Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[Animatic33]

Well, my 820 has suddenly stopped reading all/most of my UHD discs. I was playing the UHD of Skyfall last night when it started giving me grief. Now it seems all/most of my UHDs won’t load. It will play all the blurays fine, but something has happened to the UHD playback. I’ve power cycled it, reset the settings and still nothing. Not sure what the next step is. Player is 5 years old…

Edit: I did a full factory reset on it (as per Panasonic’s instructions) and it seems that some uhds will play, and others will not all. Scanner Cop 1&2 work flawlessly, Beastmaster and Daughters of Darkness took a bit longer to read, but Flesh For Frankenstein will not read. I have a 420 in my room that I've tested Flesh For Frankenstein on and it loads up just fine. I’m wondering if there’s a corrupted temporary database on the 820's memory that might have been affected by my faulty Skyfall disc. On Monday I’m going to call an electronics shop that I found through Panasonic’s website and weigh my options.

[Retroj23]

Originally Posted by sfmarine

I just wanted to thank those who got back to me regarding my fan/drive noise issue with the 820. Perhaps I just have really excellent hearing, but I came across numerous threads on other forums (AVS, Reddit), where noise factor concerns were raised.

Walmart surprisingly would not send me a replacement so my only option was to return it for a refund--which I did. This opens the door for me to purchase the 9000 at some point.

Would I buy the 820 again? I definitely would (on sale), and it would be excellent for one of my bedrooms. It played everything I threw at it without issue. It just works! Which is what you want in a player. I just could not stand how loud it was and found that fan to be quite annoying. The HDR optimizer is really awesome as well which is why I plan on getting the 9000.

YMMV marine but if you have a Magnolia/Best Buy near you, you might find a good deal on the UB9000. I was at my local store yesterday and there was a used one for $500. I was very close to buying it but I couldn't justify it. And I'm very happy with my 203.

[thebigcheese3k]

Has anyone compared the DVD upscaling of the 820 to the PS5 or Xbox Series X? I’m wondering if they’re a better option for DVD playback.

[sapiendut]

DVD playback sucks on these Panasonics.

[lamont360]

Looking between the 820 and the 420. Currently I'm running an older 1080p epson UB 3020...Believe...Might be a 5020... It's been a while. Either way. It's a 1080p display.

Looking for something to improve the visual quality when watching 4k content on it. I hope to upgrade at some point to the upcoming Laser Epson 5060 4K model that has HDR10+. No confirmation on DV yet, but I am assuming it doesn't.

Assuming that the new projector only does HDR10+, and I'll be running audio to my AVR/amps, what would the group recommend? The 420 or the 820? Be nice to save every penny I can if the visual HDR optimizer is equivalent.

Thanks!

[martydmc12]

Originally Posted by Animatic33

Well, my 820 has suddenly stopped reading all/most of my UHD discs. I was playing the UHD of Skyfall last night when it started giving me grief. Now it seems all/most of my UHDs won’t load. It will play all the blurays fine, but something has happened to the UHD playback. I’ve power cycled it, reset the settings and still nothing. Not sure what the next step is. Player is 5 years old…

Edit: I did a full factory reset on it (as per Panasonic’s instructions) and it seems that some uhds will play, and others will not all. Scanner Cop 1&2 work flawlessly, Beastmaster and Daughters of Darkness took a bit longer to read, but Flesh For Frankenstein will not read. I have a 420 in my room that I've tested Flesh For Frankenstein on and it loads up just fine. I’m wondering if there’s a corrupted temporary database on the 820's memory that might have been affected by my faulty Skyfall disc. On Monday I’m going to call an electronics shop that I found through Panasonic’s website and weigh my options.

Not sure if you saw my posts in the past few days about my 9000 not ejecting the disc.

Getting worried these Panasonic players aren't as great as everyone has proclaimed them to be. I say that as a loyal Panasonic consumer for the past 25+ years. Might have to consider looking at the Pioneer 4K player if worst comes to worst.

[CreasyBear]

Originally Posted by lamont360

Looking between the 820 and the 420. Currently I'm running an older 1080p epson UB 3020...Believe...Might be a 5020... It's been a while. Either way. It's a 1080p display.

Looking for something to improve the visual quality when watching 4k content on it. I hope to upgrade at some point to the upcoming Laser Epson 5060 4K model that has HDR10+. No confirmation on DV yet, but I am assuming it doesn't.

Assuming that the new projector only does HDR10+, and I'll be running audio to my AVR/amps, what would the group recommend? The 420 or the 820? Be nice to save every penny I can if the visual HDR optimizer is equivalent.

Thanks!

The HDR Optimizer is the same across the 420, 820, and 9000. The 420 just doesn't have DV.

[Animatic33]

Originally Posted by martydmc12

Not sure if you saw my posts in the past few days about my 9000 not ejecting the disc.

Getting worried these Panasonic players aren't as great as everyone has proclaimed them to be. I say that as a loyal Panasonic consumer for the past 25+ years. Might have to consider looking at the Pioneer 4K player if worst comes to worst.

I had not, but did take the time to read through it just now.

I had a similar issue as yours, but with a blu-ray of Bill and Ted wouldn’t eject on my 820. Same symptoms as yours. I did open my unit (it’s out of warranty) and was able to get the tray to release. Seeing your issue with the 9000 sounds very frustrating and at the cost of those units today makes the prospect of quality merchandise seem a little hard to believe. I hope the repair shop gets you sorted.

I’ve contacted Bay-Bloor Radio about my unit and will hopefully hear back as to whether it can be serviced by them or get pointed to a shop they’d believe is reputable. But I am worried about the chip shortage and with parts scarcity this may be a problem. I am glad I made the decision to purchase a 420 as a backup last year, just in case something like this occurred.

[martydmc12]

Originally Posted by Animatic33

I had a similar issue as yours, but with a blu-ray of Bill and Ted wouldn’t eject on my 820. Same symptoms as yours. I did open my unit (it’s out of warranty) and was able to get the tray to release.

So it sounds like a tray/gear issue, rather than an issue with the chip and/or programming. Gears are one thing, telling the player to do one thing but it does something else is a programming/software error I would suspect, which I think would be more costly and time consuming in the long run.

Definitely thinking about buying some backup players, especially for future proofing later on down the road.

[screwhead728]

Originally Posted by danny24

The UB9000 is actually discontinued but replaced with the UB9000P1K as you probably know. Crutchfield has the new model along with Value Electronics. It's pretty much the same premium player.

Having used both the 820 and UB9000 I can say the UB9000 is definitely quieter but video looks almost identical.

I'm not new in the forum but new in this thread. I recently bought the Panasonic UB9000 from Best Buy, like about 3 weeks ago to be exact. I guess the player I got was the P1K you're mentioning? And if so, how can I confirm? Because on Best Buy's website, it says p1k, but I guess there's other ways to confirm. Also, what is the difference between the p1k and the older version?

[Riake]

Does double-tapping Playback Info while watching Netflix, or any of the other streamers, reveal the mastering information?

[idlebrain]

Originally Posted by screwhead728

I'm not new in the forum but new in this thread. I recently bought the Panasonic UB9000 from Best Buy, like about 3 weeks ago to be exact. I guess the player I got was the P1K you're mentioning? And if so, how can I confirm? Because on Best Buy's website, it says p1k, but I guess there's other ways to confirm. Also, what is the difference between the p1k and the older version?

You will see UB9000P1K on the back panel above serial number. BB doesn't have stock for Old version since last couple of months. It will be new P1K version. Except DAC, they both supposed to be same.

[RevolverOcelScott]

So my 820 seems to be running great. Only thing that bothers me, is now about every 20-30min audio cuts out for a fraction of a second, like a word in a line of dialog randomly. Nothing in my setup changed from my last 4K player. Any ideas?

[slimdude]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

DVD playback sucks on these Panasonics.

The primary reason why people buy 4K blu-ray players (in general), is to watch 4K UHD movies in HDR and Dolby Vision and Blu-rays. DVDs are always secondary. I watch my DVDs on my plasma tv in my bedroom, not on the 4K TV in my home theater.

[sapiendut]

Originally Posted by slimdude

The primary reason why people buy 4K blu-ray players (in general), is to watch 4K UHD movies in HDR and Dolby Vision and Blu-rays. DVDs are always secondary. I watch my DVDs on my plasma tv in my bedroom, not on the 4K TV in my home theater.

Exactly. That’s why I still end up with an 820 and two 9000 regardless of the DVD playback capability. I essentially only use them for BD and UHD BD playback.

[screwhead728]

Originally Posted by idlebrain

You will see UB9000P1K on the back panel above serial number. BB doesn't have stock for Old version since last couple of months. It will be new P1K version. Except DAC, they both supposed to be same.

Thank you. Just checked and I have the P1K version.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

Exactly. That’s why I still end up with an 820 and two 9000 regardless of the DVD playback capability. I essentially only use them for BD and UHD BD playback.

"Exactly" my ass. For such good quality players to have such shite DVD playback is a curious inconsistency, if it advertises DVD playback and costs this much fookin money then you'd think it'd be top of the pile for playing them old discs, but no such luck. Just because you don't play DVDs on them doesn't mean no-one else does, it's always wild when someone's excuse for whatever poor performance of x tech is "meh, I don't use it so it doesn't matter".

[mkozlows]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

"Exactly" my ass. For such good quality players to have such shite DVD playback is a curious inconsistency, if it advertises DVD playback and costs this much fookin money then you'd think it'd be top of the pile for playing them old discs, but no such luck. Just because you don't play DVDs on them doesn't mean no-one else does, it's always wild when someone's excuse for whatever poor performance of x tech is "meh, I don't use it so it doesn't matter".

On the one hand, okay, sure, that makes sense to me. On the other hand... well, I will never under any circumstances play a DVD ever again and so I literally do not care even one whit what the DVD playback is like, and if they could shave $5 off the cost of the player by making DVD playback terrible, I would want them to do it.

"Don't buy this if you care about DVDs, but it's otherwise good" seems like a fine reconciliation of that.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by mkozlows

On the one hand, okay, sure, that makes sense to me. On the other hand... well, I will never under any circumstances play a DVD ever again and so I literally do not care even one whit what the DVD playback is like, and if they could shave $5 off the cost of the player by making DVD playback terrible, I would want them to do it.

"Don't buy this if you care about DVDs, but it's otherwise good" seems like a fine reconciliation of that.

But it hasn't affected the price, these are still some of the most 'spensive players on the market. Hell, if they had just removed the DVD playback when designing this chipset I'd have been happier with that! Rather have it be gone completely than thrown in as an afterthought with threadbare functionality and awful deinterlacing.

[danny24]

This is why I use a 203 and UB9000 as my main setup. DVD playback on the Panasonic is pretty much garbage. The Reavon X700 even has better DVD upscaling than the 820/UB9000. Oppo 203/205 Sony X800/X800M2/X1100ES has the best DVD upscaling imo.

I mainly play UHD and BD discs but will pop a DVD in once in awhile. It's still a good format even if it's SD/480p.i and dated now. People still watch them and enjoy them even if we don't as much as we used to.

Hopefully Panasonic on future models improves the DVD upscaling.

The Pioneer LX500 likely has good DVD upscaling as Pioneer players have always done good with upscaling DVD's. I don't own an LX500 so I can't tell.

DVD upscaling should matter imo. Most people that buy any player will likely play DVD's. Obviously the 820/UB9000 players are mainly geared towards UHD/BD playback.

Sadly though DVD is going the way of VHS. People still enjoy them and I do once in awhile.