Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[Naiera]

Pretty sure you can’t actually make a Blu-ray player region free; you have to switch regions. Are you sure the discs you tested weren’t actually region A and B?

[chip75]

Originally Posted by Naiera

Pretty sure you can’t actually make a Blu-ray player region free; you have to switch regions. Are you sure the discs you tested weren’t actually region A and B?

I don't think any of them are, like you posted, you have to change region manually. DVDs are automatic on modified players.

[TheShape31]

Originally Posted by Naiera

Pretty sure you can’t actually make a Blu-ray player region free; you have to switch regions. Are you sure the discs you tested weren’t actually region A and B?

Originally Posted by chip75

I don't think any of them are, like you posted, you have to change region manually. DVDs are automatic on modified players.

I confirmed region compatibility with my Sony X800 (Reg. A). The discs I tested were correctly flagged as Reg. B and would not play.

On the UB820:
I watched a Reg. A Blu-ray, then immediately switched to one of the Reg. B discs which played perfectly. I’d then switch back to a Reg. A release, and again, no issues. Another Reg. B disc, another success. No button presses necessary at any time.

I don’t know how it’s happening, and I was just as surprised to see it as you are to hear about it.

Edit:
The region A discs were multi-region.

[IlCorvo]

Originally Posted by TheShape31

I confirmed region compatibility with my Sony X800 (Reg. A). The discs I tested were correctly flagged as Reg. B and would not play.

On the UB820:
I watched a Reg. A Blu-ray, then immediately switched to one of the Reg. B discs which played perfectly. I’d then switch back to a Reg. A release, and again, no issues. Another Reg. B disc, another success. No button presses necessary at any time.

I don’t know how it’s happening, and I was just as surprised to see it as you are to hear about it.

Which mod did you use?

[TheShape31]

Originally Posted by IlCorvo

Which mod did you use?

My unit was purchased direct from 220 Electronics, so I’m uncertain of the technical details.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by TheShape31

I confirmed region compatibility with my Sony X800 (Reg. A). The discs I tested were correctly flagged as Reg. B and would not play.

On the UB820:
I watched a Reg. A Blu-ray, then immediately switched to one of the Reg. B discs which played perfectly. I’d then switch back to a Reg. A release, and again, no issues. Another Reg. B disc, another success. No button presses necessary at any time.

I don’t know how it’s happening, and I was just as surprised to see it as you are to hear about it.

Silly question: while you can double check that the Reg. B discs are locked, have you done the same with the Reg. A discs? I aks because some discs that are marked as Reg. A are actually Reg. Free, in fact most major US studio releases from the last 5-10 years aren't locked and some studios have always been Reg. Free like Warners. If you're playing indie titles e.g. Shout or Kino that's another matter, those are almost always Reg. A locked so if they're working without any extra jiggery-pokery along with Reg. B titles then you have a unicorn of a player.

Or to do a control test you could switch the Panny to Reg. B and try playing some of these Reg. A titles

[TheShape31]

Update:
I went through several different studios last night with Reg. A discs, including Kino. I dug deeper today and popped in a new Shout purchase, the only brand I couldn’t remember testing… And it finally worked. Too many “Reg. A” releases to list, both from major and indie studios, unexpectedly turned out to be multi-region.

Well, at least that’s settled.

[Hasslein Curve]

I’ve had my 820 a couple weeks now. I’ve thrown everything at it disc-wise. 4K, 1080, DVD, CD. I had about 2 sec of pixelation during a 1080p playback on the first day. No issues after that.

Speaking about faulty disk playback… I own one of those bad copies of World Trade Center, the 2 disc blu. The feature film disk still wouldn’t read on the 820 but the special features disc read fine. Neither the PS3 slim or the UBK90 was able to do that.

There is a noticeable PQ upgrade from the UBK90 to the 820.

[Cherokee Jack]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Ooh, I meant to reply to that. My 820 has been fine for scratched discs, I don't think any one brand is immune to a badly damaged disc (had to send back Fright Night as the Panny nor the OPPO could play past the scratched point) but for light scratches it's been fine, nothing like as sensitive as what matey described his as. I don't doubt his experience but my own, with all the Panny UHD players I've had, has been excellent. But then that's what UHD has been like, it's a lottery as to whether the player you buy will be 99% bulletproof or as sensitive as an exposed nerve.

Yeah, based that assertion on owner comments on another forum. Several members acted as if it was common knowledge that the 820 was especially temperamental reading dirty or lightly scratched discs but that's obviously anecdotal. My own player didn't start regularly having issues reading certain discs until right after the warranty ended (naturally). It did have severe pixelation with several of the Craig Bond UHD's shortly after buying it but I read in the Craig UHD thread that the old releases were known to have playback problems on certain players so I didn't think too much of it at the time. I do seem to remember a few members saying they'd sent their 820's to Panasonic for a fix however...

Would you say it's worth opening the player up and giving it a cleaning? Lots of dust here in Arizona and it gets into everything.

[Cherokee Jack]

Following up on my 820's playback issues, I experienced them again tonight and now I'm definitely getting suspicious that my player might be faulty. The disc (Hunt for Red October UHD) had no scratches visible under close inspection and just a few tiny particles of dust. Yet it broke up into pixelation several times, something it did not do the last time I watched it on my old Sony X800.

The odd thing is that the pixelation only occurred immediately after resuming playback after pausing it; it did this after pausing a few times so I don't think it was a specific part of the film with an issue. This is not the first disc where pixelation has occurred after pausing but it's the most extreme example of it only occurring after pausing. Might this indicate a player issue rather than just oversensitivity to disc faults?

[CompleteCount]

Originally Posted by Cherokee Jack

Following up on my 820's playback issues, I experienced them again tonight and now I'm definitely getting suspicious that my player might be faulty. The disc (Hunt for Red October UHD) had no scratches visible under close inspection and just a few tiny particles of dust. Yet it broke up into pixelation several times, something it did not do the last time I watched it on my old Sony X800.

The odd thing is that the pixelation only occurred immediately after resuming playback after pausing it; it did this after pausing a few times so I don't think it was a specific part of the film with an issue. This is not the first disc where pixelation has occurred after pausing but it's the most extreme example of it only occurring after pausing. Might this indicate a player issue rather than just oversensitivity to disc faults?

I had to replace my 820, as it started to damage discs. Blus - no problem. DVDs - probably fine, as I don't play them on it. Initially, I thought it was having trouble when it came to layers, as all of the buggered ones were triples. All discs were clean & scratch-free when they went in, but would pixilate and freeze when nearing the 50 minute mark. Discs were cleaned and de-greased but the damage was permanent.

The crunch ('arf) came when I paused a 66GB disc about 2 minutes in, and when I went to play it again, things pixilated and froze in exactly the same way. My wife literally stopped me from throwing the player out the window, and looked for another one the next day.

At any other time, applying the phrase: "it's gone berserk!!" to any situation involving a domestic appliance usually results in hilarity, but I found that hard way that this one which doesn't.

I still have the faulty player, long after its warranty expired, and am thinking of taking it apart for a complete clean as an experiment.

[danny24]

Originally Posted by CompleteCount

I had to replace my 820, as it started to damage discs. Blus - no problem. DVDs - probably fine, as I don't play them on it. Initially, I thought it was having trouble when it came to layers, as all of the buggered ones were triples. All discs were clean & scratch-free when they went in, but would pixilate and freeze when nearing the 50 minute mark. Discs were cleaned and de-greased but the damage was permanent.

The crunch ('arf) came when I paused a 66GB disc about 2 minutes in, and when I went to play it again, things pixilated and froze in exactly the same way. My wife literally stopped me from throwing the player out the window, and looked for another one the next day.

At any other time, applying the phrase: "it's gone berserk!!" to any situation involving a domestic appliance usually results in hilarity, but I found that hard way that this one which doesn't.

I still have the faulty player, long after its warranty expired, and am thinking of taking it apart for a complete clean as an experiment.

How can the 820 damage your 4K discs? only thing I can think of is an alignment issue but the laser lens alone shouldn't damage anything. Unless you mean damage from cleaning them.

[CompleteCount]

Originally Posted by danny24

How can the 820 damage your 4K discs? only thing I can think of is an alignment issue but the laser lens alone shouldn't damage anything. Unless you mean damage from cleaning them.

I have no idea, but after it wrecked the 5th disc I'd had enough, and ordered a new one. I've always kept my discs in excellent condition - I just can't fathom why the damn machine started doing it. The 66GB disc it ruined by merely pausing it was one which hadn't been played before, but was inspected for smearing/residue before loading.

[Ghisy]

Has anyone experienced problems playing the "Top Gun" (OG) 4K UHD with the 820?

My copy has a bunch of glitches and artifacts right from the opening credits. I've checked, the disc is clean and scratch-free. Could this be a disc problem? (it freezes on my Sony X700 btw)

[chip75]

Originally Posted by CompleteCount

I have no idea, but after it wrecked the 5th disc I'd had enough, and ordered a new one. I've always kept my discs in excellent condition - I just can't fathom why the damn machine started doing it. The 66GB disc it ruined by merely pausing it was one which hadn't been played before, but was inspected for smearing/residue before loading.

The only time I've experienced damage is a combo unit with the disc upright, I put in a Family Guy DVD and it gouged it like someone keying a car.

Unless there was debris inside, there shouldn't be any contact apart from the hub.

Was there visible damage? have tested them on another player?

Sounds like a bit of a nightmare.

[FilmPrick]

Thanks in advance for anyone who takes the time to read and respond to this.

I am a little confused about the operation of this player (UB820).
I have one HDMI 2.1 cable going from the HDMI video/audio out port to my TV (LG OLED C2).
In the audio settings, I have DTS/DTS-HD set to bitstream and BD-Video Secondary Audio set to off. I also have 7.1ch auto reformatting set to off.
I am playing a standard blu-ray disc with a DTS-HD MA 5.1 track.
When I look at the playback info, it claims that PCM 7.1ch 48kHz is being sent across the HDMI cable to the TV. This is counterintuitive to what I would have expected. With bitstream selected and 7.1ch auto reformatting turned off, I don't understand why it is still sending PCM and with the wrong channel count on top of that.

My understanding is that with bitstream, the player will not perform any audio decoding and will instead send the audio off as is.
This is what I want because on my TV (LG OLED C2) I have HDMI input format also set to bitstream and I have the Digital Sound Output set to pass through so that the audio will continue over the eARC connection to my Samsung HW-Q990B Soundbar. I want the audio to arrive at the soundbar untouched so that the soundbar can take care of any decoding/processing as it should be best at doing that.

I have the soundbar set to Standard mode with the hope that the audio will arrive over bitstream and play the DTS-HD MA 5.1 track as intended. But again, the playback info for the player seems to indicate that the audio has somehow become PCM 7.1ch, which seems wrong.
Any ideas as to why the player is seemingly outputting this type of audio when my settings mentioned above contradict that?

I am considering using 2 HDMI cables from the player, one out of the audio only port to the soundbar directly, and one out of the video/audio port to the TV. I'm not sure if this will make a difference, but at least the audio will be bypassing the TV to eliminate one variable. If I were to do that, should I connect to the ARC port on the soundbar or just one of the regular HDMI ports? I believe regular?
Also, any opinions on the Downmix setting on this player or the SDR/HDR conv. setting? Not sure if one of these may also be playing a role with my situation.

Thanks again.

[chip75]

Just at a quick glance ... LGs no longer support DTS, so that's probably the issue. I'd send audio to your sound bar directly.

[CompleteCount]

Originally Posted by chip75

Unless there was debris inside, there shouldn't be any contact apart from the hub.

Was there visible damage? have tested them on another player?

It's kept in a dedicated home cinema room, which is always clean, hoovered, etc. No damage visible, before or after, and tried on another Panasonic player with the same results, but only playing back the damage rather than inflicting it.

Again, there is little logical reason why it went that way. I feel like misquoting Airplane II - "Hmmm...maybe it's just an a$$hole".

[danny24]

Originally Posted by CompleteCount

It's kept in a dedicated home cinema room, which is always clean, hoovered, etc. No damage visible, before or after, and tried on another Panasonic player with the same results, but only playing back the damage rather than inflicting it.

Again, there is little logical reason why it went that way. I feel like misquoting Airplane II - "Hmmm...maybe it's just an a$$hole".

You returned the unit so the only way to know for sure is open the optical drive up and see what was going on inside. Sounds like an anomaly though.

[cminer72]

I've had my 820 for a month had my first WTF moment the other night when the player said my Age of Extinction disc wasn't compatible. I opened the tray and closed it and the disc played. After the movie, I looked at the disc and it had a heavy fog of outgassing film covering it, the slot in the case too. Cleaned the disc with white vinegar and it loads every time now. I guess the moral is clean your discs. It seems more temperamental to smudges than scratches.