Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Oppo Blu-Ray now has subtitle shift

The biggest problem with Blu-Ray is the movie studios. They are so worried about people stealing their products that they go to increasing measures to protect their product, even at the expense of alienating the consumer. All of this extra crap is a problem with almost any Blu-Ray player, since things are constantly changing and have to be fixed by firmware updates. I've only had a few Blu-Ray's that wouldn't play on the Oppo and they were all ones that were just released. How many DVD's have I run into that wouldn't play on the Oppo? Zero! And I watch more DVD's (from many regions) than I do Blu-Ray's.

Now, I've had the PS3 longer than the Oppo and haven't had any problems ever with a Blu-Ray not playing. Though the PS3 won't play PAL discs or discs from any other region, which is why I got the Oppo. If you want the most stable Blu-Ray player I say it is the PS3. If you want a standalone player that pulls the most out of any optical disc you put in it and is 98% as stable as the PS3 then go with the Oppo.

I'm well aware of the nit picking which occurs at AVS, and I like it. I'm pretty good at figuring out what matters to me and what doesn't. So I do like to know the worst-case, and determine if it is something which would bug me or not.

Regarding the use of the lossy core when the secondary audio is in use: yes, you're right, the only player (that I know of at this time) which can mix the lossless HD audio with a secondary source is the PS3. But that's just it, the PS3 is $350, and I have one already; the Oppo is $500. I expect that a more expensive device of any type be able to perform the tasks of any less expensive one at least as well.

That's all I'm saying is the Oppo is priced at a point where I demand a little closer to perfection before I buy. Even if there is nothing else in that price range which compares, it still has to live up to my expectations of what I think I should get for that money. I would rather have no BD player, or just settle on a less functional device which costs much less until there's something available which ticks all my boxes, and then cost stops being an issue.

Murph, perhaps I misled a little in my Sony response. I don't think Sony was always overpriced, subpar equipment, I just feel they fell into the trap of becoming too big for their britches. I think they definately came out with quality products in the beginning, but then as their reputation grew, they let their name carry them to places they didn't deserve to be.

I still remember the day I stopped looking at them through beer googles, it was back in the mid 90's and a friend of mine & I were both on the market for a 36 inch tv (the biggest CRT you could get at the time). We had both always been Sony fans, but when we got down to visit our local electronics stores, the Sony's were damn near twice the price of the other brands, and to my eye, was exactly the same, not twice as good!

I was asking a salesman about a Sony and another tv which looked identical to it, and I can't remember which brand exactly the other tv was (I'm thinking maybe JVC?), but the salesman told me that both of the picture tubes came down the same assembly line & had all the same parts, but then one went into a Sony, and the other into the other brand, and the Sony got marked up because of their name.

That turned me right off... Why should I pay $500 extra bucks to have 'Sony' stamped on my television? So when it was all said and done I wound up with a Toshiba which cost me like $1200 bucks while my buddy plunked down something closer to $2000 for a Sony Vega or whatever they were called. And everytime I was over at his place watching tv I couldn't help but to laugh under my breath as I thought to myself, "this thing isn't any better than my tv, poor sucker".

Since then I've only bought a couple Sony products (including the DVD player I currently use), and that was only when the product in question was priced competetively with the direct competition.

You and me both, on both of those points. I've had way too much success with Panasonic and Toshiba to even really consider anything else. Speaking of which, I haven't been keeping up on BD players lately, but I noticed at Best Buy the other day that Toshiba finally has a BD player out... Too bad the day had to come.

I had my first movie the other day that wouldn't play as well, Inglourious Basterds. I have a Panasonic BD-55 and this was the first movie to not play. After upgrading the firmware, it worked fine, but I thought it was a bit odd as well.

I do also find handshaking a pain with the BD player as opposed to my other components, but it seems pretty stable once it has finished. Rarely (10% of the time perhaps) I'll get a dropout in the first couple minutes of a movie, but it comes back on for good pretty much every time.

Don't worry Micheal, I was not in anyway defending Sony. I just find the whole progression story from leaders to leaners an interesting one.

My sony buying expereinces are very limited. But when I bought my one and only sony tv, I don't know, 10 years ago now? I don't think there was a better looking tv on the market, the TAO(Does that sound right?) had just come out I believe and looked pretty great too, but I still preferred the sony.

I did pay almost twice as much as all my other friends did at the time, but I'm still using mine and they aren't. I think I paid about $3200 all in with a stand.

I bought a 32" XBR at the time, it actually does HD(1080i only, no 720p) on two inputs. To this day I still think the picture on that tv is better then any Plasma or LCD I've ever scene... I'm serious, this thing still puts out a FANTASTIC picture and I actually even noticed the sound on it the other day when I was watching the Dropkick Murphys open the hockey game up, it still sounds great too!

I think Chris’ assessment is fair and accurate, especially about Oppo being a media darling. One should remember he is clearly stating this in the context of his needs and preferences and as always others mileage may vary as did mine. I’ve never owned anything that didn’t represent making some sort of choice involving tradeoffs. For the average person I imagine an inexpensive stand alone BD player is the best choice. For us weirdos it comes down to features and performance.

I needed/wanted a player that would play almost any disk I put in it (BD83 doesn’t do VCDs), have analog outs, great BD playback quality, outstanding DVD playback quality, ability to do PAL and region free (after marked mod)(I travel a lot and buy things overseas), and reasonably fast load times since I hate waiting. Truncated audio has only happened to me on one Boston SACD so it’s a non-issue for me.

I didn’t need a gaming machine as I already have an XBox 360. I didn’t need lossless media playback or Netflix streaming, which my HTPC handles with easier more useful interfaces IMO. I don’t use secondary audio or BD live features while watching a movie (to distracting) so I don’t care about their effect on playback quality as I turn them off unless I want them for later less critical viewing.



I totally agree with your strategy for waiting for the second iteration unfortunately for my needs their was no other option even close to the price of the Oppo and I had already put off buying a Blu-ray player as long as I could. [rant] I’m still hoping the format dies and gets replaced by something else soon because overall I think it’s a crappy hodgepodge of ever changing standards and I hope HDMI dies with it. [/rant]

When I read the reviews of the people not happy with the Oppo BD-83 most seem to have one thing in common. Lack of due diligence in researching their purchase which IMO is why I’m glad Chris and others are sharing their findings regarding various players.

I hope Blu-Ray stays around as long as possible so that we can get as many Blu-Ray titles as possible. The next thing to replace it (since it already is getting its foot in the door) is going to be downloads and streaming. I love my Netflix streaming, but only because it is free. The substandard audio (and sometimes video) along with dealing with the fluxuation of your internet connection and/or the server that they have the content on is bad enough that I wouldn't want to pay for a streaming service. If downloaded movies go anything like music downloads then 90% of it is overly compressed garbage, that 90% of the people can't even tell is garbage. No thanks.

Jay:

I had the LG 350C for a couple of weeks as well. I found that it locked up a few times and ran pretty warm.

Recently I picked up a LG 360BD from Costco for $150 and it is miles ahead of the 350. It's actually the same as the LG 370C model...even has both the 360 and 370C model numbers on the manual...probably a special Costco version I guess. Regardless it plays just about any video format including DIVX, mkv, etc via disc and the front usb port and even has a youtube function that connects via wired internet. To update the firmware for this you just use the updates for the 370C. Very happy with this player for the money.