Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Oppo BD 93/95

I was wondering how many of you guys have either of these players.. Catbrat just ordered a 93... I was wondering what the quality of netflix playback is like on these as compared to other products that stream netflix. I am sure the Blu ray/DVD play back is as good or better than my 83, which i think is wonderful.

The BD38 does not have a netflix option, it's to old. I am kind of wanting to get something to stream netflix, but i want to get as close to blu ray quality as possible.. Hence my waiting to buy something....

Thanks

I'm currently not using Netflix (nor any other movie) streaming. I discovered that before that is going to happen, 1) I need to upgrade my connection from DSL to Cable, and 2) Either Netflix needs to maintain a higher quality of movies, or the others need to drastically lower their prices.

I have the BDP95 and previously owned the 83 which I sold and got almost as much money for it from what I paid. In terms of video/audio performance, Oppo players are that good, especially the 83 which was the companies first BR player. Without really being able to make a direct comparison, based on my recollection, I can't see much of any difference. Of course the newer players have more features(dual HDMI connections, more network connectivity etc.). I have tried the Netflix option(this was the main reason that Oppo switched their video processing to the Marvel system) and quite frankly, it is OK but it is still not BR quality so for me personally, I wasn't overwhelmed and if you are going to spend this kind of money on a player, you might as well be able to get the most out of it.

I have a BDP-83 and a BDP-93. I have tried streaming movies, but it was horribly slow, so I gave up - and I do have cable Internet. I don't recall what speed, but it's plenty fast.

I like Oppo. They make great products and their customer service is outstanding. The main reason I have both machines, is that the 83 was giving me fits and the disk tray would stick and act erratic at times. I needed another BR player for another set up, so I just ordered the 93 and sent the 83 to Oppo for service. Even though the 83 was well out of warranty, Oppo fixed it and sent it back to me free of charge.

I might also add that the Oppo's have sub title shift. This is important to me as I have a CIH set up and without the subtitle shift, I would not be able to read them when watching a 2.35 movie.

CIH?

I have the BDP-93 and Netflix streaming.

I have tried Netflix streaming on many devices: PC, XBox360, Oppo, Tivo, Wii and Android phone.

The quality of the picture is about the same between Xbox/Oppo. The Tivo quality is similar but more likely to "degrade" - it dynamically switches to a lower bit rate when it can't get or keep up with the highest available bit rate. Note that any device will degrade if the bit stream becomes lossy, due to in-home bandwidth contention or ISP flakiness, etc. In my experience, the Tivo just seems the most prone to degrading. But for my wife the Tivo is by far the most convenient way to stream Netflix.

Then there is the question of the menu options and the "buttons" available in the Netflix player for each device. The PC (browser) has the best menu, but the screen, seating and sound system are drawbacks, and you have to use the mouse. The Xbox menu is better than the Oppo's, but it has been a couple of months since I tried the Oppo and the Netflix app could have been updated/improved since then. The Oppo did not have the option to enable closed captioning the last time I tried.

The Wii is pointless unless it is your only option. The phone app is cool when you are away from home, but I would use it only if Wifi is available.

An excellent summary. As usual, in the end , it is always about bandwidth, whereas people like us are looking for maximum quality while, unfortunately, the service providers and the masses priority are maximum numbers and to do it as cheap as possible "quality be damned".

I purchased an Oppo BDP-93 last fall. Best $500 I have spent in a while

I almost bought a 93, but I wasn't convinced that I would get the best bang for the buck out of it. I just needed a solid blu-ray player. Didn't need the bells and whistles that the Oppo provided (for a price). Don't get me wrong, they are supposed to be superb machines, but just too much $$$ for something that I wouldn't tap into all of the extra features on.

I don't need/want that are a premium price impacter:
SACD support
DVD-Audio
Analog outs
Dual HDMI out

Nice features, just something I don't need. The streaming stuff is in just about any other player, so I went with something else that was highly rated.

So far, all I can find are 2 players that have 2 HDMI outs, but I haven't looked at Denon players.

2 HDMI outs are necessary if you want 3D TV and still using a 2D receiver. I'm surprised I haven't heard more about this problem.

Yea, I bought a new receiver too, so again, it is an awesome box, but I just didn't need the premium stuff. The dual HDMI outs and Analog outs are great for people with older receivers.

You know, I got rid of Netflix because they pissed me off with the price increase. But I'm sure they (netflix?) sent me a disc that I could stream netflix in the Oppo.

Isn't the PS3 considered one of the best bluray players and is at $250? Does the oppo do some magnificent stuff that the ps3 can't?

I have the bdp93 but not in love with it.. you can stream movies from your lan with it was too slow, this feature ended up being worthless for me. I don't use netflix. I prefer my Samsung bluray player over this one. This was the first and last oppo. I don't use it for DVD playback so I don't care about it's upscaling abilities.

PS: Remote is reallllllllllly big.

Luc, i have a BD83, and really like it... But for me to buy a new player it MUST stream netflix well, and also have a good picture from netflix before i will be a buyer....

Otherwise, there is absolutely no reason for me to change/"upgrade" from my 83.

Netflix has a plugin for Media Center that's outstanding.

I never tried netflix, it would probably hurt my monthly bandwidth allowance. I already maxing out my 100GB limit each month.

My OPPO-93 just arrived at work. I opened the box to inspect. I'm impressed by how they packaged it.

They package their products much better than one would assume given the price. My BD83 was packaged better than its 2,000$ Sony and Denon competitors....

This is weird. I wouldn't expect Pandora to sound better just because it's being passed from OPPO to Pioneer AVR instead of Sony or Panasonic to Pioneer AVR, but I could swear it sounds sweeter. I can't explain it, but is this just mental or a real effect?

I like the look of the Home menu (where it displays stuff like Netflix, Pandora, etc.) better than the others. It has a richer look to it.

it doesn't

FYI, this current Home Menu is not the original when the player was first introduced. This is what I love about the aftermarket support of Oppo, they actually upgraded the menu with a firmware update several months after the player was on the market.

Ok, I've been switching back and forth between the Panasonic 310 and the OPPO 83 players, just playing Pandora content. Everytime I switch back to the Panasonic, the sound is more muted, so I know something is going on with the frequency ranges between the 2 systems. All other things being equal. I don't know what it is, but the OPPO plays with better sound. Also in both cases the AVR sets itself to PLII Music. Definetely not just differences in volume either. I turned it up in both cases just to eliminate that possibility.

With Panasonic BR player, I get bass, but nothing exceptional. With the OPPO, I get exceptional bass.

to verify this....
step 1) set volume limit on your reciever
step 2) start drinking until they sound the same..


If you can walk after completing step 2, then it is possible it is a placebo affect... However, if you can not walk after completing step 2, then there is a real and true difference....


Note, it is best to follow these instructions on a day prior to a scheduled day off...

I know what I say sounds silly, but if wasn't all that noticeable, I wouldn't have written about it.

have you started following said instructions yet? it is best not to post while following step 2... Mark may make fun, as the night progresses....

on a side note, i completely believe you.. The circuitry in the Oppo is most likely FAR superior to the panasonic, hence the reason i recommended you buy one

Playing a standard CD, I hear no difference. No reason to even try the old player. I'm playing some Norah Jones that I listen to all the time. I get the exact same sound. The only difference so far is the downstreaming audio content.

I thought I might have heard a difference in the upper ranges, but I tried the old player and got the same results.

You should get a netflix subscription, and tell me how you like the quality....

Trying some DVD's just to check out the upconversion. It's possible that I don't have some settings set properly yet. I tried the crappiest quality DVD I had and watched certain portions of it. It happens to be The Abyss, btw. There was no visual improvement. But, with this movie, it's basically garbage in equals garbage out.

Tried the DVD version of AI. No noticeable differences between Panasonic and OPPO. They both displayed the same fuzzy image, with ghost images of objects to both the left and right.

No differences in the blu-ray playback of AI either. At least the ghost images were gone, both players.

go bluray or go home.

I don't know that it would surprise me at all to find out that the Oppo does a little tweaking / EQ to the Pandora selection, knowing that it's dealing with compression and some likely perceptions from said compressions.

My Denon 3808 has a mode that's supposed to improve the sound of compressed sources. I don't remember if I have it engaged for those sources or if I had a preference or not.

That is my impression also.

I just completed viewing the DVD and Blu-ray versions of portions of the movie X2 X-men united. I sat about 3 feet away from the screen. There was absolutely no differences in quality of DVD or Blu-ray. Panasonic and OPPO looks exactly the same.

One minor problem I experienced with the OPPO through all of this is when I put in the X-men DVD, the system locked up with what looked like multi-colored static on the screen that didn't move. I had to turn the unit off and back on to get it working again.

Pandora offers two quality (bitrate) settings. It's possible the Panasonic defaults to the "normal" quality setting and the Oppo can access the "high" setting. I know you can chose this in the browser player and Android app. I haven't found a way to check it on my Onkyo AVR thou so I'm assuming it could be hard coded into the app it's using.

Ben, I thought a higher-quality bitrate was only available to paid members and even then, only online?

I asked someone at Pandora about the higher bit rates maybe a year a half ago, and was told that it was available online only.

I would have a paid membership to Pandora if I could stream higher quality into my Axiom system via my TiVo.

I'm going to keep the OPPO and take the Panasonic back to BB. Only because of it's ability to play SACD. If it couldn't do that, I'd keep the Panasonic instead. My next step will be to buy the same music in CD and SACD and see if I can even tell a difference.

The biggest difference is not likely to be the bit rate, but rather the remastering geared towards audiophiles (and not peon commoners) and the ability to play true multi-channel mixes.

My system is only a 3.1. It seems whenever I play a CD, and I put my ears up to the center channel, I hear sound coming from them. So, the receiver is probably combining the left and right and mixing it into the center. With an SACD, I should get a different channel output from the center with the surrounds probably thrown away.

After the TV, my next upgrade will probably be 2 QS8's. But that probably won't happen until next winter.

I've been following this thread at avsforum. Now, it looks like the ST50 is the way to go from the Panasonic line, because the GT50 isn't bringing any improvement to the table. Won't know for sure until the GT50 has been analyzed. It isn't available now, but should be by the end of this month.

I think i'm actually happy to hear some of the negative feedback about netflix.
I've contemplated going this road myself (getting a streaming setup for online content and giving up the cable/satellite costs), but so many have reported marginal quality from online streaming, i think i'll stick with the old school disc system for some time yet (for video anyway).

eech, there goes another month of HD satellite bills...

Last night, I connected to VUDU, using the OPPO player. VUDU has 3 choices for quality, SD, HD, HDX. I ran their internet speed test and it registered a 4.5, which put me on the line between HD and HDX. SD is 480, HD is 720, HDX is 1080. So, I watched some trailers for free using the 720. I couldn't tell the difference from this video to a video on blu-ray disc, it was that good. I'm assuming the 720 was upconverted to 1080 by OPPO. The Panny might have done just as good, but I didn't test it.

If you sign up with VUDU, you also will get a free $5.99 credit to watch a movie.

question, how big is your tv catbrat?

I'm another one that finds netflix to be meh, nothing really to be excited about. I have a good internet connection too, able to watch VUDU in the highest resolution no problem. I was actually really disappointed in netflix, I was expecting something better and it was basically a regualr DVD quality with no upscaling. Its not bad if you are on a 32" TV, but sitting relatively close (9 feet) to a 58" you tend to see the quality differences.

Currently only a 37 inch (50 inch in the works), but I sit 2-3 feet away when I'm looking for flaws, etc.

I think I read somewhere that at around 32", its almost pointless to get 1080p, but I think that was at normal viewing distances and not super close up. Once you get your new TV it would be good to revisit your experiments on video quality between upscaled 720p and 1080p. It would also be good to see newer movies, maybe like the dark knight or transformers where the movie was intended to be seen in high def and has IMAX parts. I've always wondered whats the point with blurays of old movies, when they were never intended to be seen at high resolution. I do buy them simply for the uncompressed soundtrack though.

I've replaced a LOT of my older DVD's with blu-rays. There is usually a big difference in quality. I visited that comparison last night with the movies AI and X-men United. One of the biggest differences I noticed last night was the DVD had a ghost image around objects that were only visible when you were looking for them. Like just next to the face and ears of someone's head. It was very near the object which makes it harder to see, unless you were friendly and up close. This is one of the things that makes the DVD images a little blurrier. On blu-ray, these ghost images were not there.

Ah I get that. I wonder it that ghost imaging is the cause from going from 480p which is the native resolution and upscaling it to 1080p, almost like stretching it too thin. Thats probably why the OPPO is so highly regarded is that its able to do this quite well, but maybe some DVDs just cant handle it. I've also had blurays where the image just wasnt up to snuff, but maybe because of the techniques used to make the image to 1080p, but I really don't know, I just remember going huh, thats not as good as I thought it was going to be.

I think I've proven, to me, that the upscaling ability of the OPPO is overrated. It didn't seem to do any better with this DVD image than the cheaper players can do.

Now, I didn't see any such degradation with VUDU's image. I'm not sure why. It seems that some form of upscaling would be applied to those images as well. When VUDU was processing the 720, I looked closely at the image and didn't see anything that looked like a 720 TV image with the visible dots. It upscaled it to a 1080 and looked very good, like I've said previously.

Be thankful you are in the US and have options. Our choices here in Canada are very limited outside of regular sat or cable companies.

I would also say to refrain final judgement until your new shiny, bigger, tv arrives. I have seen the difference on a 42" seem like nothing, but when put on a 58" TV become noticable. Then again, that 42" TV was a 720p/1080i tv and did not have 1080p capabilities. I have seen VUDU's 1080p streaming movies and they are quite good.

I'm not sure why everyone is so surprised about the quality of Netflix streaming. The service is very convenient but quality wise it's NOT bluray. The vast majority of their customers don't care. VUDU is way more expensive in comparison.

Ya I don't remember if you have to be paying for it as I have been for a couple years now. I do know the Android app can select normal or high quality which is why I was curious about how that's handled in other appliances. It just seemed like the best way to explain how one player would sound so much better than another.

does Vudu have an unlimited option or ONLY the 2$ for 2 night thing? And how is the audio?

Thanks.

I have a 93 also and was not overly impressed with its up conversion. Also had had a couple of issues with it locking up. Once in a while it will seem like it skips frames on the picture on start up. When I stop the movie and start over, it goes away. I do love the SACD. It sounds amazing, definitely worth a listen. Overall, blu ray picture and audio performance is excellent.

With VUDU, you pay about $6 per movie, for newer titles, less for older ones. That buys you about 2 days to watch it as many times as you want. The audio was excellent. My system is only 3.1 so I can't vouch for 5.1 and higher.

I had another problem with it last night. I couldn't get any sound from a CD I was playing. I just finished playing a movie, so I know it was working. I didn't turn it off and back on, just took out the movie and put in a CD. No sound. I turned everything off and back on, this time in CD activity mode (without TV). Still no sound. Then I started unplugging and replugging in hdmi cables. It was the hdmi #2 on the back of OPPO that was causing the problem. Unplugging it and plugging it back in caused it to start working again. I never had these types of problems with any of the cheaper players.

I also have an OPPO BDP-93 and it is not without issues. I had to send back under warranty the original one.It would stick on the "loading" step and, another issue, it would start freezing after playing for close to two hours. OPPO replaced it but even the replacing unit will once in awhile stick on the "loading" step.It is very annoying because when it happens the unit does not respond to command from the remote; the only way to solve the issue is to turn it off and on again. I tought the freezing issue was heat related so I moved the unit by itself on a separate shelf with plenty of space. This freezing issue is not totally resolved. When it happens again the unit does not espond to the remote control. I have to open the drawer remove the disc and turn off the unit. Then after powering on again, I re-insert the disc and it plays fine.

OPPO told me that the original player had no fault found according to their tests and that there was a long hair which could have been the cause.

I ordered my first SACD today from Amazon. It's Elton John's 2nd album, titled "Elton John".

Mine stuck on the loading step once, so far. I had to turn it off and back on. It must be a common issue with this unit.

i have the Oppo 83 and i had the freezing problem and sometimes the disk did not load. had to unplug it from the wall socket and try again.
their most recent update says that the loading problem for some Blu-ray has been taken care of.
the freezing has not happened so far since i installed the new update, but i have used the player only a few times since the install.

here's what their latest release notes say (re. the BDP-83):

Resolved the random image freezing issue observed on several Warner Brothers Blu-ray movies. The problem happens when "BD-Live Network Access" is set to "ON" in the player's setup menu. Sample titles include "Sex and the City 2 (BD, 2011)" and "Inception (BD, 2011)". This issue has been resolved in this release.
Resolved the loading failure issue observed on several recently-released Blu-ray series, including "Fringe" (Season 3, 2011), "Chuck" (Season 4, 2011), "Dexter" (Season 5, 2011), "Star Wars" and "Lord of the Rings". Normally, these movies can be played with no problems when initially loaded. However, if disc playback has been stopped or the disc ejected, the disc would fail to load again the next it is played. The TV would get a black screen and the front panel display would remain at 00:00:00. The cause of this error is related to the discs' resume function implemented in BD-Java. This firmware properly handles the resume function.
Other general disc compatibility improvement based on recent and upcoming releases. Sample titles include "Contagion (BD, 2012)" and "Mildred Pierce (BD, 2012)".

i just read that the new updates for the 90 series makes the same kind of fixes as for the 80 series, and more.

hope this answers some questions. :-)

i can accept those small problems occurring once in a while seeing the quality of the player.

Right now in my rack I've got a CD recorder/player, a DVD recorder, a B-D player, an HD-DVD player and an old Oppo DVD player because it plays SACD and DVD-Audio discs.

I've often thought that I could reduce the players by one if I bought a new Oppo B-D player that would also handle SACD and DVD-Audio, but this sounds like a buggy option for the price.

I wish I could see an DVD upscale conversion between the PS3 and the oppo, would be nice to know if there is a noticeable difference. The only PS3's were able to to plac SACD's are the old fat ones, which I have, but I believe the newer ones lack that ability. overall its hard for me to see a great advantage over the PS3, in all aspects of cost, quality, and abilities.

With all of the talk of problems.. Mark, i have never had an issue with my BD-83... i would say that every electronic manufacture has some issues. However, it does not mean that every user experiences said issues. You are seeing a VERY small sample of the population of people who have Oppo products...

It depends on your system.. I have an all analog system (RCA/XLR)... i have no HDMI at all... For stereo i would like the capability of having balanced stereo out, and would appreciate better D/A chips in the analog section...

This is also the reason i do not own a new apple TV.. i have no way to connect it without buying a HDMI-> component converter, and i have read that those are hit and miss on output quality....

For purely upscaled DVD playback and stereo, isnt having a bluray player a little overkill. Half the awesomeness of bluray is the lossless audio and I believe that can be done only over HDMI. But I understand yah, if you don't need or can't utilize it, whats the point, and you should get the best player that fits your system.

one thing I've always noticed to, is that the people having problems are very vocal about it, and the ones that don't, well you don't hear from them very often. The squeaky wheel gets the grease or something like that.

I have a BDP-83 as well, and I've had plenty of freezing issues. A lot of titles lately have been stuck at 00:00, and it has taken several times of powering down and powering back up before it finally loads. I actually had to use the PS3 to play Game of Thrones because of the number of times it just wouldn't load. I did install the latest firmware the other day, so hopefully that does actually resolve a lot of it.

well here is someone what has both the ps3 and the oppo. Have you done a comparison between the two on DVD upscaling or Bluray playback? notice any differences. Is there a reason why you choose to use the oppo instead of the ps3 as your first choice in playback? I'm guessing loading times.

On the DVD upscaling, I notice no difference. The PS3 isn't the fastest at loading, but then, neither is the OPPO. I suppose the main reason I use the OPPO first is because the PS3's fan noise is just slightly noticeable.

thanks for the input. I hear ya on the fan, the old fatboy in the home theatre room can get loud sometimes. It also sreams bloody murder sometimes when inserting a dvd, not during playback just loading the dvd, scared the crap outta me the first time.

I blame the horrible and retarded bluray format for the long load times. The DVD format is better in every possible way except picture quality (obviously) over bluray.

/end rant

That said bluray load times aren't really too bad on my HTPC. At least every appliance I've seen takes longer to start up.

Just wondering if you had installed all the latest firmware updates on the 83? They just had one last week.

As I said:




The firmware came after I already watched Game of Thrones.

I also keep all the firmware up-to-date on my stuff. I updated the OPPO-93 firmware before I used it for anything else.

i need to updated my 83, i just got my thumb drive back yesterday!...

The one other thing the Oppo's offer that I do not think anyone else does, is source direct. This is something important for folks who use external video processors.

One day soon, I'm going to go through all of the options built into this player and see what all it's got. A couple of things I've discovered is 1) Demo mode for video that splits the screen in half that allows you to see the effect of any tweaking that you do through the player. One side before changes, the other side, after changes, and 2) The ability to play either the SACD version or the CD version from hybrid SACD discs. This will let me easily hear any differences between the 2 by switching between the 2 options. This way I don't have to buy the CD version.

I took the Panasonic 310 player back to BB today for a refund. Keeping the OPPO for better or for worse. Yipes, Now i've gone and ruined that relationship too.

Mother always said, do what you're good at. You should talk to Chris (Lampy). He'll string someone along for years as long as there are continuing bargains to be had from them on stuff he wants. He's a master.

Got my first SACD today. It's Elton John's 2nd album, titled Elton John. Can't wait to listen to it tonight in CD, SACD stereo, and SACD multi-channel (on my 3.1 system) to see if there's any differences that I can detect.

Wait. So you've got multiple pairs of front speakers, but no surrounds?

don't you mean Wall.1?

There's a story behind it. Yeah. But mostly I couldn't find a place to put surrounds in this room until just recently. It was after I decided that they didn't HAVE to go behind or just to the sides of the listening position. They would go halfway between me and the front wall instead.

Waiting until I have $760 to order 2 QS8's in real wood finish, after much other work has been done around the house.

I like Wall.1 btw.

The Elton John SACD sounded great. I was a bit disappointed to discover that the CD option in the SACD Multi/Stereo/CD track selections would only play Multi and Stereo. The CD option seems to have been disabled, but not greyed out. I could choose it, but nothing happens when I do. When I switch between Mutli and Stereo SACD options, the track stops for a few seconds, then restarts at the beginning. I couldn't tell any difference between these two settings because it seems my receiver mixes some of the left and right channels in to the center on stereo mode anyways.

I guess if I'm going to do any comparison between SACD and CD, I'll still have to buy the CD, along with more wait time between listening to the separate tracks.

I can see why noone would want to play SACD's in CD mode outside of this comparison, but it would be nice if they could at least implement the ability to play the CD tracks since the option is there. This leads me to believe that maybe they did that on purpose, because there may not be that much, if any, difference between the 2.

That's not right.

Are you sure you weren't hearing an imagined "center" because of good imaging?

It could be that this is an SACD only disc. My Take Five SACD is like that.

Nope, your both wrong.

I can put my ears up to my center channels while I'm playing stereo and there is definitely noise coming out of them. It's probably an option I have set in the receiver because at one point in time, I wanted noise coming out of the center channel.

This is a Hybrid SACD. Hybrid's contain both the lower quality CD tracks and the higher quality SACD tracks. I've proven this because my work computer and car do not have SACD players and this SACD will play in both of them. Only it's playing the CD tracks instead.

My Denon receiver overrides my stereo setting if I put in a multi-channel media. I've never tried to put it back to straight stereo unless the media also included a stereo track (which you would have to choose from the media's menu).

I'm like Mark. On my receiver, I am pretty sure "Stereo" would result in fronts only plus LFE to the sub. "Pure Direct" would give me fronts only, no sub. Definitely not center in either case. However, I'm not sure I can even choose either of these when using a multi-channel source. Although, it's possible that I just never tried.

What would happen if you force a multi-channel media into stereo mode? I assume that if you can do it, it must be smart enough to blend the surround and LFE tracks into the main left and right.

Mostly just thinking out loud at this point.

The CD tracks on the SACD disk are stereo only. AFAIK, all CD tracks are either mono or stereo, never multi-channel. SACD, DVD-A, and whatever other derivatives that are out there, would be the only multi-channel sources that I know of (music only).

When I pop in a normal CD, I still get 3.1 sound. I just need to check my receiver settings. But, I'd probably set it back to 3.1 anyway since that's the way I prefer to listen to it.

One option that I'm a little confused about is PCM vs DSD.

On the back of the SACD, there is a logo for DSD. When I flip back and forth from PCM and DSD options on the OPPO, it doesn't restart the track and there is no sound difference. There is an on screen note when picking DSD that says it requires a DSD compatible receiver. I don't know if Pioneer Elite VSX 21TXH model is, or not. When playing the disk, the receiver panel displays the letters SACD, so I know it's recognizing it as an SACD disk.

According to other stuff I've read online, SACD is always in the DSD (Direct Stream Digital) format. Some were originally recorded in PCM, but it gets converted to DSD before put on the disk. I guess there must be some old ones out there still in the pre-converted condition. It this is so, I'd think that the player would automatically change to PCM without requiring a person to manually make that switch. Confusing.

If the AVR will not process DSD, the player will default to PCM. Not many audio processors except DSD.