. I just find it an odd coincidence that certain blu-ray discs stopped playing as the firmware changed. About the only ones that still play are four of the five that came with the player when I bought it through a mail-in promotion. As much as I like Flight of the Phoenix and Stir of Echoes, I would really like to watch some new movies that used to run on the 300 but no longer do.

As I said, I just wish there was a way to wipe the firmware, reinstall the old version, test, and then I'd have the answer to my question. If they still didn't run under the old firmware [like they used to] then I'd know the laser is awry.

I also see that Sony put up a notice that a new version will be out in January because of the problems with Wall-E.

Hi . I finally got Wall-E and Dark night......Watched both of them last night with no problem.

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by shadesph

How come some standard dvds fill the entire screen in the blu ray player but in my regular dvd player they are letterboxed? is this normal?

I'm assuming your referring to the same DVD displaying differently on both players. Those DVDs that are "filling" the whole screen would be anamorphically encoded. Have you checked the settings on you DVD player?

If you're still having trouble figuring it out, post the model of your DVD player and we can provide step-by-step instructions.

[shadesph]

yes the same dvd displaying differently on both players. for example groundhog day in the standard dvd player is letterboxed like it should be but on the blu ray player it is playing in full screen.

i have the bdp-s300

[skh]

I'm a new to this but I downloaded the 4.40 update and Free Easy Burner to do the image cd-r and all I get is can't read disc from my BDP-S300. I burned two discs and niether will play. Any help would be great! Thanks

[JasonR]

Burn the disk as an image.

http://www.imgburn.com/

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by shadesph

yes the same dvd displaying differently on both players. for example groundhog day in the standard dvd player is letterboxed like it should be but on the blu ray player it is playing in full screen.

i have the bdp-s300

I just wanted to clarify a few points to make sure we're talking on the same page. When you state the dvd is playing in full screen I'm assuming you're referring to widescreen? Which Groundhog Day DVD do you have?

The various releases of the Groundhog Day DVD are suppose to be enhanced for widescreen (anamorphically encoded) and has an aspect ratio of 1.85:1. You should see very small black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. However, depending on the degree of overscan by your TV you may or may not notice this. If you have this DVD the widescreen image should fill your screen on both the dvd and blu-ray players.

I'm thinking the settings on the DVD player are not set right and the Blu-ray player is showing it correctly. What dvd player do you have? Can you post images of what you're seeing?

[shadesph]

Originally Posted by rdodolak

I just wanted to clarify a few points to make sure we're talking on the same page. When you state the dvd is playing in full screen I'm assuming you're referring to widescreen? Which Groundhog Day DVD do you have?

The various releases of the Groundhog Day DVD are suppose to be enhanced for widescreen (anamorphically encoded) and has an aspect ratio of 1.85:1. You should see very small black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. However, depending on the degree of overscan by your TV you may or may not notice this. If you have this DVD the widescreen image should fill your screen on both the dvd and blu-ray players.

I'm thinking the settings on the DVD player are not set right and the Blu-ray player is showing it correctly. What dvd player do you have? Can you post images of what you're seeing?

http://www.dvdempire.com/Exec/v4_ite...searchID=50889

thats the version i have. when played in the blu ray it does not have the black bars but on the regular dvd player it does . shouldn't wide screen dvds have the black bars even on 16:9 tvs. i thought that was the proper way. i tried jaws and both dvd players it had the bars even the blu ray. but that says anamorphic on the back. maybe it is something with anamorphic dvds?

[skh]

OK, used the burner suggested, Started fine, but it displayed the DL OK after about 9 minutes. the tray is open and then the power turned off. I understood this would take about 30 minutes and I wouldn't see the DL OK until the end. Should I wait longer? It has been off for about 5 minutes now. this is the 4.40 update on the BDP-S300. Thanks

[tek101]

Originally Posted by skh

I'm a new to this but I downloaded the 4.40 update and Free Easy Burner to do the image cd-r and all I get is can't read disc from my BDP-S300. I burned two discs and niether will play. Any help would be great! Thanks

Yup. I wasted 3 Cd-rs (Burned with Imgburn...Like I have been doing)

and CDBurnerXP.....Still does not work.

Its not the burner...: When I Unzip the file , It does not give me the right size

It must be : "52,580,864 bytes" As sony said....

Finally, got the Cd from Sony ....Its Ok now.

[JasonR]

Remove the disc and turn it on, it will say DL OK then.

[skh]

Thanks for the help! It took 5 cd-r and the Express Burn program but It now has the 4.40 update. It took under 10 minutes which I wasn't expecting. I thought it was to be 30 minutes. Still don't understand why The cd-r burning went so bad. Each one would get Can't read or loading which I stopped after 10 minutes, then can't read again, then a loading which stopped and said can't read. Then the 5th and final try (as I was out of cd-r's) worked. It is playing great now. Thanks for the help!!

[skh]

Maybe the Maxell CD-R's I was using were bad???

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by skh

Maybe the Maxell CD-R's I was using were bad???

Maybe ... were there errors during the burning process.

[skh]

No errors were shown at all. I just didn't understand what was going on.

[tek101]

Originally Posted by skh

Maybe the Maxell CD-R's I was using were bad???

Nop...I also use TDK...does not work..
only this 4.40 firmware that I had problem with.

[shadesph]

Originally Posted by rdodolak

I just wanted to clarify a few points to make sure we're talking on the same page. When you state the dvd is playing in full screen I'm assuming you're referring to widescreen? Which Groundhog Day DVD do you have?

The various releases of the Groundhog Day DVD are suppose to be enhanced for widescreen (anamorphically encoded) and has an aspect ratio of 1.85:1. You should see very small black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. However, depending on the degree of overscan by your TV you may or may not notice this. If you have this DVD the widescreen image should fill your screen on both the dvd and blu-ray players.

I'm thinking the settings on the DVD player are not set right and the Blu-ray player is showing it correctly. What dvd player do you have? Can you post images of what you're seeing?

http://www.dvdempire.com/Exec/v4_ite...searchID=50889

thats the version i have. when played in the blu ray it does not have the black bars but on the regular dvd player it does . shouldn't wide screen dvds have the black bars even on 16:9 tvs. i thought that was the proper way. i tried jaws and both dvd players it had the bars even the blu ray. but that says anamorphic on the back. maybe it is something with anamorphic dvds?

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by shadesph

http://www.dvdempire.com/Exec/v4_ite...searchID=50889

thats the version i have. when played in the blu ray it does not have the black bars but on the regular dvd player it does . shouldn't wide screen dvds have the black bars even on 16:9 tvs. i thought that was the proper way. i tried jaws and both dvd players it had the bars even the blu ray. but that says anamorphic on the back. maybe it is something with anamorphic dvds?

The link from your post is broken.

Not all widescreen movies will have black bars and the size of the black bars, for those that do, will depend on the aspect ratio of the film.

Check out this wikipedia page on Film Apect Ratios (also take a look at the links founf at the bottom of the page):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_aspect_ratios

All of the Groundhog Day DVDs list an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 whereas a widescreen tv has an aspect ratio of 1.78:1. You should see very very small black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. However, since the difference is very very small you may not see those bars depending on the degree of overscan your tv has. Some televisions have an overscan option listed with the menu on the tv. I'd look to see if your tv has a similar option and set it to the lowest value possible.

It sounds like the Blu-ray player is displaying the DVD properly but the DVD player is not.

If I knew what the make and model of the dvd player you had and/or you could post pics so we can see what you're seeing I might be able to tell you where to specifically look and what the proper settings for the dvd player would be.

It's hard to troubleshoot since each player can have different menu settings. However you can look in the dvd player's menu to make sure the tv's aspect ratio is listed as 16:9. Also, check to see if the player has a video output (full, normal, etc) option and try changing the selected value.