Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[CaptainZombie]

I ran a few more movies on this since yesterday, and of course as I am watching John Wick this evening I keep getting nothing but artifacts and freezing with the second half of the movie. WTF is it with these stupid players. Isn't there one good 4K BD player out there that doesn't have problem after problem?

I will say that I do like the picture better with the UB820 over the Sony players that I had, but man, for a bit more expensive player than the Sony this thing should not be doing the same crap as the Sonys.

[jess1581]

Originally Posted by CaptainZombie

I ran a few more movies on this since yesterday, and of course as I am watching John Wick this evening I keep getting nothing but artifacts and freezing with the second half of the movie. WTF is it with these stupid players. Isn't there one good 4K BD player out there that doesn't have problem after problem?

I will say that I do like the picture better with the UB820 over the Sony players that I had, but man, for a bit more expensive player than the Sony this thing should not be doing the same crap as the Sonys.

Did you check the disc to be cleaned or to see if there are scratches?

[CaptainZombie]

Originally Posted by jess1581

Did you check the disc to be cleaned or to see if there are scratches?

I did. I have this habit before putting a movie into even my previous Sony player to clean them. I have been doing the same with the Panny player too. I'll throw in a few more movies this weekend to see how things run.

Is it me or placebo, but the movies in the Panny do look a tad bit better than the Sonys.

[Guydowood]

Indeed. I’ve had the UB820 for 2 years now and most recently I’m getting the disc cannot read pop up with pretty much all 4K discs now. It’s ridiculous to pay a premium price for a player that shouldn’t shit the bed this continuously. I have followed the wipe the disc before loading it, have blown compressed air into it to somewhat move the dust particles and yet the loading time is slow and the cannot read disc pop up. I’m not sure if purchasing the UB450 would be worth picking up or not at this point.

[CaptainZombie]

Originally Posted by Guydowood

Indeed. I’ve had the UB820 for 2 years now and most recently I’m getting the disc cannot read pop up with pretty much all 4K discs now. It’s ridiculous to pay a premium price for a player that shouldn’t shit the bed this continuously. I have followed the wipe the disc before loading it, have blown compressed air into it to somewhat move the dust particles and yet the loading time is slow and the cannot read disc pop up. I’m not sure if purchasing the UB450 would be worth picking up or not at this point.

That really does stink and sorry to hear that. I just wish that both Sony and Panasonic would make some new updated players, but I think at this point in the game that is a no go. Considering that the UB820 is a $400-500 player, depending on when you get this thing on sale, it should be really kicking some butt at this price. I just can't justify spending the crazy prices for the UB9000 which sounds like it is a much better player overall.

I think that I will return the X800M2 for sure, I do like the overall picture quality of the UB820 much better with the 4K discs and will keep the Panny.

[sojrner]

Originally Posted by CaptainZombie

I ran a few more movies on this since yesterday, and of course as I am watching John Wick this evening I keep getting nothing but artifacts and freezing with the second half of the movie. WTF is it with these stupid players. Isn't there one good 4K BD player out there that doesn't have problem after problem?

I will say that I do like the picture better with the UB820 over the Sony players that I had, but man, for a bit more expensive player than the Sony this thing should not be doing the same crap as the Sonys.

Bummer man. You are correct that it should not do that. The fact that many of us do not have this issue with that player (on that same disc too) means that either you should clean your disc (off-gassing, fingerprints, etc), it's a scratched-up disc, or you have a lemon and need to return that player for a replacement.

Hope it works out for you.

[mdhaus]

Originally Posted by Telemachus

UB820 is trash for file playback and DVDs look worse than anything else I own that does DVD. The Sony is a great player it's just a dumpster fire for BD100 discs

Unfortunately, that means that it's a dumpster fire for a big chunk of titles on the market. Yes, it's a lot cheaper...but you pay royally in quality and it's just not worth it, especially when you can get a Panasonic on-sale for not much more.

[mdhaus]

Originally Posted by DRC72

I picked up an 820 at Best Buy yesterday for $349. I bought it as a back up player for my 9000.

I also have a 9000 and an 820, each in different rooms. Both are great players.

[PUsokrJosh305]

Originally Posted by Guydowood

Indeed. I’ve had the UB820 for 2 years now and most recently I’m getting the disc cannot read pop up with pretty much all 4K discs now. It’s ridiculous to pay a premium price for a player that shouldn’t shit the bed this continuously. I have followed the wipe the disc before loading it, have blown compressed air into it to somewhat move the dust particles and yet the loading time is slow and the cannot read disc pop up. I’m not sure if purchasing the UB450 would be worth picking up or not at this point.

Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it in directly to the wall to see if that would work?

I know I had a glitch every once in a while where my 820 wouldn't read anything I put into the player (DVD, Blu-ray, 4K). I figured out it was a power issue. My old Monster Cable surge protector wasn't giving the player enough power. Once I bought a new surge protector, the issue went away.

Try that and see if it works! Otherwise, it might be a laser reading issue.

[SpaceDandy]

Originally Posted by CaptainZombie

The first movie I watched on the X800M2 which is Hellraiser III (Arrow UHD), and I get a freeze towards the end of the film. It is so frustrating with this format for sure. The original X800 would drive me nuts having to unplug the player at times during hard lock ups. It seems like the 800M2 isn't too far behind with the problems.

Is there anything that the UB820 lacks on vs. the Sony players?

The Media Player feature of the Sony X700 and X800M2 support more video, audio and subtitle formats. The Sony is notably able to read transport streams, while Panasonic units forbid it.

Unfortunately, the Sony can spectacularly fail with interlaced content. Really, there are no "perfect" players and it all comes down to what are your use case and preferred disc format. For discs (DVD to UHD), Panasonic is better. If you use the media player feature extensively, Sony may be a preferred choice.

[Guydowood]

Originally Posted by PUsokrJosh305

Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it in directly to the wall to see if that would work?

I know I had a glitch every once in a while where my 820 wouldn't read anything I put into the player (DVD, Blu-ray, 4K). I figured out it was a power issue. My old Monster Cable surge protector wasn't giving the player enough power. Once I bought a new surge protector, the issue went away.

Try that and see if it works! Otherwise, it might be a laser reading issue.

I did try that trick, but I didn't consider plugging directly into the wall, and just back into the surge protector. I will give that a try and see how it goes! Thanks for the tip!

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by PUsokrJosh305

Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it in directly to the wall to see if that would work?

I know I had a glitch every once in a while where my 820 wouldn't read anything I put into the player (DVD, Blu-ray, 4K). I figured out it was a power issue. My old Monster Cable surge protector wasn't giving the player enough power. Once I bought a new surge protector, the issue went away.

Try that and see if it works! Otherwise, it might be a laser reading issue.

Surge protection seems to be a really big thing in the US, and most reports of the 820 being a bag of donkey dicks seem to stem from there too. Makes me wonder if there's a connection. Or perhaps Panny just sent a really bad batch to the US.

[Cherokee Jack]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Surge protection seems to be a really big thing in the US, and most reports of the 820 being a bag of donkey dicks seem to stem from there too. Makes me wonder if there's a connection. Or perhaps Panny just sent a really bad batch to the US.

Have my replacement UB820 hooked up to the same Panamax unit as the janky old one and it’s worked flawlessly so far. I like the theory that Panasonic was using inferior parts during the height of COVID manufacturing shortages.

[deatheats]

Originally Posted by Cherokee Jack

Have my replacement UB820 hooked up to the same Panamax unit as the janky old one and it’s worked flawlessly so far. I like the theory that Panasonic was using inferior parts during the height of COVID manufacturing shortages.

Another possibility is that quick start is rendering a lot of “restarts” ineffective since it’s only putting the player into standby. It’s not until the end user literally unplugs the power to try a different surge protector or outlet they are seeing the full restart take place.

Very few people are running with quick start disabled due to the increase boot time, and they likely aren’t unplugging the device or disabling it very often either…so players can go months without actually being powered off.

[Telemachus]

Quick start is awful, and it does nerf disc restarts from my experience, turn it off. You think you know slow boot times you must not have owned an HD-A1.

Originally Posted by mdhaus

Unfortunately, that means that it's a dumpster fire for a big chunk of titles on the market.

When I first got my player most titles were BD-66, I think all Disney titles are at least my MCU set, but funny now almost everything is BD-100 so it really is a big problem.

[Cherokee Jack]

Originally Posted by deatheats

Another possibility is that quick start is rendering a lot of “restarts” ineffective since it’s only putting the player into standby. It’s not until the end user literally unplugs the power to try a different surge protector or outlet they are seeing the full restart take place.

Very few people are running with quick start disabled due to the increase boot time, and they likely aren’t unplugging the device or disabling it very often either…so players can go months without actually being powered off.

Pretty sure I eventually turned quick start off on my last unit after seeing it recommended as a possible cause of various problems. Didn’t make a difference but then again maybe it was too far gone at that point. I’ve had it turned off since day one on the replacement. I also use my current UB820 far less often than the old one after picking up a cheap X800M2 to handle DV discs. Doing whatever I can to baby the thing because I’m not going back to watching vanilla HDR10 discs without the Panny optimizer.

[sapiendut]

Originally Posted by Telemachus

Quick start is awful, and it does nerf disc restarts from my experience, turn it off. You think you know slow boot times you must not have owned an HD-A1.



When I first got my player most titles were BD-66, I think all Disney titles are at least my MCU set, but funny now almost everything is BD-100 so it really is a big problem.

Ahhhhh. I remember the HD-A1 and Sony BDP-S1. Those are slooooooow.
I always turn off any type of quick start. By the time my projector is ready everything else will be ready too.

[TotallyTuned]

Guys, I think my UB820 is a lemon.

It's too late for a return and it is out of warranty. (just over a yr of ownership, low volume use)

Two different disks now pixelate/stutter/freeze with intermittent sound at about the point where the layers switch. Both were 100GB disks, they were from different studios. One Lionsgate, one Universal. Both run perfectly fine in my x700 which is ironic because i bought the 820 when I had issues with some 100GB disks on that player.

Now maybe the mastering is imperfect, but there is a pattern here and since many people say they don't encounter issues like this with their 820s, I am left to assume mine is not working to spec. The question is, do you guys think replacing the drive unit would fix the problem? Not sure what component to suspect, but the drive unit costs $200 and is still cheaper than a new 820. (Which does have a gorgeous picture when it works)

BTW, I've tried the following to give the 820 every chance of reading the disk:

* cleaning the disk
* disable Viera link
* disable Dolby Vision
* Switched HDMI cords (both are 18gbps, one was from Monoprice, the other Sony)
* connected the player directly to the TV to bypass the video passthrough of my Denon AVR

[sapiendut]

How come you don’t realize for a year that you are using a lemon unit?

[TotallyTuned]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

How come you don’t realize for a year that you are using a lemon unit?

1. I try not to rewatch movies too soon or they will be ruined for me. Generally I wait at least a yr before I rewatch something. Prior to Nov 2023, I used the Sony to watch everything so I did not immediately start re-watching my whole catalogue. Till recently. I had no reason to suspect that something that works on the Sony would not work in the UB820.

2. Not every disk in my collection is 4k, and not every 4k is 100GB.

3. I think it is a soft lemon rather than a rotten lemon. It's not that it won't read ANY 100GB disks, it just has lower fault tolerances so there are SOME 100GB disks it doesn't like. I recently watched all 3 Extended Edition disks from The Hobbit and Waterworld. All 100GB disks that functioned as expected.

And like I said, maybe the most recent culprit SISU 2022 has a microscopic flaw of some kind, but if other people are not having this issue all the time, and the x700 and PS5 can read the disk, then surely the 820 is somehow deficient. That's my reasoning anyway.