Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[hceuterpe]

Anyone else notice audio dropouts with certain titles on the 820? So far the combination appears to be Dolby Atmos and what I suspect are seamless branching titles. John Wick BD does this, along with several Disney UHD titles. I have literally tried everything, swapping cables, different connection setups, etc. Interestingly, when I tried a test and ran one of the Disney 4K titles (Cars 3) through makemkv and played the file back with my Shield TV Pro, the audio was flawless.

The other thing I've observed is switching the audio to PCM, I have yet to experience the dropout. This feels like the Mediatek/TrueHD/Seamless branching bug all over again...

[sapiendut]

I can’t remember Cars 3 but I just watched John Wick trilogy two weeks ago and I don’t recall any audio dropout.

[BijouMan]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

Anyone else notice audio dropouts with certain titles on the 820? So far the combination appears to be Dolby Atmos and what I suspect are seamless branching titles. John Wick BD does this, along with several Disney UHD titles. I have literally tried everything, swapping cables, different connection setups, etc. Interestingly, when I tried a test and ran one of the Disney 4K titles (Cars 3) through makemkv and played the file back with my Shield TV Pro, the audio was flawless.

The other thing I've observed is switching the audio to PCM, I have yet to experience the dropout. This feels like the Mediatek/TrueHD/Seamless branching bug all over again...

Every disc I have played on my DP-UB9000 has played seamlessly all the way through from start to finish. This machine is often the one used to review (Ultra HD) Blu-ray Discs. I have Cars 3 but I haven't played it yet, but I am very confident I won't have any issues. I haven't heard anyone report problems with the John Wick discs or Cars 3. Your discs may have pressing defects causing some of the pits to be unreadable. Even if the discs are clean and unscratched, the layers could have been "smushed" together in one area during pressing causing all of the pits in that particular area on at least two different layers to be out of focus and indistinguishable. You will not know that your discs are like this until you run the entire discs through a player or computer drive. If you have a computer drive, you can download a program called Nero DiscSpeed and use the ScanDisc function. To make sure it's your discs, if you have a friend who also has these discs, try playing their copies. If their copies work, go to the store where you bought the discs from and ask for replacements. If replacement are not available, request them from the studios who created the discs.

[hceuterpe]

Originally Posted by BijouMan

Every disc I have played on my DP-UB9000 has played seamlessly all the way through from start to finish. This machine is often the one used to review (Ultra HD) Blu-ray Discs. I have Cars 3 but I haven't played it yet, but I am very confident I won't have any issues. I haven't heard anyone report problems with the John Wick discs or Cars 3. Your discs may have pressing defects causing some of the pits to be unreadable. Even if the discs are clean and unscratched, the layers could have been "smushed" together in one area during pressing causing all of the pits in that particular area on at least two different layers to be out of focus and indistinguishable. You will not know that your discs are like this until you run the entire discs through a player or computer drive. If you have a computer drive, you can download a program called Nero DiscSpeed and use the ScanDisc function. To make sure it's your discs, if you have a friend who also has these discs, try playing their copies. If their copies work, go to the store where you bought the discs from and ask for replacements. If replacement are not available, request them from the studios who created the discs.

I thought this as well. Though I also scan every UHD/BD disc I get to ensure readability the moment they arrive. Cars 3 also scanned fine (which is how I was able to do that test). if it was a disc defect, wouldn't the PCM setting have the same issue?

Finally, aren't there some differences between the 820 and 9000?

If I have to resort to setting the 820 to PCM output for Dolby tracks, I suppose that will work. The AVR I'm repurposing is too old to support DTS:X/Atmos

[sapiendut]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

I thought this as well. Though I also scan every UHD/BD disc I get to ensure readability the moment they arrive. Cars 3 also scanned fine (which is how I was able to do that test). if it was a disc defect, wouldn't the PCM setting have the same issue?

Finally, aren't there some differences between the 820 and 9000?

If I have to resort to setting the 820 to PCM output for Dolby tracks, I suppose that will work. The AVR I'm repurposing is too old to support DTS:X/Atmos

Most notable difference: they use different models of disc drives.

[bnmdjm]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

Anyone else notice audio dropouts with certain titles on the 820? So far the combination appears to be Dolby Atmos and what I suspect are seamless branching titles. John Wick BD does this, along with several Disney UHD titles. I have literally tried everything, swapping cables, different connection setups, etc. Interestingly, when I tried a test and ran one of the Disney 4K titles (Cars 3) through makemkv and played the file back with my Shield TV Pro, the audio was flawless.

The other thing I've observed is switching the audio to PCM, I have yet to experience the dropout. This feels like the Mediatek/TrueHD/Seamless branching bug all over again...

I am having the same problem. It's the very reason I came to this thread right now. I've noticed it the most with Disney UHDs also. WALL-E and Soul have both done it this week...

It's very subtle on mine and it's not usually repeatable at the same point on the disc. I have a 48 Gbps certified and independently tested and verified by Vincent Teoh HDMI cable that goes straight from the player to the TV and no scratches at all on the discs.

[hceuterpe]

Originally Posted by bnmdjm

I am having the same problem. It's the very reason I came to this thread right now. I've noticed it the most with Disney UHDs also. WALL-E and Soul have both done it this week...

It's very subtle on mine and it's not usually repeatable at the same point on the disc. I have a 48 Gbps certified and independently tested and verified by Vincent Teoh HDMI cable that goes straight from the player to the TV and no scratches at all on the discs.

Well I'm glad to know I'm not crazy and imagining things lol!

Cars 3, Captain Marvel, Princess and the Frog, Thor Dark World, John Wick (BD). I also tried HDMI 2.1 cables. Also very subtle (split second dropout when it happens) and seemingly random, i.e. not reproducible at certain points.. Does switching to PCM output improve things? I'm going to try one more connection option and connect the 820 directly to the TV and the audio out HDMI to my receiver as a last test. One curious observation however: the 820 doesn't like my Sharc eARC adapter. The adapter works fine with my XSX and TV webos streaming apps and handles either 7.1 LPCM and/or Dolby Digital+ just fine, but when the 820 pass audio with it in the mix, the player treats the max it can support as basically SPDIF (so no more than stereo PCM or plain Dolby Digital).

[PUsokrJosh305]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

Anyone else notice audio dropouts with certain titles on the 820? So far the combination appears to be Dolby Atmos and what I suspect are seamless branching titles. John Wick BD does this, along with several Disney UHD titles. I have literally tried everything, swapping cables, different connection setups, etc. Interestingly, when I tried a test and ran one of the Disney 4K titles (Cars 3) through makemkv and played the file back with my Shield TV Pro, the audio was flawless.

The other thing I've observed is switching the audio to PCM, I have yet to experience the dropout. This feels like the Mediatek/TrueHD/Seamless branching bug all over again...

Is your A/V receiver older or newer? Sometimes older receivers have issues with audio dropouts. Also, does the screen go blank or just the audio drops out?

[bnmdjm]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

Well I'm glad to know I'm not crazy and imagining things lol!

Cars 3, Captain Marvel, Princess and the Frog, Thor Dark World, John Wick (BD). I also tried HDMI 2.1 cables. Also very subtle (split second dropout when it happens) and seemingly random, i.e. not reproducible at certain points.. Does switching to PCM output improve things? I'm going to try one more connection option and connect the 820 directly to the TV and the audio out HDMI to my receiver as a last test. One curious observation however: the 820 doesn't like my Sharc eARC adapter. The adapter works fine with my XSX and TV webos streaming apps and handles either 7.1 LPCM and/or Dolby Digital+ just fine, but when the 820 pass audio with it in the mix, the player treats the max it can support as basically SPDIF (so no more than stereo PCM or plain Dolby Digital).

Honestly I feel the same way.

It's happened to me on so many movies I've lost count. Back to the Future II, WALL-E, Soul, 1917, multiple Star Wars titles and many more. Probably 20+ titles. And like you said, literally a split second dropout. I'll always think - maybe it's supposed to sound like that, but then I go back and replay it, and it'll play fine and it's like, nope that was definitely a dropout. It's got to the point where it isn't fun that every time I watch a film I have to remember certain parts where this happens and go back and test to see if I'm crazy and/or if the film was actually supposed to sound that way.

I have mine connected with video straight to the TV with the aforementioned 48 Gbps HDMI cable, and another high speed HDMI cable going to my Denon X4500H.

I haven't tried PCM, but then again I'm setup for Atmos so I don't really want to haha. I've finally decided to at least reach out to Panasonic customer service since I'm still under warranty to at least see what they have to say.

[hceuterpe]

Originally Posted by bnmdjm

Honestly I feel the same way.

It's happened to me on so many movies I've lost count. Back to the Future II, WALL-E, Soul, 1917, multiple Star Wars titles and many more. Probably 20+ titles. And like you said, literally a split second dropout. I'll always think - maybe it's supposed to sound like that, but then I go back and replay it, and it'll play fine and it's like, nope that was definitely a dropout. It's got to the point where it isn't fun that every time I watch a film I have to remember certain parts where this happens and go back and test to see if I'm crazy and/or if the film was actually supposed to sound that way.

I have mine connected with video straight to the TV with the aforementioned 48 Gbps HDMI cable, and another high speed HDMI cable going to my Denon X4500H.

I haven't tried PCM, but then again I'm setup for Atmos so I don't really want to haha. I've finally decided to at least reach out to Panasonic customer service since I'm still under warranty to at least see what they have to say.

I have all but the original 6 Star Wars titles on UHD I could try, along with 1917, as well. Do you recall whether Rise of Skywalker also does this? Any other titles you can think of where this occurs?

Tbh I don't know about you but the audio dropouts are extremely distracting to the point I lose focus on the movie itself and listen super close if the dropouts keep occurring. Perhaps try the PCM output setting to see if the issue goes away?

I wanted to try this on my XSX, but tbh half the time I try to play a UHD title on it, the XSX instead just goes crazy and shuts off LOL. The blu-ray player capabilities on the Xbox consoles have always been quite an afterthought, with the one benefit is you can force everything to play with an old codec like Dolby Digital if need be. Perhaps I could go lug the One X and reconnect it to the new setup to try it, instead.

[Better in Blu]

Originally Posted by BijouMan

Every disc I have played on my DP-UB9000 has played seamlessly all the way through from start to finish. This machine is often the one used to review (Ultra HD) Blu-ray Discs. I have Cars 3 but I haven't played it yet, but I am very confident I won't have any issues. I haven't heard anyone report problems with the John Wick discs or Cars 3. Your discs may have pressing defects causing some of the pits to be unreadable. Even if the discs are clean and unscratched, the layers could have been "smushed" together in one area during pressing causing all of the pits in that particular area on at least two different layers to be out of focus and indistinguishable. You will not know that your discs are like this until you run the entire discs through a player or computer drive. If you have a computer drive, you can download a program called Nero DiscSpeed and use the ScanDisc function. To make sure it's your discs, if you have a friend who also has these discs, try playing their copies. If their copies work, go to the store where you bought the discs from and ask for replacements. If replacement are not available, request them from the studios who created the discs.

Good points. My 9000 has been flawless as well. The movies you mentioned have been issueless. Foreign imports, box sets, limited and special edition discs all have been seamless. As a standalone player, it compares favorably to my Oppo's in the past.

[pbz06]

Anyone run into playback issues with UHD for Lone Survivor? The scene where the action is about to start and Wahlberg's character whispers "get ready to fight". My player crashes and freezes with pixelated screen...and it's repeatable.

[sapiendut]

If it is repeatable, it’s usually the disc’s problem.

[BijouMan]

Originally Posted by bnmdjm

Honestly I feel the same way.

It's happened to me on so many movies I've lost count. Back to the Future II, WALL-E, Soul, 1917, multiple Star Wars titles and many more. Probably 20+ titles. And like you said, literally a split second dropout. I'll always think - maybe it's supposed to sound like that, but then I go back and replay it, and it'll play fine and it's like, nope that was definitely a dropout. It's got to the point where it isn't fun that every time I watch a film I have to remember certain parts where this happens and go back and test to see if I'm crazy and/or if the film was actually supposed to sound that way.

I have mine connected with video straight to the TV with the aforementioned 48 Gbps HDMI cable, and another high speed HDMI cable going to my Denon X4500H.

I haven't tried PCM, but then again I'm setup for Atmos so I don't really want to haha. I've finally decided to at least reach out to Panasonic customer service since I'm still under warranty to at least see what they have to say.

I have watched the UHD release of WALL•E multiple times on mine and it has always played all the way through. It also happens to be one of my favorite movies of all time. I have not tried watching through Back to the Future Part II or Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker yet, although I have inserted both and they seem to play fine.

[PUsokrJosh305]

Originally Posted by hceuterpe

I thought this as well. Though I also scan every UHD/BD disc I get to ensure readability the moment they arrive. Cars 3 also scanned fine (which is how I was able to do that test). if it was a disc defect, wouldn't the PCM setting have the same issue?

Finally, aren't there some differences between the 820 and 9000?

If I have to resort to setting the 820 to PCM output for Dolby tracks, I suppose that will work. The AVR I'm repurposing is too old to support DTS:X/Atmos

Also, your receiver should be able to decode the Dolby Atmos tracks since Dolby Atmos has a 7.1 Dolby TruHD core to it. DTS: X tracks on the other hand may be a bit finicky.

[hceuterpe]

Originally Posted by PUsokrJosh305

Also, your receiver should be able to decode the Dolby Atmos tracks since Dolby Atmos has a 7.1 Dolby TruHD core to it. DTS: X tracks on the other hand may be a bit finicky.

I realize, it supports it, but as I mentioned leaving bitstreaming setting on the 820 for "Dolby" seems to induce the audio dropouts for Atmos titles. I mentioned the receiver not supporting Atmos mainly to point out that effectively I wouldn't be losing anything with having the player decode it to 7.1 LPCM, vs passing TrueHD to the receiver.

So far connecting the player directly to the TV with a second HDMI cable for audio to the receiver doesn't help. Setting Dolby to PCM, I wasn't able to induce the dropouts. I'm trying out another remux'ed file from the original disc on the Shield TV Pro with True HD passthrough, again so far, so good ...

[Nori]

Would be interesting to know what receivers people with the issue are using. Sometimes some combinations produce different results.

[rickardl]

Anyone with audio drop outs/freezes, try a hard reset...

Originally Posted by rickardl

This is weird... earlier I reported that I had no issues with Black Hawk Down 4K Extended cut/Atmos except one audio wobble during end titles with my 820.
Now when I sampled it again, I had freezes and audio drop outs for a few secs!
And repeatable as well, always the same places.
After a hard reset ("08 FIN") and setup again, the freezes/audio drop outs are gone...
Fingers crossed that they stay gone.

1. Turn the unit OFF.
2. Press and hold [OK], the [Yellow] button and the [Blue] button on the remote control at the same time for more than 5 seconds.
“00 RET” is displayed on the unit’s display.
3. Press [►] right repeatedly on the remote control until “08 FIN” is displayed on the unit’s display.
4. Press and hold [OK] for more than 5 seconds

[NKB2017]

My UK BD of '40 Year Old Virgin' is soooo out of sync... it's so noticeable.
The disc plays fine in my Oppo's.

[bnmdjm]

Originally Posted by rickardl

Anyone with audio drop outs/freezes, try a hard reset...


1. Turn the unit OFF.
2. Press and hold [OK], the [Yellow] button and the [Blue] button on the remote control at the same time for more than 5 seconds.
“00 RET” is displayed on the unit’s display.
3. Press [►] right repeatedly on the remote control until “08 FIN” is displayed on the unit’s display.
4. Press and hold [OK] for more than 5 seconds

Tried this long ago. No difference.