Abandoning Blu-ray for a while.

[Filterlab]

Well, I bought the Panasonic player a few weeks back and I'm already thinking that it's been a mistake - at this point anyway.

The picture quality is superb, contrast between dark and light is seriously excellent and to have no 'blocking' or 'toothing' is great. Sound quality is extremely good even though my processor isn't HDMI and is simply running Dolby/DTS via Coaxial.

But this juddering, it's really getting on my nerves. No matter what I do I can't seem to stop the problem. I've tried switching from PAL to NTSC, changing the resolution from 1080 to 720, watching via composite - but nothing works.

Oddly the problem wasn't prevalent until I updated the firmware to 1.4 (from 1.2) but since it's not possible to revert to a previous firmware level, I'm stuck at 1.4. Panasonic have been NO HELP whatsoever, failing to reply to three helpline requests via Panasonic.co.uk.

I'm very miffed as I spent £700 ($1,372) on a Blu-ray player that is uncomfortable and distracting to watch.

However, on playback of normal DVDs, whether viewed via upscaling or standard definition, there simply isn't a problem. No judder, just clean and smooth motion.

As I said I've gone through every setting possible to try and cure the problem but it just seems to me that this technology has been released without really being properly thought through.

There seems to be a huge question mark over what and how the varying frame rates and consequential pull-down should be addressed and the whole thing smacks of disagreement.

With 24fps trying to be 25fps (24.97fps is it?) and 1080/50p really being 1080/50i trying to be displayed at 1080/60 on a 60hz TV which is actually 50hz in the UK anyway even when on NTSC mode and some BD players having 1080/24 mode but the displays not being compatible because 24 is not an integer of 60 blah blah blah, what is going on?

Will these issues ever be rectified or is this format money down the toilet?

I'd imagined that buying a Panasonic HDTV for £2,000 ($3,920) and a Panasonic Blu-ray player that it should produce a perfect image as both units must definitely be compatible, but nope.

Any ideas anyone, or do I sell the BD player and go to the other camp?