Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[cjake]

Originally Posted by Robert Zohn

@ King Crimson, the selling price came out to be $135, which is higher than I expected and wanted. For the moment we're delayed while working on getting the price down.

Robert, you seem to have the EB (Great Britain) version of the UB9000 operating manual on the Value Electronics site.

The Great Britain and European versions of the UB9000 include a different remote than the US/Canada versions.

The N2QAYA000175 remote is included with the US and Canadian version of the UB9000.
The N2QAYA000172 remote is included with the Great Britain and European versions.

In an earlier post I mentioned that I purchased a N2QAYA000172 remote from a Spanish online shop. It works fine with my US version of the UB820.

One difference between the two remotes is that the 172 has -10 and +60 second manual Skip buttons while the 175 does not. So in that way I prefer the European remote as I use -10 second backward skip quite often.

If you want to update the website with a US/Canadian version of the operating manual, I found one at this link:

http://help.panasonic.ca/viewing/ALL...5/TQBS0285.pdf

Both operating manuals have diagrams of the remote that will identify the button differences between the two.

[Robert Zohn]

Thank you cjake!

When I put up the UB9000 user manual the only choice in English was the UK manual. I'll update my UB9000 webpage with the USA user manual.

[eddievanhalen]

Has anybody tried setting the video output on Panasonic players to either Limited RGB or Full RGB? With Limited RGB I get crushed blacks and with Full RGB the black level is correct on my Samsung display.
I was curious about the RGB video settings as component video has to be converted to RGB at some point to feed the panel as they work with RGB.
I found with two surprises, one is that the 420 outputs 12 bit RGB video on HDR which my Samsung set recognizes as such, I get both HDR and Wide Color Gamut. The second one is that picture looks a bit cleaner than with 4:4:4 12 component, the difference is subtle but it is there.
But I found very surprising to check that RGB, 12 bit video and HDR and compatible, I thought RGB video was limited to 8 bit and not compatible with RGB.
When the Sony X-800 is set to output RGB it's limited to 8 bit so Wide Color Gamut is lost. The On Screen info on my Samsung set displays HDR 'though with the X-800 set to RGB despite being stripped of Wide Color Gamut.

[sapiendut]

The correct output should be limited RGB.

RGB can be 8 bit, 10 bit, etc.

All panels are natively RGB

[WutDaFunk]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

The correct output should be limited RGB.

RGB can be 8 bit, 10 bit, etc.

All panels are natively RGB

Would that be the best setting for an LG C8 OLED? Or ycbcr?

[sapiendut]

I can’t remember. If the TV can’t take it, the picture will be overly pink or overly green, you’ll see it in a blink of an eye. I always try to send the RGB signal to the display so the display doesn’t need to do any conversion.

[Geoff D]

But doing it that way means that the player is still converting it from YCbCr to RGB so the conversion itself is unavoidable, and I'd much rather have the TV with its superior 14-bit processing that cost me three and a half grand doing that than a player which cost 3% of that figure. I see banding introduced into the Panny's image when using the Optimiser, it's slight and doesn't overtly affect all content but it's definitely there and although that doesn't relate to colour space per se it's an example of how the Panny's processing can hit a brick wall. Hardly touched the Optimiser since.

Eddie: these players should not be on Full because the content is mastered to Limited levels. If it looks better to you then that's great, but if everything has been set up correctly at your TV's end then Limited should have the correct black level - "crushed" or not - and Full should look very washed out, even the black bars should be grey and not black. If they are black in Full then you've got something very off in the TV's settings somewhere.

[eddievanhalen]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

But doing it that way means that the player is still converting it from YCbCr to RGB so the conversion itself is unavoidable, and I'd much rather have the TV with its superior 14-bit processing that cost me three and a half grand doing that than a player which cost 3% of that figure. I see banding introduced into the Panny's image when using the Optimiser, it's slight and doesn't overtly affect all content but it's definitely there and although that doesn't relate to colour space per se it's an example of how the Panny's processing can hit a brick wall. Hardly touched the Optimiser since.

Eddie: these players should not be on Full because the content is mastered to Limited levels. If it looks better to you then that's great, but if everything has been set up correctly at your TV's end then Limited should have the correct black level - "crushed" or not - and Full should look very washed out, even the black bars should be grey and not black. If they are black in Full then you've got something very off in the TV's settings somewhere.

Samsung TV's have a setting for Full Range and Limited range RGB but there's something weird. If I set RGB level on the Samsung TV to "Auto" what looks whitish and with grey black bars is when I set the output of the Panasonic player to Limited, Full plays video at normal levels, just like if the output was set to 4:4:4 but cleaner.
I have a 1000 Euros 49" Samsung TV, a low end set on my book, I doubt but one can never be sure, that my Samsung set has the kind and quality of processing of your high end set.
Setting the Panasonic to output 4:4:4 12 bit video makes it look great but with 12 bit RGB video it looks better, cleaner, I like how it looks this way either with UHD BD's or BD's upscaled to 2160p.
The Sony X-800's picture pales in comparison with the one of the Panasonic's.

[PUsokrJosh305]

I'm planning on getting the UB820 later on today through Best Buy! (Been saving up and have a 10% off code, haha!) Now, I don't have a 4K TV yet, but I plan on getting one in the future. Does the 820 do well with converting to SDR?? I would love to get a Panasonic 4K TV but alas, I live in the U.S. and I won't be visiting the Canadian border anytime soon. I do miss Panasonic being over here in the U.S.!

[FilmFreakosaurus]

Originally Posted by PUsokrJosh305

I'm planning on getting the UB820 later on today through Best Buy! (Been saving up and have a 10% off code, haha!) Now, I don't have a 4K TV yet, but I plan on getting one in the future. Does the 820 do well with converting to SDR?? I would love to get a Panasonic 4K TV but alas, I live in the U.S. and I won't be visiting the Canadian border anytime soon. I do miss Panasonic being over here in the U.S.!

That's one of the reasons the 820 is so popular... solid HDR to SDR conversion.

[jt7272]

Originally Posted by Bigbro

Amazon Prime doesn't work properly. Indeed stuttering etc. I use a wired connection pumping out 250MB per second. This is more than enough. No problems with the Netflix app. Furthermore probably the ethernet connection does not allow more than 100MB to pass anyway. This should be more than enough since the streaming apps only use a max of about 20 MB per second.

I can concur that I indeed have the same issue. Amazon prime video looks like dirt on this player. The first problem is that it runs at 60Hz. This is just sacrilege for a device of this caliber. That would be like Blu-rays playing only at 60Hz. I have a Sony X800 that streams both Prime and Netflix flawlessly, and in 24 Hz when the content supports it.

The second problem is that the app is so laggy. Once again, it runs fine on my Roku, Sony X800, PS4, etc.

I tried to talk to Panasonic support about this and they were just clueless. They asked me if I had 24p enabled in the settings...I had to tell them that the setting was only for Blu-ray's, not streaming...

[jt7272]

Originally Posted by jt7272

I can concur that I indeed have the same issue. Amazon prime video looks like dirt on this player. The first problem is that it runs at 60Hz. This is just sacrilege for a device of this caliber. That would be like Blu-rays playing only at 60Hz. I have a Sony X800 that streams both Prime and Netflix flawlessly, and in 24 Hz when the content supports it.

The second problem is that the app is so laggy. Once again, it runs fine on my Roku, Sony X800, PS4, etc.

I tried to talk to Panasonic support about this and they were just clueless. They asked me if I had 24p enabled in the settings...I had to tell them that the setting was only for Blu-ray's, not streaming...

Also, people need to be aware that they will NOT get 4kHDR content via streaming on this device if your display does not support 18gbps HDMI. 4kHDR is possible with 10gbps HDMI but only at 24 Hz. Fortunately most streamed content is produced at 24Hz so it would work just fine (as it does on a Sony or Samsung player) IF the damn UB820 supported 24p streaming (it does not).

So, please verify that your display has 18gbps HDMI before purchasing! Otherwise your streaming will be limited to 1080p60 SDR.

Unfortunately this type of information is not easy to discern and it is not clearly stated anywhere by Panasonic.

[rickardl]

So... I am using the UB820 with a 2013 Samsung Plasma PS64F8500...
Yes, I know I don't get/have HDR or 4K but I wanted to view some of the new 4K releases (such as Alien and Black Hawk Down) even though would be downscaled.
So far I am very pleased, looks great IMHO!
But I wonder if there are some settings which would maximize my (limited) viewing experience a bit more.
I have set
Video Format to 1080p
4K Output to Off
24p Output to Automatic
Dolby Vision to On
HDR10+ to On
Colour Mode to YCbCr (automatic)
Deep Colour Output to Auto 12-bit prio
HDR/Colour Gamut Output to SDR/BT.709
HDR TV Type to Basic Luminance LCD and Projector
HDCP Output Setting HDCP 1.4 Limit
Content Type Flag to Automatic

HDR Opimizer to On
DR Conversion Adjustment to -2
Tone Curve (Black) to +2
All Noise Reductions to 0 (I think they defaulted higher?)

Also, when viewing a normal blu-ray, I get some other options:
Display to "Normal" or "Projector" - what would be best for 2013 Plasma?
Picture Type to "Normal" or "Cinema" "Fine Cinema" etc?

[adamjankowski]

Does anyone own this player along with an LG OLED?

[PissedOffPeoN]

I do why .

[rickardl]

Originally Posted by PUsokrJosh305

Does the 820 do well with converting to SDR??

Yes it does and that was also my reason for buying it and I am not disappointed at all.
The image and Atmos sound from Bladerunner (1982) which I watched yesterday on my Plasma was just amazing...

[spider-neil]

Is the 820 a quiet player? I had the LG UP970 and it sounded like a plane taking off when playing 4k.

[cartload]

Originally Posted by spider-neil

Is the 820 a quiet player? I had the LG UP970 and it sounded like a plane taking off when playing 4k.

I would not call the 820 quiet, but it has never sounded like a plane taking off while playing a 4K disc. I think the 820 is noisy when loading discs, but it gets quiet enough for me when the movie starts

[curlyjive]

Anyone else have freezes playing black hawk down? Mine would freeze everything 15 minutes or so. I ordered a replacement disc, but I saw on other forums people having freezing with that disc and the 820

[PissedOffPeoN]

I heard that's the source problem of the disc when sparechange reviewed it.