Blu-ray player that will play multi-region DVDs

[TonyDA]

Well, thanks for all the help in here guys - plumped for an Oppo 80 yesterday, which was despatched today. Hopefully all works as it should, and i'll be able to watch some UK discs later this week. Will post some feedback on the player compared to the PS3 if anyone's interested.

Thanks again
Tony

[Spatial]

never mind

[Jurassic]

Was just about to pick up one of the Foehn & Hirsch players from Ebuyer. But looking at a pic of the back of the unit it doesn't look like its got an optical out port, which makes it pretty useless for me. Can anyone confirm thats the case?

[Spatial]

No, there's no optical out.

[Jurassic]

No, there's no optical out.

Gah, will maybe have to reconsider getting one. Thanks for the info.

[NeoStuey]

Well, thanks for all the help in here guys - plumped for an Oppo 80 yesterday, which was despatched today. Hopefully all works as it should, and i'll be able to watch some UK discs later this week. Will post some feedback on the player compared to the PS3 if anyone's interested.

Thanks again
Tony

Have you got your player yet Tony, how have you found it?

I really like mine but would quite like Oppo to release a new firmware, the BDP-83 has now had 2 new firmware releases since I got mine. They have replied to my emails to say they are working on one but no release date yet.

[TonyDA]

Have you got your player yet Tony, how have you found it?

I haven't had too much of a chance to play with it, but am really impressed with the picture quality, which is an improvement over the PS3 in my opinion - especially in the depth of blacks, which I found varied in quality before. Would quantify that by saying that I can't be sure that wasn't due to calibration, TV settings or anything else.

Sound seems weaker, with a higher balance of noise to speech. By this I mean that I found myself turning the volume up for speech, then reaching for the remote there was any music, explosions etc etc. Again, I've hardly played with any settings, which I'll do over the weekend, so I'm not finding fault with the player!

What is nice though is being able to switch between regions and play UK discs. So, Amazon/Tesco purchases have already included the LOTR set, In The Loop, Mesrine, White Ribbon and The Box - all locked to Region B, and all available here very cheaply.

Will have a proper play with it all - and, hey, actually watch some films! - over the weekend, and will post back with further thoughts.

[NekoFever]

I really like mine but would quite like Oppo to release a new firmware, the BDP-83 has now had 2 new firmware releases since I got mine. They have replied to my emails to say they are working on one but no release date yet.

The one from a couple of days ago was just the one that's been in beta for a few weeks. There will be an equivalent one for the 80 in a week or two with the same fixes and features.

[Spatial]

Wait a second, I thought we'd established that I was talking crazy talk and that there was no way that the PS3 and a stand alone Blu-ray player could produce a different picture?

[NeoStuey]

The one from a couple of days ago was just the one that's been in beta for a few weeks. There will be an equivalent one for the 80 in a week or two with the same fixes and features.

I'm still classing it as two releases.

I first asked about a firmware update to the BDP-80 on the 28/3 and then again on the 29/4. Oppo have said to me no there is no firm release date available for a new firmware on the BDP-80 whilst their engineers bug test which is fair enough. Would like a stable version over a buggy one any day of the week.

Besides the only issue I currently have revolves around DTS-master audio bit-streaming. On Evangelion 1.11 and the US Die Hard collection. Evangelion the audio drops for a second then comes back and on Die Hard 2 doesn't play at all through my AMP (switching the AMP/inputs or selecting a different audio track then switching back to DTS-MA all fail to get the track to play). Changing the BDP-80 to PCM output bypasses the issue but would be nice to not have to perform the switch.

[Lyris]

Wait a second, I thought we'd established that I was talking crazy talk and that there was no way that the PS3 and a stand alone Blu-ray player could produce a different picture?

There is a way they can produce a different picture, but the PS3's picture is accurate, and I imagine the Oppo's is, also. So, the differences will be due to the TV setup used (most TVs feature per-input settings).

If you look at the Gamma section of the software screenshots I posted on the previous page, the line from each player is basically straight (the wavy bits are caused by the TV it was connected to). If the PS3 was showing more or less detail in shadows, the line would be crooked at that point (it would bend upwards at the 0-10 part of the chart if it was killing shadow detail, and sag downwards if it was revealing too much).

[Matt]

So we can thus establish that Spatial is indeed crazy

[Spatial]

Well that's a given.

But I was more than a little disheartened at some peoples (deliberate?) misinterpretation of my comments that I was somehow slagging off the PS3 as being total rubbish as a Blu-ray player.

[NekoFever]

Besides the only issue I currently have revolves around DTS-master audio bit-streaming. On Evangelion 1.11 and the US Die Hard collection. Evangelion the audio drops for a second then comes back and on Die Hard 2 doesn't play at all through my AMP (switching the AMP/inputs or selecting a different audio track then switching back to DTS-MA all fail to get the track to play). Changing the BDP-80 to PCM output bypasses the issue but would be nice to not have to perform the switch.

It could be an issue with your receiver rather than the player. It's either a problem with the audio track itself, a problem with the player, or a problem with the receiver. The facts that the player can decode it and there haven't been any widespread complaints suggests that the track's fine, and it's unlikely that the player introduces problems simply by bitstreaming it without decoding.

I don't have any of those releases so I can't verify for you, unfortunately. In any case, make sure to let Oppo know so that those discs can be tested.

[Matt]

Well that's a given.

But I was more than a little disheartened at some peoples (deliberate?) misinterpretation of my comments that I was somehow slagging off the PS3 as being total rubbish as a Blu-ray player.

I must of missed those posts? I didn't take it that way in the slightest, I was just genuinely surprised that you saw a difference as it made no sense given what I knew about BR and HDMI. Since Lyris has confirmed everything with techy graphs, it's more confusing people are saying other players look better. I'm wondering if it's not one of those colour range modes on the PS3, I suppose if it's turned On and the TV / PJ doesn't support it, the result would be crushed blacks / overexposed whites, and a loss of detail as a result.

Maybe Lyris needs to pay a house visit and check it out

I'm genuinely thinking of buying the £58 player for multi region ability, and to give the girlfriend an easy way to play CDs. If I do, I'll certainly do some comparisons on the big screen and report back.