Samsung DVD-HD941

[Jondice]

Delays

According to a "review" on amazon.com, this product will likely be delayed until at least mid november due to some manufacturing issues

 

[Unregistered]

I had the 931 and took it back.

1) Most good HDTVs will upconvert anyway (mine did anyway)
2) I had no control on scaling the image when using the DVI port. ie.e not all images are widescreen but I could not prevent the 4:3 images from being stretched
3) The 931 has a very annoying bright blue light on the face you could not dim...
4) Sammy DVD players have a history of getting sound and video out of sync
5) DVDs are not recorded at HD...I wanted a HD sat box (true HD) and with only one DVI port figure more bang for the buck with the Sat box using it. Went back to component DVD player. Most people can't see any difference anyway.

 

[MikeW]

Samsung HD-941 vs. Denon DVD-2910

Does anyone have an opinion on which would be the better buy? Cost is not the most important issue.

 

[petermwilson]

Hi,
I was just at Sam's Club here in Toronto and saw the Samsung HD841 complete with DVI cable, (which is the only output it scales from for $248 Canadian. It also is a combo dvd-a/sacd player.

Fortuneately they had one operating which gave me a chance to check the DVI output and (although the manual was unavailable, nowhere on the box or the player did it say that the DVI out was HDCP compliant. This is great news for anyone with an earlier display with a non HDCP compliant input.

Otherwise the scaling ability of this player will be restricted home made dvds or store bought dvd's that arn't worth having copy protection on them.

The scaling capabilities from DVI are 720p 1080i and 746 (whatever that is)
Although I haven't seen it happen I'm going to guess that those players or displays that are HDCP compliant may just pass through a 480p picture. If your trying to scale the picture it may have artifacts or other anamolies that make you think its a poor player when in fact its just HDCP doing it's thing.

Anyway for the Canadian person asking, the guy at Sams told me you had a year to bring it back so I guess there's nothing to lose.

If you go to the DVDO site they explain HDCP as it pertains to scaling from digital (which is DVI or HDMI). If either the player or the display is HDCP enabled from either the player or the display it will not scale to HD rezes.

My brother has one of the first Tosh rptv's to come out with DVI which was not HDCP enabled. The 841 would be perfect for him or anyone else in the same situation. If the 941 is HDCP enabled, unless it also scales from component your out of luck.

Peter m.

 

[brassmaster]

Let's get the facts straight:
1. This player will not upscale through component outputs because that's an analog, unencrypted connection. Samsung is a member of the DVD forum and as such, cannot output an upscaled signal through any analog, unencrypted output.
2. This player will probably not work well, if at all, with a non-hdcp compliant monitor through the dvi connection because it IS an hdcp-compliant player.
3. If you have an hdcp-compliant set, this player WILL in fact upscale your dvds to a 720p, 768p, or 1080i resolution.

All of this aside, the HD-841 isn't a good buy anyway because it has the picture quality issues associated with the first upscaling dvd player from samsung, the HD-931.

-Brassmaster

 

[petermwilson]

Hi,
My impression was that the HDCP compliance folks are mostly concerned about the digital DVI and HDMI digital out/inputs of units rather than analog.

The LG (GoldStar) DV7832 scales to 1080i and 720p from both component and DVI. I can attest personally to the component part because an ISF tech did it on my Tosh65H80 (which doesn't have DVI) and we A/B'd it with my HOLO3D scaler being fed by an SDI modded Panny RP82 and the results were very impressive. The Bravo D1 also scales but I'm not sure if it does it from both.

In fact the new Denon 5805 not only upconverts any 480i signal from composite and s-vid to component, with the addition of Faroudja DCDI processing scales one or all component outputs to 720p and 1080i.
I think the new Sony Flagship does the same.

This video scaling on the Denon (from component only) is not HDCP compliant.
The DVI and HDMI digital outputs are.

HDCP compliance from my perspective basically means that I cannot scale most store bought dvds, but I'm free to scale a home made video past 720 x 480p. Although I can understand the concerns for large scale pirating, it restricts what those of us with HTs can do to make Spiderman look its best on our display unit unless of course you put it through DVD X Copy, compress it and take out the copy protection. This means that when you scale it your just bringing it back to its original quality.

Anyway, thats the law and when HD DVD comes out we'll have a whole new issue because the only cable were likely to be using for high quality video and audio is digital HDMI.

Peter m.

 

[nick_danger]

I have the HD841 connected to my Zenith plasma EDTV via the DVI port and the picture is astonishing. I've got absolutely no idea how the addition of DCDi would help the picture any more, but I'll be sure to give it a try.