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RE: To cheap or not to cheap, that is the question!

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In Reply to: RE: To cheap or not to cheap, that is the question! posted by late on March 03, 2010 at 18:10:25

The bugs in the Oppo BDP-83, if that's the model you meant, are quite tiny for many people. Virtually none (I can think of) re playing BD. There's one that some people notice when playing some SACDs (mostly classical ones it seems), but I've never got it (no classical SACDs!). None for playing DVD-As that I've noticed. Ahh...DVD...there ARE some bugs but nothing that ruins viewing at all, all fully work-aroundable with no degradation of anything, just a minor nuisance and I bet most people won't even notice them.

There is an HDMI bug in that the Oppo can totally lock up if it's not turned on last in the HDMI chain...a nuisance, but easy to get around. Now, I use HDMI almost always. If using analog audio output, the bass management is "limited" but that's not a bug as the design was done knowing about it.

If you are going to use HDMI for audio and aren't a DVD freak (like me) then the BDP-80 is substantially cheaper with most of the BDP-83 bang.

Be wary of people blowing bugs out of all proportion. I haven't encountered a DVD/BD player yet that doesn't have some operating idiosyncrasy. You'll never get perfection in something this CHEAP, they will always come out with a new model that has new "idiosyncrasies" to confound you. Much more complicated than a CD or SACD player. Not to mention that Blu-ray is still a moving target.

Follow Ups:

RE: To cheap or not to cheap, that is the question! - Jazz Inmate 11:24:28 03/04/10 (1)
My Oppo has frozen on a new DVD that the PS3 then played flawlessly.
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We must be the change we wish to see in the world. -Gandhi
- RE: To cheap or not to cheap, that is the question! - cfraser 15:23:12 03/04/10 (0)
  I was trying to only keep quite repeatable things as "bugs". There are no doubt lots of individual circumstances with specific discs that I wouldn't know about. I have one DVD with a manufacturing "glitch" that ONLY plays through in the BDP-83, so can go either way. Also there are self-made DVDs of all descriptions and formats I couldn't comment on.
  Something like the Star Trek BD Dolby TrueHD dropout while bitstreaming is a bug of some sort, but is very unrepeatable, both in duration and location. Still, it's noticed by just about everybody to some extent (my only dropout was for less than 0.5s). I forgot about that bug above. [My PS3 is "old" and doesn't bitstream TrueHD so no problem with that player.]
  Edit: Oppo is still looking into this one, being not identically repeatable makes it more difficult to nail down.
  To me the most annoying thing is the propensity for lockups. This happens way too often IMO; I have DVD players I've used for years that it never happened once, and never happens with my PS3. It's something to do with the HDMI handshaking, and is most likely to happen when changing disc formats (least for me). Edit: Oppo is well aware of the lockups and apparently has an improvement or fix for the next FW release. Otherwise, power-cycling does it.
  The thing that annoys me second most is when fast-forwarding at certain speeds past a chapter stop on a DVD: the player can jump ahead 1 or 2 chapter stops. This is very repeatable, been going on for a long time, and hard to believe they haven't fixed it by now. Doesn't happen with BDs. [I watch lots of TV DVDs, and like to skip past the opening credits, and many don't have a chapter stop at the end of them...so I see this bug a lot.] Since I bought the "premium" BDP-83 for DVD (IMO it's the only thing it does significantly better than my other players, via HDMI), I wish they'd pay a little more attention to fixing the other minor DVD bugs too. I do realise DVD (and CD) are the least "sexy" aspects of the player for many people, but the DVD ability is a/the major selling point of this player over some others HT-wise so should be attended to.
  
  Edits: 03/04/10 03/04/10

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