Panasonic UB820/UB9000 4K UHD Blu-ray player

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by Ruined

Sounds like ROM drives going bad on some of the panasonics. happened back in the day with the a110/a310 dvd players, mass faulty drives

My 820 drive was always a pain, but after almost four years I decided to sell it because I knew it wasn't going to get better. Went with the 420 (don't need DV) and it's far more rock solid not tripping up on small scratches like my 820.

[Ruined]

Originally Posted by HeavyHitter

My 820 drive was always a pain, but after almost fours I decided to sell it because I knew it wasn't going to get better. Went with the 420 (don't need DV) and it's far more rock solid not tripping up on small scratches like my 820.

Yeah it sounds like for a period of time a lot of Panasonics went out with bad rom drives not limited to any one model. I have seen this story across the spectrum of the line

[Tim n Tempe]

Originally Posted by Ruined

I think the build quality is fantastic. Better than the oppo 203 even. But even with the best build quality you might have a part with some design flaw or issue that will surface in 2 years. Something like a laser getting misaligned after 2 years is not really related to build quality IMO

I've got a 12 year old Sony BD player that will works flawlessly. This problem reading DVD discs is unacceptable IMO.

My second thought is to sell this with a note of caution, and just rely on my Xbox for SD DVD, and 4k BD and call it a day. I will miss that beautiful backlit remote though!

[sapiendut]

Faults will happen with any products from any company. I’d rather have a player that dies after X number of years rather than a player that needs to be unplugged and replugged every week.

I’ve been using an 820 and two 9000 for almost 5 years now with zero problem.

[Tim n Tempe]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

I’ve been using an 820 and two 9000 for almost 5 years now with zero problem.

Do you watch a fair amount of DVD content?

[sapiendut]

Mostly 4K discs. So far the count is about 800 4K, 300 BD and 300 DVDs (concerts and music videos)

[DMRI2006]

Originally Posted by Ruined

I think the build quality is fantastic. Better than the oppo 203 even. But even with the best build quality you might have a part with some design flaw or issue that will surface in 2 years. Something like a laser getting misaligned after 2 years is not really related to build quality IMO

You're arguing semantics, no matter what you want to call it, this flaw is part of the physical operation of the player. To me that falls under build quality but you can call it whatever you want. Either way, if I pay upwards of $1000 for a player that died before I got 2 years of use out of it as mine did, that's still Panasonic's problem for whatever you want to call it: build quality, design flaw, misalignment, yadda yadda.

No matter what, it's still on them and shouldn't happen on a device of this expense. Under 24 months of use is outrageously poor, there's no excusing it.

Originally Posted by Tim n Tempe

I've got a 12 year old Sony BD player that will works flawlessly. This problem reading DVD discs is unacceptable IMO.

My second thought is to sell this with a note of caution, and just rely on my Xbox for SD DVD, and 4k BD and call it a day. I will miss that beautiful backlit remote though!

It looks like you can get a few hundred easy just for selling one of these as non-functioning. Especially if it's the initial run with the original DAC that some might care about.

After my 9000 died, I thought about replacing the drive, but the drive by itself is apprx $250 off Panasonic's site so by that point, I opted to just get one of the Warehouse players instead. If it happens AGAIN I will try the drive replacement.

[pbz06]

Originally Posted by DMRI2006

You're arguing semantics, no matter what you want to call it, this flaw is part of the physical operation of the player. To me that falls under build quality but you can call it whatever you want. Either way, if I pay upwards of $1000 for a player that died before I got 2 years of use out of it as mine did, that's still Panasonic's problem for whatever you want to call it: build quality, design flaw, misalignment, yadda yadda.

No matter what, it's still on them and shouldn't happen on a device of this expense. Under 24 months of use is outrageously poor, there's no excusing it.



It looks like you can get a few hundred easy just for selling one of these as non-functioning. Especially if it's the initial run with the original DAC that some might care about.

After my 9000 died, I thought about replacing the drive, but the drive by itself is apprx $250 off Panasonic's site so by that point, I opted to just get one of the Warehouse players instead. If it happens AGAIN I will try the drive replacement.

You are ignoring the many many people that haven't had a single issue. Implying or trying to diminish the quality of Panasonic seems weird. I don't think you understand how products are manufactured and that EVERY brand of EVERY type will manifest some type of "issue". Also, it's arbitrary pointing out the cost as "AT THIS PRICE, UNACCEPTABLE" because it's a moving goalpost for your argument. It would be unacceptable to someone else no matter where you set it to, maybe someone that thinks $30 is a lot to spend.

[sapiendut]

Put it this way. If the majority are experiencing what you’re experiencing, Panasonic would not be the top selling player in the industry.

[Tim n Tempe]

Originally Posted by pbz06

You are ignoring the many many people that haven't had a single issue. Implying or trying to diminish the quality of Panasonic seems weird. I don't think you understand how products are manufactured and that EVERY brand of EVERY type will manifest some type of "issue". Also, it's arbitrary pointing out the cost as "AT THIS PRICE, UNACCEPTABLE" because it's a moving goalpost for your argument. It would be unacceptable to someone else no matter where you set it to, maybe someone that thinks $30 is a lot to spend.

My question to you is this:
If you had three films on DVD that you really enjoy, and your player did not play them...would that be an acceptable trade off as it played all your 4K discs, and BD fine? Would you just let it go, and find other means to view the problematic (to the Panasonic) DVD discs?

[Tim n Tempe]

Originally Posted by sapiendut

Put it this way. If the majority are experiencing what you’re experiencing, Panasonic would not be the top selling player in the industry.

Given the relative obscurity of the DVD titles I have issues with on the Panasonic, it seems there probably 2 people in the world that would lodge a complaint. Like I said it is nonissue to probably 99.99% of the owners of this specific player. But it is affecting me specifically because of my love lesser-known DVD titles.

[sapiendut]

For lesser known DVDs (usually discs I bought in Asia, mostly concerts and local movies, legit — not bootlegs) I have a Panasonic DVD player I bought in Asia with no region coding that I bought in 2007 and it plays literally everything.

[Ruined]

Originally Posted by Tim n Tempe

My question to you is this:
If you had three films on DVD that you really enjoy, and your player did not play them...would that be an acceptable trade off as it played all your 4K discs, and BD fine? Would you just let it go, and find other means to view the problematic (to the Panasonic) DVD discs?

Yes, if those DVD discs had a reason they could not be played due to a technical reason (e.g. they were PAL instead of NTSC), and not because the player is flaking out. If the player was flaking out, then I'd get a new player or get it repaired rather than keep a faulty player.

By the way, if 4K/BD plays fine and DVD does not, the reason is because DVD uses a red laser and BD/4K a blue laser, and thus in this case your blue laser is likely fine while your red laser is misaligned.

[grim_tales]

Hey,
I recently got this player for when I eventually get 4K some time in the future In the player settings, it says "Select TV type" but not sure which one to choose, I have a Panasonic ET61 LED (non 4K) - and the options are like OLED, High Luminance LCD, Mid Luminance LCD which is confusing.
It looks good but is much larger/heavier than my old player - I had to put it next other boxes (VCR etc) on the shelf, what a beast.
Also there's some kind of sub menu where you can change TV picture settings and the third one (Standard Blu Ray) looks darker than the others - if that's default I don't know why it looks darker than my TV did with my old BDT370 player.

[B.inthe6]

Originally Posted by thebarnman

I use the 9000 remote on my 820. I think this is the original one and this is where I bought it. It takes a while to get shipped but for me it was worth it having back lights and -10 second rewind.

https://mandos-a-distancia.es/en/Pan...l?currency=USD

Thanks for the link. Ordered one today for my 820 & will report on it when delivered. I look forward to the 10 sec rewind feature. Do you think that is less stressful on the 820 (transport etc) than repeatedly manually rewinding? Not sure how that works. Thanks again.

[chip75]

Originally Posted by grim_tales

Hey,
I recently got this player for when I eventually get 4K some time in the future In the player settings, it says "Select TV type" but not sure which one to choose, I have a Panasonic ET61 LED (non 4K) - and the options are like OLED, High Luminance LCD, Mid Luminance LCD which is confusing.

Also there's some kind of sub menu where you can change TV picture settings and the third one (Standard Blu Ray) looks darker than the others - if that's default I don't know why it looks darker than my TV did with my old BDT370 player.

Off the top of my head the TV type won't affect the image with an SDR display, it's designed to pre-map the image before it hits the display.

Standard Blu-ray is a picture preset without any post-processing, Set 1 and 2 have some tweaks. There's a bit of an optical illusion when you select Standard as the menu greys out, I don't think there's a huge brightness or contrast differences with the other settings, I checked the DVD ones and edge enhancement and noise reduction is added.

[grim_tales]

I didn't know there were DVD ones too, where can they be found on the menu?

[Ruined]

Originally Posted by DMRI2006

You're arguing semantics, no matter what you want to call it, this flaw is part of the physical operation of the player. To me that falls under build quality but you can call it whatever you want. Either way, if I pay upwards of $1000 for a player that died before I got 2 years of use out of it as mine did, that's still Panasonic's problem for whatever you want to call it: build quality, design flaw, misalignment, yadda yadda.

The point is there is no such thing as "high end optical assembly" that I am aware of. All these players use basically the same thing for that. If the one Panasonic used had some issue that surfaces after 24 months, that is unfortunate, but not necessarily something they would have been able to know, buy a better part, or spend more money on to figure out - thus unrelated to build quality.

[Ruined]

Originally Posted by grim_tales

Hey,
I recently got this player for when I eventually get 4K some time in the future In the player settings, it says "Select TV type" but not sure which one to choose, I have a Panasonic ET61 LED (non 4K) - and the options are like OLED, High Luminance LCD, Mid Luminance LCD which is confusing.
It looks good but is much larger/heavier than my old player - I had to put it next other boxes (VCR etc) on the shelf, what a beast.
Also there's some kind of sub menu where you can change TV picture settings and the third one (Standard Blu Ray) looks darker than the others - if that's default I don't know why it looks darker than my TV did with my old BDT370 player.

BASIC LUMINANCE LCD is what you should use.

the settings correspond to the peak nits capability of the display

[chip75]

Originally Posted by grim_tales

I didn't know there were DVD ones too, where can they be found on the menu?

DVD, Blu-ray, and Ultra HD Blu-ray all have they're own presets, you just have to be playing the discs.