Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by stmhlm

Any chance you could share your new pictures? They are the last pictures I need to assemble my document.

Like Wabs –

Originally Posted by Waboman

What exactly is happening here? Are we taking bets on if we get an update or not?

I too am confused. Document? Is this a school project, open letter, and/or who specifically at Panasonic are you forwarding this ‘document’ to?

[stmhlm]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Like Wabs – I too am confused. Document? Is this a school project, open letter, and/or who specifically at Panasonic are you forwarding this ‘document’ to?

Thanks for the confidence, I'm assembling a formal document including detailed information about all your concerns and wishes, addressing compatibility-, functionality-, playability- and other firmware related remarks that would make Panasonic players more user-friendly. This includes facilitation of firmware limitations, user complaints since pre-release of the devices, as well as implementation ideas of new features that would increase your overall satisfaction with your player. Why am I doing this? Is this a school project? No, certainly not, do you work as a janitor? Jokes aside, good luck getting anything addressed, ever, if you just sit around complaining on forums, manufactures couldn't give jack jelly about that, by taking on an initiative, gathering the communities across several websites, collecting all the concerns from worldwide consumers, at least I've made the very best attempt of you receving a new firmware update containing most of what can be implemented within the current capabilities of the hardware of your player, submitting something formal, as in a document, rather professionally, have a thousand more times likeliness of receving the manufacturer's attention, submitting it to the person/position with exact responsibility over the issue, which in this case is precisely what I'm doing, my so-called document will be submitted to the person that is head over Panasonic's blu-ray player team.

[Gold Ranger]

I'm not berating you, but I do have a few questions...

1- why did you decide to do this?
2- why now?
3- do you have clout with Panny?
4- how did you come by the people you are sending this to?

Thanks for your time and for doing this.
I know people over the years have tried to get things rolling, here's hoping you have better luck.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by stmhlm

Is this a school project? No, certainly not, do you work as a janitor?

No, but nothing wrong with being a janitor, nor it being a school project. My nephew just today graduated Harvard Law - https://hls.harvard.edu/ and received an award for doing a school project which involved over 1200 hours of pro bono work which made a meaningful difference.

Originally Posted by stmhlm

my so-called document will be submitted to the person that is head over Panasonic's blu-ray player team.

good luck with the outcome

[stmhlm]

Originally Posted by Gold Ranger

I'm not berating you, but I do have a few questions...

1- why did you decide to do this?
2- why now?
3- do you have clout with Panny?
4- how did you come by the people you are sending this to?

Thanks for your time and for doing this.
I know people over the years have tried to get things rolling, here's hoping you have better luck.

1. I'm looking at potentially purchasing the UB9000.
2. The sooner, the better.
3. Not sure exactly what you mean, but I have direct contact with the people responsible, yes.
4. I established contact with Stacey Spears, Spears & Munsil.

[Badas]

Originally Posted by Andrew Woo

I share the experience. But I can't say that it has any influence on the functionality of the 9000.

I was getting a little worried. Far hotter than any other player I have owned.
Then I had Star Trek UHD failure. However it is a disc failure.
Last night I watched 3 films in a row. 6 hours and it was hot but flawless.
So I'm just going to move on and just accept it gets hot.

[Better in Blu]

Originally Posted by Badas

I was getting a little worried. Far hotter than any other player I have owned.
Then I had Star Trek UHD failure. However it is a disc failure.
Last night I watched 3 films in a row. 6 hours and it was hot but flawless.
So I'm just going to move on and just accept it gets hot.

First, I've heard of this. Many weekends I will use my player for 10+ hours straight, and it's only warm to the touch. As long as the functionality isn't affected, wouldn't worry but not sure why an internal fan wouldn't be running.

[LordoftheRings]

Originally Posted by stmhlm

Thanks for the confidence, I'm assembling a formal document including detailed information about all your concerns and wishes, addressing compatibility-, functionality-, playability- and other firmware related remarks that would make Panasonic players more user-friendly. This includes facilitation of firmware limitations, user complaints since pre-release of the devices, as well as implementation ideas of new features that would increase your overall satisfaction with your player. Why am I doing this? Is this a school project? No, certainly not, do you work as a janitor? Jokes aside, good luck getting anything addressed, ever, if you just sit around complaining on forums, manufactures couldn't give jack jelly about that, by taking on an initiative, gathering the communities across several websites, collecting all the concerns from worldwide consumers, at least I've made the very best attempt of you receving a new firmware update containing most of what can be implemented within the current capabilities of the hardware of your player, submitting something formal, as in a document, rather professionally, have a thousand more times likeliness of receving the manufacturer's attention, submitting it to the person/position with exact responsibility over the issue, which in this case is precisely what I'm doing, my so-called document will be submitted to the person that is head over Panasonic's blu-ray player team.

With Panasonic 4K Blu-ray players . . . that'll be the day.
God lock

[chip75]

Originally Posted by stmhlm

Any chance you could share your new pictures? They are the last pictures I need to assemble my document.

I'll post them tomorrow, sorry for the delay.

[sephirothkefka]

Originally Posted by Better in Blu

First, I've heard of this. Many weekends I will use my player for 10+ hours straight, and it's only warm to the touch. As long as the functionality isn't affected, wouldn't worry but not sure why an internal fan wouldn't be running.

My player is quiet for at least 30 seconds and then turns on fan and stays on with a mild droning though it does cancel out after a bit. It doesn't get super duper hot either just reasonably warm. I did successfully manage to put new thermal compound on it rather than use the pad they used from factory though (Arctic MX-4).

[chip75]

Originally Posted by chip75

I'll post them tomorrow, sorry for the delay.

Like I said previously, it's a minor thing compared to the other things listed, but it is a slight annoyance.

Below is with STATUS two-press, everything is displaying properly with a Blu-ray of Stargirl.



PLAYER INFO. everything is correct.



Below is a DVD of Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman with the STATUS displayed. I assume as the image is 4:3, the player moves the pop-up towards the centre of the screen. But the pop-up is displayed corrected and not squeezed.



But when you press the PLAYER INFO. button the pop-up is distorted or squeezed. I assume it's because the 4:3 is narrower than the pop-ups natural width and the player adds the pillar-boxing.



Below is an image from Crimes of Passion DVD the PLAYER INFO. pop-up is displayed correctly, like Stargirl above.

Hope that helps and good luck!

[stmhlm]

Originally Posted by chip75

Like I said previously, it's a minor thing compared to the other things listed, but it is a slight annoyance...

Chip75, thank very much for posting, those images are excellent.

I fully understand your concern, below is what I think is happening with the Panasonic.


I think STATUS has more 'padding' in the firmware code of the player, where PLAYER INFO has much LESS, see below:



STATUS - yellow markings indicating the 'padding' surrounding the on-screen-display element.





PLAYER INFO - yellow markings indicating LESS 'padding' surrounding the on-screen-display element.





This results in PLAYER INFO not to being displayed in its 'native aspect ratio' - much like the example below.





I don't think PLAYER INFO is narrower by design, it is just forced to a narrower aspect ratio by the 'padding'.

If Panasonic applied similar 'padding' to PLAYER INFO as STATUS, the issue would be resolved, example below.




I will refer to these posts in my document, including all of the information above.

Thanks again for the excellent images.

[Waboman]

I’m confused. What is this “document” you’re working on? From what I’ve gathered you don’t even own one of these players nor have any hands on experience with them. So if I understand correctly, you’re simply gathering complaints/concerns from owners and putting them on paper? Do you have a golfing buddy who works there? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love Panny to correct some issues. But I’m not holding my breath.

[stmhlm]

Originally Posted by Waboman

I’m confused. What is this “document” you’re working on? From what I’ve gathered you don’t even own one of these players nor have any hands on experience with them. So if I understand correctly, you’re simply gathering complaints/concerns from owners and putting them on paper? Do you have a golfing buddy who works there? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love Panny to correct some issues. But I’m not holding my breath.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=8131

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=8128

[LordoftheRings]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If3S...ature=youtu.be

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Waboman

I’m confused. What is this “document” you’re working on? From what I’ve gathered you don’t even own one of these players nor have any hands on experience with them. So if I understand correctly, you’re simply gathering complaints/concerns from owners and putting them on paper? Do you have a golfing buddy who works there? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love Panny to correct some issues. But I’m not holding my breath.

It’s been my experience that when a home entertainment company is motivated to take the initiative in reaching out to the consumer, like in past examples of this happening on Blu-ray.com –
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...on#post1922584

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...st#post2043039

or, for that matter, any forum or platform, there is at least a reasonable chance of them thinking about devoting the resources (staff and time = $$) into accomplishing something desired by consumers, or at least, by default, o.k.’ed by most consumers involving some aspect of physical media. On the other hand, to provide unsolicited information to the home entertainment folks of a major company or corporation rarely achieves anything more than a polite thank you, or at most a minor concession in implementation for PR purposes.

Now, if stmhlm has been approached by Panasonic and in turn acting as a cut-out, been specifically commissioned by Panasonic to provide them this information, then that is a different matter and there is more hope as to achieving something meaningful coming to fruition. In the couple times I’ve visited this thread I haven’t seen him stating as such. Ergo, like you said, keep breathing. I do see one positive about it, as, comparatively, it’s more polished than that painful Pioneer player thing we had going on several weeks ago.

[LordoftheRings]

Well said Penton. And it's best trying than not. Us common mortels (Panasonic past, present and future customers), all we can do is pray and wish best luck to the most ardent entrepreneurs.

[sa5150]

Originally Posted by sephirothkefka

Hello! Just a first time poster here who wanted to give my thoughts on the UB820! I have a US spec machine made in the Czech Republic sometime in 2020. Overall I am very pleased with the machine and its been quite solid and reliable when connected to my Denon AVR-X3700H and LG CX though the only issues I have is some issues with some Warner and Disney 4K discs going frame by frame while in the pop-up menu for a few clicks on the remote while paused and occasional sluggishness with some menus. I watched Atlantis: The Lost Empire recently via the 2 pack and navigating through the menus was unusually slow (was just fine on my PS5) though most menus work wonderfully. I have some of the other 2 packs and discs from that era as well though I have yet to try them. Image upscaling was quite fantastic as well with 1080p discs and DVDs. Its quite easy to work on and very repairable to work on as well. Was honestly surprised it used a vacuum-florescent display as well as itself being modular with the IR sensor! Overall I'm quite pleased with the machine and if anyone looking to buy this model is interested in asking questions about it then feel free! I have also compared it to the X700 and UBK90 as well.

Nice , I thought that the Euro decks were the only ones made in Czech Republic . Anyone else get a usa player like that ?

[cupboy]

Originally Posted by sa5150

Nice , I thought that the Euro decks were the only ones made in Czech Republic . Anyone else get a usa player like that ?

Both of the 9000 machines I bought from Best Buy dot com were made in Czech Republic.

[sephirothkefka]

Originally Posted by sa5150

Nice , I thought that the Euro decks were the only ones made in Czech Republic . Anyone else get a usa player like that ?

I suspect they were from CR due to the virus disrupting one of Panasonic's Chinese factory. the only part from china is the remote. My batteries were Panasonic Zinc-carbons from Poland iirc.