Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[J Nada]

Just to keep you all updated on the 1.66/Lionsgate situation, I got my copy of Knives Out today, but everything is packed up as the house is being redecorated. When I have a room back, I will watch and post my findings.

[Oniiz86]

Originally Posted by wxman2003

It does a good job converting HDR to SDR compared to the OPPO 203. The OPPO 203 crushes everything below 4% whereas the 820/9000 do not.

Not that it matters much but just for accuracy sake it was below 2%, it was a shame that OPPO's engineers couldn't fully eradicate the black crush, it must've been a MediaTek chipset limitation as Samsung & Panasonic players never did suffer from this issue.

[PuppetMasterBlu]

Originally Posted by captainsolo

Is the 820 considered the best downscaling to SDR option for a player? I'm thinking I might go ahead and get one to use with my ST60 plasma for the time being to at least be able to watch UHDs in SDR.

Yes. I use it with a 1080p projector and it looks quite amazing. It's going to take a long time to get a new receiver and a new TV so I have to settle for now.

[Prisonbmichael]

Hey everyone. I hope this is the right place to post this. My panasonic ub820 4k player is having problems playing 4k discs. The bluray versions that come with the 4k uhd work fine. I know it cant be the discs as they work on my last 4k player. There are times that it will eventually work. For e.g. first time I put in mad max 4k and it didn't work. It eventually worked when i changed the bd live internet acess option to permit. Other 4k discs were working but mad max wasn't. Last night I was trying to play dog soldiers 4k and it didnt work. I changed the 4k usb cable just in case and it worked and then it worked for other 4k disc I tested(nothing was working at all again). I then turned dolby vision setting off and then everything seemed to work. Now it's not working. I did get the player pre owned from cex (in the uk). Its weird that the bluray discs are fine but the 4k isnt. It says cannot read disc please check the disc. I've cleaned the disc as well. My 4k cable is going from audio/video out to my hdmi port 2 in my lg c9. Also ultra hd deep colour is turned on in hdmi 2. This makes my believe that it's a setting issue. as surely if it was the disc tray then surely nothing would work. Do I need to be connected to the internet constantly for the 4k disc to work because of BD live. Sorry for being an electronic noob. Sorry for the long post as well. Can anyone please help me?. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

[FilmFreakosaurus]

Originally Posted by Prisonbmichael

Hey everyone. I hope this is the right place to post this. My panasonic ub820 4k player is having problems playing 4k discs. The bluray versions that come with the 4k uhd work fine. I know it cant be the discs as they work on my last 4k player. There are times that it will eventually work. For e.g. first time I put in mad max 4k and it didn't work. It eventually worked when i changed the bd live internet acess option to permit. Other 4k discs were working but mad max wasn't. Last night I was trying to play dog soldiers 4k and it didnt work. I changed the 4k usb cable just in case and it worked and then it worked for other 4k disc I tested(nothing was working at all again). I then turned dolby vision setting off and then everything seemed to work. Now it's not working. I did get the player pre owned from cex (in the uk). Its weird that the bluray discs are fine but the 4k isnt. It says cannot read disc please check the disc. I've cleaned the disc as well. My 4k cable is going from audio/video out to my hdmi port 2 in my lg c9. Also ultra hd deep colour is turned on in hdmi 2. This makes my believe that it's a setting issue. as surely if it was the disc tray then surely nothing would work. Do I need to be connected to the internet constantly for the 4k disc to work because of BD live. Sorry for being an electronic noob. Sorry for the long post as well. Can anyone please help me?. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

BD Live should not have to be on for discs to play. There is no internet tethering with 4k discs.


You might want to clear player storage in case the internal memory is getting full from the last owner.

The only other thing I can think of is the player's optical drive is faulty. There are normally two or more laser pickups due to the different wavelengths needed to read each disc format. The 4k disc part of the pickup may be malfunctioning.

[Prisonbmichael]

Thanks for the reply. I done a factory default. I didn't know about multiple laser pickups. Dog soldiers eventually worked but I think you are right it's the laser pickup inside. Thanks for the help.

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by Prisonbmichael

Hey everyone. I hope this is the right place to post this. My panasonic ub820 4k player is having problems playing 4k discs. The bluray versions that come with the 4k uhd work fine. I know it cant be the discs as they work on my last 4k player. There are times that it will eventually work. For e.g. first time I put in mad max 4k and it didn't work. It eventually worked when i changed the bd live internet acess option to permit. Other 4k discs were working but mad max wasn't. Last night I was trying to play dog soldiers 4k and it didnt work. I changed the 4k usb cable just in case and it worked and then it worked for other 4k disc I tested(nothing was working at all again). I then turned dolby vision setting off and then everything seemed to work. Now it's not working. I did get the player pre owned from cex (in the uk). Its weird that the bluray discs are fine but the 4k isnt. It says cannot read disc please check the disc. I've cleaned the disc as well. My 4k cable is going from audio/video out to my hdmi port 2 in my lg c9. Also ultra hd deep colour is turned on in hdmi 2. This makes my believe that it's a setting issue. as surely if it was the disc tray then surely nothing would work. Do I need to be connected to the internet constantly for the 4k disc to work because of BD live. Sorry for being an electronic noob. Sorry for the long post as well. Can anyone please help me?. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

I have the same player and TV and I'm experiencing issues playing 4K discs too at random times. I get massive pixellated image on the screen and the player slowly freezes. I thought changing my HDMI cables to 8K 48gbps HDMI cables would fix the issue, but no.

I bought this player after reading tons of praise for it on facebook groups. It's supposed to be one of the best players around.

[eChopper]

Per Bob Pariseau at avsforum try changing the colour space in your player to 4:2:2

Reduces the bandwidth of data travelling in the HDMI cable while still still preserving what what was encoded on the disc

I did that a few months ago and I have had hardly nil freezes since then

[Geoff D]

What you do with the HDMI output has literally no bearing on how the drive reads the disc.

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by eChopper

Per Bob Pariseau at avsforum try changing the colour space in your player to 4:2:2

Reduces the bandwidth of data travelling in the HDMI cable while still still preserving what what was encoded on the disc

I did that a few months ago and I have had hardly nil freezes since then

Won’t that mean less picture quality? Less color? The LG C9 is capable of 4:4:4 (I think, since it’s a high-end tv) so I don’t understand why that setting is bad, but please explain further.

[88mph]

Is the UB820 still a good buy right now? I've been waiting for a price drop and it never came and now I keep thinking a newer model is around the corner.

But the longer I wait the longer I am unable to experience 4K HDR discs. I have a few in my collection already gathering dust.

[wxman2003]

Originally Posted by The Edge

Won’t that mean less picture quality? Less color? The LG C9 is capable of 4:4:4 (I think, since it’s a high-end tv) so I don’t understand why that setting is bad, but please explain further.

Just less processing. Unless things have changed, on my E6, if you send 4:4:4, the E6 will convert it to 4:2:2 anyways. So skip the step, and set the player to 4:2:2.

[The Edge]

Originally Posted by wxman2003

Just less processing. Unless things have changed, on my E6, if you send 4:4:4, the E6 will convert it to 4:2:2 anyways. So skip the step, and set the player to 4:2:2.

I tried that step and even set the Deep Color setting from 12-bit to 10-bit. Then I tried watching Passengers and for the first 20-25 minutes it was fine. Then I started experiencing the massive pixelated image issue again. Had to skip forward and backwards to make it go away. So something is wrong with the player, I think. However, I don’t have a protection plan on it regretfully, and since this is a Best Buy dot com order and I’ve had the player since April of this year, I’m not sure I’m able to exchange for another of the same unit.

[TechnicalEntry]

Originally Posted by The Edge

Then I started experiencing the massive pixelated image issue again. Had to skip forward and backwards to make it go away. So something is wrong with the player, I think.

I’m having this exact issue right now playing Quantum of Solace, it’s unwatchable with the scrambling of video every few seconds. Watched Casino Royale yesterday and got a few seconds of it but otherwise it was fine. Have also encountered this on random other discs.

Got so frustrated I gave up and just watched a movie on my 4K Apple TV instead, which is ridiculous...

[V.M. Varga]

So would one recommend UB820 if I have a LG C8? I'm looking for a decent player that can play DV and is able to be modded region free.

[Cruel Angel]

Ordered an 820 for myself today!

[Member-425016]

Odd message prompts on my 9000 when I power it up lately.

"Invalid card" (I have, and continue to use nothing but discs in my player)

Weird.

[Geoff D]

I've had that pop up once or twice on the 820 when it starts up. Not using any external memory here either.

[Jonathan McLeod]

I think it's related to BD-Live stuff. Not that many people use that functionality any more (or ever did) anyway.

[dcx4610]

I have a weird situation with my 820 where it will automatically power on when I switch on my receiver. No other devices do this. Does anyone have any idea what would cause this or if there are any settings to prevent this?