Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Panasonic's dizzying lineup (need info)

I am considering buying a used Panasonic dvd player progressive scan.
After having looked at some of the Panny's that are considered best overall, the XP30 and RP82 are the obvious choices.
However, what other units from Panasonic also uses the same onboard deinterlacers?
The XP50 is a 'step up' from the the XP30, so does it use the same chipset still? (i'm assuming it does)
How about the RP91 compared to the RP82?
Does anyone know?
Panasonic does not provide a column where it says what model of decoder chipset is used. There are only a few Pannys on the Secrets of Home Theatre dvd shootout list which is falling out of date.

Hi chesseroo

I was looking to upgrade my toshiba sd-9200 to a panasonic also (RP-82)but decided to wait it out for the new high definition dvd format player rather than upgrading players a couple of times...... perhaps a Samsung DVD-HD931, who knows, gonna wait and see a good perfomer hd dvd player before final decision

good luck in what you choose...

JBG

Chesseroo:

I own the Panny DVD-CP72, which is a five-disk progressive scan DVD player. It was of the same generation as the RP82, XP30 and XP50, and I belive these were the four models that had the faroudja chip and the best deinterlacing. There were some discussions (including the DVD Shootout) that describe minor differences in data or actual performance, but essentially, these models have the same video performance. The rp82, cp72 and xp50 all have DVD-Audio capabilities as well.

The new Panny models no longer use the better chip, and apparently are a step down in performance from last year's models. I did notice a noticeable difference in performance between my Toshiba SD-5700 (which is an excellent player in its own right) and the Panny. The Panny picture with those models is very crisp and filmlike, a bit hard to describe, but the picture just looks better than lots of other DVD players. Good luck.

Thanks for the info.
I have a line on a CP72 model that i think i'm going to buy. Had i known we were getting a large screen tv last year, i would have bought a progressive scan dvd player to start with. Instead we picked up a Panny CV52. Some of the features/remote functions are annoying but i will put up with them for good quality video.

I believe I have the RP62 (progressive scan). Is this is the same family as the 82 that is mentioned?

take a look at this chesseroo ....

http://www.samsung.com/Products/DVDPlayer/Hypervision/DVDPlayer_Hypervision_DVD_HD931.htm



tell me what you think....

I saw that but i'm still leary of the new technology.
So many questions are raised.
Do dvds have to be recorded as HD-dvd before this technology can really be used effectively? Otherwise is it not simply an attempt at making a lesser quality recording into a higher resolution format? Creating more lossyness (although the page of info says otherwise of course).
Will it be a significant step better than progressive scan?
A friend of mine tried using an S-video cable instead of the regular coax connection for his cable tv hookup through his vcr. Although on paper the svideo quality should be better, it was not. The picture was horriblly pixelated. The lossyness of the coax was much nicer to watch. Only goes to show me again how the white paper specs and ideas do not always make something better.

I just can't hold my breath for the HD technology to improve while in the meantime, i don't even have the progressive scan version of a dvd player. I have personally watched the progressive scan vs. interlaced and it does look a alot better on our rptv at home.
If in two or three years time HDTV and HD-dvd become more mainstream then i think i will consider that technology. But for now, and the next 2 or 3 years, a progressive scan dvdp should do me fine. Had i known we were getting a newer tv last year i would have bought the progressive scan player with that in mind a year ago, however we had no intentions of buying a new tv at all so it just had not occurred to me to bother.
We expected to buy a progressive scan (or whatever technology was in use at the time) once we did get a newer, larger tv...in about 2 or 3 years.
It is almost a case of Murphy's Law i guess.
Hindsight is always clearer than foresight.

Thinking along those lines now though, i'm considering getting a dvd-a capable prog scan dvdp when i buy. I don't have any dvd-a discs right now but there are some that have caught my eye. I have also heard the dvd-a quality vs. regular cd and again, i believe the sound is amazingly clear and without having to use a DSP like DPL2 to 'extrapolate' the surround channels. I figure if anything, any new dvdp technology that comes along in the future will most likely be compatible with both sacd and dvd-a discs so i'm not too concerned about the whole format war.
I was not going to go out of my way to buy one specifically in the past year but now that i have the opportunity to pick up a new dvdp with the dvd-a as an option, then why not eh?

Chess, it's definitely a good idea to get a progressive scan player, and while you're at it you might as well get DVD-A capability, but the "higher resolution" of that and SACD might not be of real benefit in and of itself. A few months ago I ran into something on the topic by an engineer who's a motion picture music editor and which tends to reinforce what I've suspected were the reasons for the "better sound". Check the background of "soundhound" here and his several comments analyzing why better recording, mixing, mastering, etc.is what matters, not higher sampling rates or bits here . Food for thought.

I have no doubt that trying to discern a good cd quality recording from a dvd-a would be very difficult if at all possible.
Getting the higher than cd quality bitrates is not necessarily the upgrade that i would be looking for in the dvd-a standard.
Instead, it is the attention to detail for the dvd-a/sacd standard and the specifically designed multichannel recordings that i believe make the improvement to my ears. As even soundhound mentions in his post:

"I am not against having the very best of what the current technology has to offer, and I am an avid supporter of both SACD and DVD-A, but I would want to impress the fact that a lot of what you are hearing as "improvement" is simply the result of more careful attention to the recording of the original master, and the fact that these new formats are multichannel."

Ultimately some sound jockey out there will mix a crappy dvd-a and it will make a difference.
Just what i need, an overdone treble range pop album on dvd-a MULTICHANNEL instead of the usual 2 channel ear piercing experience!

Well it seems that i should have a slightly used Panasonic CP72, 5 disc dvd player on the way soon.
The price was decent, $250 cdn shipped to my door which will be offset by the sale of my present CV52 player to a friend.
The 'upgrade' to a progressive scan, dvd-a capable and somewhat tested dvd player will end up costing about $100-130 after all is said and done. It was way cheaper than my non-progressive scan, non-dvda player that cost me $400 just a year ago.