D

dafirst

Junior Audioholic
Hello fellas, i am in the market for a new Blu-ray 4k player which Oppo most definitely is the one that comes to mind. I was reading an article regarding difference in the 203 & 205. The 203 seems to be very popular even though the 205 is the latest. My budget is on the 203 and i read a lot about it and followed youtube videos as well. I know the 203 has an HDMI Input in case someone want to add other media players like Apple Tv, Android Tv etc. To be surprise, i came across this article as the writer is stating that, one of the advantages the 205 has over the 203 is the HDMI INPUT which can support other devices. I googled the photos of both players and saw both have the HDMI INPUT. Could the writer have made a mistake or was there another 203 before this one.
Oppo 205.JPG
Oppo 203.JPG

As you can see from the back, both have the hdmi inputs. Can someone enlighten me if i'm the one who got the writer wrong or he made a mistake.
this is the link
If you read the paragraph where the writer says As A Control Center.
https://www.audioadvice.com/content/2017/10/02/oppo-udp-203-vs-oppo-udp-205-4k-blu-ray-players/
 
j_garcia

j_garcia

Audioholic Jedi
They both have the input. You can use it to feed through from another device; I've done it when my old Pre died.
 
TheWarrior

TheWarrior

Audioholic Ninja
The advantage of the 205 is in its dedicated DAC's and balanced outputs for 2 channel music listening. At more than double the money, the 205 should only be on your upgrade list if you can really make use out of the balanced connections and do regular stereo listening of your cds.
 
S

sterling shoote

Audioholic Field Marshall
The 205 has a usb DAC input which permits the import of Hi-Res 24/192 files for output from one of the 205's ESS DAC's dedicated to balanced and unbalanced stereo. I've got to tell ya, this feature is awesome. It allows me to enjoy the Hi-Res files I have residing in my iTunes Library. I'm not sure that those files sound better than AAC files; but, I am certain all my files sound better, in all manner that better can be discerned, from the ESS DAC than these files do from the DAC in my 18 year old Sony TA-E9000es, my Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi HD, or the DAC in my Airport Express. Through the OPPO's DAC overtones, undertones, detail, and nuances are revealed in such measure that it makes me really glad I purchased it instead of the 203, which as mentioned does not have the usb DAC input. Interestingly enough, I did not buy the 205 for the usb DAC input but I thought it might be useful. I purchased the unit specifically to be able to enjoy my multi-channel SACDs from a 5.1 analog preamp (Sony TA-P9000es) which is working out really well. My 3 channel "Living Stereo" SACDs have a nice wide sound stage that is absent in stereo.
r
 
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Verdinut

Verdinut

Audioholic Spartan
Did you know guys that Cineplex theaters had been using OPPO Blu-ray players in their cinemas?

I know for a fact. Once at one of their theaters on the south shore of Montreal, I was watching the beginning of an "Encore" replay of a Met Opera Live in HD Performance. As the subtitles had been set to English while most of the audience is francophone, the operator stopped the Blu-ray player, and this how I noticed that they were using an OPPO player. Because of the size of their screens, I am pretty sure that the one they use is an 8K player.

In addition, all their theaters across North America are equipped with QSC Audio amplifiers, speakers and DSPs. for our full enjoyment. QSC has definitely replaced most previous Altec equipment which was the most popular pro audio brand used in North American theaters, stadiums and concert halls starting in the 1940's.

http://www.brucesentertainment.com/QSC_Cinema_Catalog.pdf
 
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basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
I got my 203 yesterday. Got it set up, but ran in a few glitches. Maybe some of you 203 owners can share notes?

Played the audio demo BD that came with my BDP-93 from 9 years ago, and noticed I had no center channel. Pulled the racks and rechecked the wiring. Still no center channel output on the test disc's channel ID track. However, when I turn on Test Tone in the Oppo 203's speaker processing menu, I get white noise coming out of center channel when selected. Now the odd part: after using the test tone function, subsequent plays of the AIX Audio Demo revealed working center channel. So no output til I toggled the test tone. Not sure yet if it's persistent between power ups.. will find out tonight.

Next item is that it won't play most media that is on a network share. Some message like "incompatible format" pops up. HOWEVER, when I copy the media to a thumb drive and plug that into the Oppo, it DOES play without issue. I am not running DLNA, so I don't see why playing from any PC hard drive on the network should alter the data like that.

Last item: the Picture Controls don't do anything. I'm used to using this menu on my old '93 player and they work on that player. But not on the 203. And I have the March firmware installed. I tried pushing the slider to + and then -16, but saw no change in brightness, contrast, hue or saturation when each of the respective controls were adjusted. Is this a future feature that is not yet implemented?

To the good, I like the motion activated remote backlight and I love the fact that it is powerful enough to operate the player by bouncing off the screen. I don't have to lean forward anymore and point directly at the player in the rack behind me anymore.

The ability to play various media from thumb drives (and hopefully network) is great.

Picture quality is tremendous. Even the BD-Rs that I authored which originated from 35mb/s XDCam footage of orchestra concerts I shot 8 years ago, look far more detailed than they did on my '93 and my old projector. (I'm using the Sony VPL VW765ES which replaced an InFocus IN82). I always noticed that the top edges of music stands in the orchestra produced aliasing on my old setup, and on the new, it looks like an analog picture with no digital artifacts, yet even more detailed.

Of interest is the DAC filter, which is adjustable. Perhaps Oppo put that in as response to my complaint about the poor squarewave response on the '93. I have yet to put a scope on the output and try my test CD with various settings of the filter. Will report on that later.

So I'm pretty optimistic about the UDP-203 so far. I think I can eliminate a switcher by using the HDMI input to feed my region-free Oppo 981HD into the 203 when I need to watch other region DVDs.
 
lovinthehd

lovinthehd

Audioholic Jedi
Just still feeling my way around my new 203.

First, are you using hdmi or analog or ? for connecting?

Not familiar with older Oppos or demo disks but sounds like you might be listening to 4ch tracks rather than 5ch? Not unusual among older multich offerings I've run into on multich discs at least.

The time I tried to use its network access to files on my computer it takes forever to compile my music files, but they're fairly large and takes more time than I allowed (not unusual with other network devices like this in the past, too). I only have a few video files and that was fairly fast to load. However, I will generally be pushing content over wifi/dlna to the unit, not using the 203 to control.

I got my 203 yesterday. Got it set up, but ran in a few glitches. Maybe some of you 203 owners can share notes?

Played the audio demo BD that came with my BDP-93 from 9 years ago, and noticed I had no center channel. Pulled the racks and rechecked the wiring. Still no center channel output on the test disc's channel ID track. However, when I turn on Test Tone in the Oppo 203's speaker processing menu, I get white noise coming out of center channel when selected. Now the odd part: after using the test tone function, subsequent plays of the AIX Audio Demo revealed working center channel. So no output til I toggled the test tone. Not sure yet if it's persistent between power ups.. will find out tonight.

Next item is that it won't play most media that is on a network share. Some message like "incompatible format" pops up. HOWEVER, when I copy the media to a thumb drive and plug that into the Oppo, it DOES play without issue. I am not running DLNA, so I don't see why playing from any PC hard drive on the network should alter the data like that.

Last item: the Picture Controls don't do anything. I'm used to using this menu on my old '93 player and they work on that player. But not on the 203. And I have the March firmware installed. I tried pushing the slider to + and then -16, but saw no change in brightness, contrast, hue or saturation when each of the respective controls were adjusted. Is this a future feature that is not yet implemented?

To the good, I like the motion activated remote backlight and I love the fact that it is powerful enough to operate the player by bouncing off the screen. I don't have to lean forward anymore and point directly at the player in the rack behind me anymore.

The ability to play various media from thumb drives (and hopefully network) is great.

Picture quality is tremendous. Even the BD-Rs that I authored which originated from 35mb/s XDCam footage of orchestra concerts I shot 8 years ago, look far more detailed than they did on my '93 and my old projector. (I'm using the Sony VPL VW765ES which replaced an InFocus IN82). I always noticed that the top edges of music stands in the orchestra produced aliasing on my old setup, and on the new, it looks like an analog picture with no digital artifacts, yet even more detailed.

Of interest is the DAC filter, which is adjustable. Perhaps Oppo put that in as response to my complaint about the poor squarewave response on the '93. I have yet to put a scope on the output and try my test CD with various settings of the filter. Will report on that later.

So I'm pretty optimistic about the UDP-203 so far. I think I can eliminate a switcher by using the HDMI input to feed my region-free Oppo 981HD into the 203 when I need to watch other region DVDs.
 
S

sterling shoote

Audioholic Field Marshall
First, I bowed out of using my 205 for network play. I made my laptop a DLNA server and the 205 saw every music file; but, here's the rub, DLNA is not gapless and cannot be made gapless by setting the 205 to be gapless. This means music like The Firebird just cannot be enjoyed. So, I just use the front usb port which does support gapless, as well as multichannel. Second, although the 205 manual says the usb DAC terminates at both stereo and multichannel analog outputs, it actually does not terminate at mutiochannel outputs and therefore multichannel from the computer to OPPOs usb DAC can not be enjoyed. So, really only two ways to enjoy multi-channel gaplessly from OPPOs multi-channel analog output: multi-channel SACD or front usb port. I have given up on network; but, I do use the usb DAC for Stereo pleasure. I do believe my hi-rez downloads sound better than same material using Airplay. At any rate, I purchase my OPPO just for one reason, multi-channel SACD from analog not HDMI output, and the OPPO delivers it nicely.
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
Apparently my router wasn't set to DLNA mode when I was testing earlier. Oddly, media won't play off a network share drive. But when the router is set to DLNA server "on", the Oppo can play the files. Go figure.

Center channel still working, after power cycling, so that's good.

Learned from Oppo that Source Direct prevents use of the color controls.

Overall, it's working well, but one thing bothers me.. when I set the HDMI port on my VPL VW675ES to 'enhanced', I get no picture with the Oppo. I have to set it to the 'normal' mode. My understanding is 'enhanced' increases the bandwidth and bit depth capability of the input. So there is some mismatch of settings or compatibility issue with the Oppo?
 
j_garcia

j_garcia

Audioholic Jedi
Hooked up the 205 last night and listened to a few SACDs. Jazz at the Pawnshop sounded great, Dave Brubeck's Concord on a Summer Night sounded as good as ever. Can't say I hear an appreciable difference over the 105, but it still sounds excellent. Then dropped in Blade Runner 2049 Blu-ray, which I have to say video wise, does seem to look better than the 105.
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
I noticed that videos played over DLNA don't benefit from the upscaler. Having been used to playing videos via my computer to the projector's other HDMI input, I was shocked at how dull the colors were when played through the Oppo 205, and the utter lack of smoothing or anti-aliasing around edges. The images look blocky and have jagged edges when the Oppo plays the network videos.

Is the Oppo not using it's scaler when playing files from DLNA network?
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
Another issue cropped up this week.. trouble playing a BD-R that has always played in my Oppo 93. The BD-R is clean, no fingerprints or scratches. But it freezes and a magenta band with noise pixels appears across the middle third of the screen.

To be sure the disc didn't degrade, I fired up my Oppo 93 and played it there. It played without a single glitch.

What's with the terrible error correction on the 205?
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
Does the 203 play 3D blu-ray discs, or is that relegated to the 205? I have tried to play two different 3D movies... Star Wars and Journey to the Center of the Earth and when the discs load, a message comes up on the screen that the player is not 3D capable.
To anticipate your next question, the projector is a Sony VPL VW675ES and I have 3D glasses registered to it.
 
lovinthehd

lovinthehd

Audioholic Jedi
Yep 203 does 3D nicely...have gotten the message if I insert the disc before avr/tv are on, tho. Use mine in the auto 3D mode....
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
The projector is already on (lamp has to come up to full brightness) and I insert the disc and get that message. I'm given the option to watch the move in 2D.
 
lovinthehd

lovinthehd

Audioholic Jedi
Is it all your 3D discs or just those two? I don't have those two but suspect it's more an hdmi handshake thing going on with your projector and the Oppo....I'd call Oppo on Monday.
 
basspig

basspig

Full Audioholic
We have two 3D discs at the moment. Forcing 3D in the setup menu enabled us to play the Star Wars 3D disc, but for some reason, the Journey to the Center of the Earth disc refused to work with that setting and reverted to 2D.

After toggling force 3D off and then back on, I was able to get the disc to load in 3D once.

I've got only 20' of 4K certified HDMI cable run from Oppo to Sony projector. The projector has the latest firmware. The Oppo updated itself as soon as I powered it on the first time, via Ethernet. So I don't know what the problem could be.
 

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