Oppo BDP-83 Universal Blu-ray Player Review

[j_garcia]

I just downloaded the ver 620 firmware from Oppo and will be installing it today.

Has anyone done the 805 Beta on theirs?

 

[Ron Temple]

I just downloaded the ver 620 firmware from Oppo and will be installing it today.

Has anyone done the 805 Beta on theirs?

Spoke to Oppo today. The 805 Beta is supposed to fix the sub channel trim reset bug...at least that's what I thought he said. I'm going to download and install tomorrow. Also, to those waiting for calibration disks. If you purchased after 5/15 you're still waiting. They ran out of envelopes/sleeves and are awaiting their order .

 

[DaleAV]

Spoke to Oppo today. The 805 Beta is supposed to fix the sub channel trim reset bug...at least that's what I thought he said. I'm going to download and install tomorrow. Also, to those waiting for calibration disks. If you purchased after 5/15 you're still waiting. They ran out of envelopes/sleeves and are awaiting their order .

I believe the 0620 fixed the sub trim reset problem according to the description at Oppo.
The 0805 does quite few things though:



1. Blu-ray Disc compatibility improvement, especially for certain titles such as "Dollhouse Season 1", "12 Rounds" and "The Haunting in Connecticut".
2. Additional "Deep Color" options utilizing dithering. If the display does not support 36-bit deep color, dithering 36-bit to 30-bit or 24-bit may produce an image that is visually smoother than rounding 36-bit to 30- or 24-bit.
3. Improved precision for color space conversion.
4. Improved up-conversion for MKV files that have a picture size smaller than 1280x720 with 24fps frame rate.
5. Improvement for DVD navigation.
6. Fix for the issue of not being able to reset factory default settings introduced in the 34-0722 beta firmware.
7. Fix for the PAL DVD picture quality issue introduced in the 34-0722 beta firmware. The issue looks like a de-interlacing error but is caused by the decoder chip, not the de-interlacer.
8. New pop-up user interface for audio and subtitle selection.
9. Improved GOTO function for music file playback. The GOTO function now allows the user to jump to a certain time point within a music file.
10. Other general disc compatibility and performance improvements.



Of course they are accumulative, so if you did not do the '620' it will be picked up here.

 

[j_garcia]

620 installed and it does appear to fix the sub issue. I will try it out again tonight to verify.

 

[j_garcia]

620 installed and it does appear to fix the sub issue. I will try it out again tonight to verify.

FYI: the sub issue is fixed.

 

[Ron Temple]

I did the 805 Beta last night, it took, but I didn't use the player. I also got the AIX disk, so I'll finally get this puppy calibrated correctly over analog soon .

 

[Ron Temple]

Anybody try the AIX disk? I went through the calibration this afternoon. However, it offers a format speaker detection piece, Dolby TrueHD, DTS HD/MA, LPCM and the older codecs. For some reason, I got no sound during the DTS HD/MA, though Dolby TH and LPCM worked. I've never had a problem playing DTS HD/MA on movies, but maybe I'm only getting the DTS core . Can someone check this out for me?

 

[cvcgolf]

I have to ask a stupid question. My Oppo is connected to my older Yamaha through the analogs. When I watch standard dvds I switch back and forth between the analog and coax connection to try to hear any differences or improvement in sound.

Psychologically I want to believe the Oppo sounds better only because it's new equipment. I just can't hear a big enough difference. Are you guys allowing the Oppo to do the processing only on Blu-ray discs? Is there any technical reason why the Oppo could sound better with standard dvds?

 

[Ron Temple]

There might or might not be an improvement over analog vs coax with standard DVDs. It depends on your analog section of the receiver. The hi rez codecs on BDs should be easily discernable from the digital core, but from DVDs you're passing the same lossy mix over coax and/or analog. On my rig, I can hear a difference, but I don't usually bother using analog for DVDs. Most people praising the Oppo's audio ability over analog, as a player, are talking about CD, SACD and DVD A recordings.

 

[j_garcia]

Anybody try the AIX disk? I went through the calibration this afternoon. However, it offers a format speaker detection piece, Dolby TrueHD, DTS HD/MA, LPCM and the older codecs. For some reason, I got no sound during the DTS HD/MA, though Dolby TH and LPCM worked. I've never had a problem playing DTS HD/MA on movies, but maybe I'm only getting the DTS core . Can someone check this out for me?

I tried all of them except the stereo ones. No problems with any of them.

There might or might not be an improvement over analog vs coax with standard DVDs. It depends on your analog section of the receiver. The hi rez codecs on BDs should be easily discernable from the digital core, but from DVDs you're passing the same lossy mix over coax and/or analog. On my rig, I can hear a difference, but I don't usually bother using analog for DVDs. Most people praising the Oppo's audio ability over analog, as a player, are talking about CD, SACD and DVD A recordings.

Yep, what he said. I noticed on ONE disc that the sound was different via analogs vs digital, but it is an odd mix. Most other SD DVD discs should sound pretty much the same as they always did. Video gets upscaled, audio is unaffected.

 

[megaman821]

In case you are broke like me. You can win one of these at sweepstar.com/sweepstakes/oppo-bdp-83-blu-ray-disc-player-with-sacd-dvd-audi/

 

[dsa220]

Anybody try the AIX disk? I went through the calibration this afternoon. However, it offers a format speaker detection piece, Dolby TrueHD, DTS HD/MA, LPCM and the older codecs. For some reason, I got no sound during the DTS HD/MA, though Dolby TH and LPCM worked. I've never had a problem playing DTS HD/MA on movies, but maybe I'm only getting the DTS core . Can someone check this out for me?

Turn off the Secondary Audio Program [SAP] (some firmware versions may say Secondary Audio) found under the Audio Format Button. This should resolve your issue, it did in mine.

By the way, if the SAP is on, you were not hearing the DTS-HD Audio, but the core DTS audio.

Regards,

DSA

 

[j_garcia]

Turn off the Secondary Audio Program [SAP] (some firmware versions may say Secondary Audio) found under the Audio Format Button. This should resolve your issue, it did in mine.

By the way, if the SAP is on, you were not hearing the DTS-HD Audio, but the core DTS audio.

Regards,

DSA

Yep, I forgot about that. It says in the manual that unless you are going to use PiP functions of a particular disc, SAP should be OFF.

 

[Ron Temple]

Turn off the Secondary Audio Program [SAP] (some firmware versions may say Secondary Audio) found under the Audio Format Button. This should resolve your issue, it did in mine.

By the way, if the SAP is on, you were not hearing the DTS-HD Audio, but the core DTS audio.

Regards,

DSA

It is turned off. It's not a problem anyway. Oppo sent me a reply saying there were errors on the AIX encoding in the format identification portion of the disk. They've notified them, but I'm not sure if AIX agrees. I've read posts elsewhere that some are noticing the same glitch I did, others are having problems on the Dolby TrueHD section. I'm having no problem getting either format from BDs and it's the calibration section of the AIX disk that's useful to me anyway.

 

[Dr. AIX]

Contrary to the information that you received from Oppo, there are no errors in the audio encodes in any of the formats present on the BD calibration and sampler disc. We have made the streams of DTS-MA and Dolby TrueHD with their core audio standard formats to be able to detect whether you are hearing the new format encodes or the older core formats. So if the DTS-MA bitstream is being decoded at your A/V receiver you can be sure that you're hearing the DTS-MA format.

Mark Waldrep
AIX Records

 

[j_garcia]

Contrary to the information that you received from Oppo, there are no errors in the audio encodes in any of the formats present on the BD calibration and sampler disc. We have made the streams of DTS-MA and Dolby TrueHD with their core audio standard formats to be able to detect whether you are hearing the new format encodes or the older core formats. So if the DTS-MA bitstream is being decoded at your A/V receiver you can be sure that you're hearing the DTS-MA format.

Mark Waldrep
AIX Records

All I can say is that Primavera sounds spectacular on that disc. All of the tracks are great, but that one really blew me away.

 

[Ron Temple]

Contrary to the information that you received from Oppo, there are no errors in the audio encodes in any of the formats present on the BD calibration and sampler disc. We have made the streams of DTS-MA and Dolby TrueHD with their core audio standard formats to be able to detect whether you are hearing the new format encodes or the older core formats. So if the DTS-MA bitstream is being decoded at your A/V receiver you can be sure that you're hearing the DTS-MA format.

Mark Waldrep
AIX Records

Mark, thanks for your input. I'm not using bitstream, but analog. The player decodes and identifies each format but DTS HD/MA with you disk. No flags on the player, just silence. However, I really like the disk and have no problems with other BDs.

Thanks a bunch.

 

[j_garcia]

I installed the 805 firmware a week ago and so far it has eliminated the last of the minor playback issues I was having with the Oppo (mainly DVD-As and SACDs).

 

[adk highlander]

All I can say is that Primavera sounds spectacular on that disc. All of the tracks are great, but that one really blew me away.

I agree that is an exceptional track.

 

[akeoo7]

How about a BDP 83 vs 80 detailed comparaison

I would really like to see a detailed comparaison between the BDP80 and the BDP83 especially in the audio department, digital and analog. especially after hearing so many new OPPO BDP83 owners crying unsatisfied (on amazon forums) for different reasons, especially in the price for performance ratio.
Some even said that in picture quality the Pioneer 320 which currently sells for less than $200 is better than OPPO's. and all concluding the the BDP80 is a better buy than the BDP83.
By the way the Pioneer seems like great value but I need SACD and DVDA