Those of you with BluRay Players

[3db]

In this month's HomeTheatrer Maagazine is a review of three Blure Ray players from Denon, Panasonic, and Samsung. They all got more or less good reviews but they differed from the feature sets. The one thing that was mentioned that the laoding and menu navigation for BluRay discs is frightfully slow and cumbersome. This was escopially true for the Denon, not so bad fopr teh Panasonic and the Samsung approached loading/navigation speeds of a standard DVD.

Is there really that much of a slow down in loading.navigation of the disks compared to that of standard DVD? Does it annoy you to th epoint where you regret having purchased a BR player? To me, its seems that HTR is going on about somethign that is trivial.

 

[BobSD]

Just my thought, I have a $100 DVD player got free for buying a Big Screen Sony TV. Well it does everything fast, but now I bought a high end DVD player and it is very slow, like you said, maybe higher end players are slower, more complex?

 

[jostenmeat]

Is there really that much of a slow down in loading.navigation of the disks compared to that of standard DVD? Does it annoy you to th epoint where you regret having purchased a BR player? To me, its seems that HTR is going on about somethign that is trivial.

Hmm. Well, I almost only watch movies with friends, and it usually takes longer to decide on a movie than it does to have the player ready to go, first of all. Or, by the time the PJ is warmed-up, its ready to go.

Navigation menu's, it depends more on the disc itself perhaps. I hate that Rataouille has 10 ads that must be manually skipped one at a time, and can't be bypassed completely by hitting guide/menu etc. But, that's extremely rare, the only one with that many ads. The menu selection to choose lossless takes longer on that disc as well.

Some BDs come as defaulted to lossless, which I sorta wish would become the standard. Even if to my annoyance, Id even prefer if it defaulted as lossy, just choose one as a standard, so that its not a guessing game I suppose. Oh I don't know.

You know what is cool about menu navigation of BD/HD-DVD is the pop up menu. On a DVD, if you hit menu, the movie totally stops. On BD, there's a pop up somewhere (normally at the bottom), and you scroll thru scenes, change languages, change codecs, etc, on the fly. They all look different with their own stylized graphics as well. Sometimes almost to confusing effect, like the choosing cursor is a "crossed-out or x-d out" thing for a zombie/vampire movie.

Sometimes my Pana BD makes a little noise every once in a while. I'd rather it was quieter than have a faster load, if I got to choose one improvement. But, that's a very rare occurrence as well.

 

[j_garcia]

ALL of the Disney BDs have the opening trailers "feature", and many of them have the problem of freezing if you hit menu to skip. I had both Ratatoullie and Pirates of the Caribbean freeze on me, but no others so far, and each of them worked after I ejected them, reinsterted them and ran them again with skip instead of hitting menu.

The PS3 is pretty fast with all discs, so no big deal. My A2 was MUCH slower accessing menu items, esepcially while the movie was playing. With BD, almost all of your menu items are accessed during playback - one movie I noticed that doesn't do this is Nightmare Before Christmas - the menu operates like a SD DVD, but it is the only one I have seen like this so far (and it is disappointing). There can sometimes be a lag, but with the PS3 I don't notice any at all, though as jostenmeat mentioned, it depends on the movies themselves and how complex the pop up menus are. With my Dad's Insignia player, I did notice that menu access was a little slower - noticeable, but not annoying nor as slow as my A2 was. The ability to access most anything from the menus via pop-up menus is a far better option than having to go to the menu IMHO, and the cool thing is, if you watch some featurette, trailer, etc... when it is done, it returns to the movie where you were.

 

[3db]

ALL of the Disney BDs have the opening trailers "feature", and many of them have the problem of freezing if you hit menu to skip. I had both Ratatoullie and Pirates of the Caribbean freeze on me, but no others so far, and each of them worked after I ejected them, reinsterted them and ran them again with skip instead of hitting menu.

The PS3 is pretty fast with all discs, so no big deal. My A2 was MUCH slower accessing menu items, esepcially while the movie was playing. With BD, almost all of your menu items are accessed during playback - one movie I noticed that doesn't do this is Nightmare Before Christmas - the menu operates like a SD DVD, but it is the only one I have seen like this so far (and it is disappointing). There can sometimes be a lag, but with the PS3 I don't notice any at all, though as jostenmeat mentioned, it depends on the movies themselves and how complex the pop up menus are. With my Dad's Insignia player, I did notice that menu access was a little slower - noticeable, but not annoying nor as slow as my A2 was. The ability to access most anything from the menus via pop-up menus is a far better option than having to go to the menu IMHO, and the cool thing is, if you watch some featurette, trailer, etc... when it is done, it returns to the movie where you were.

I forgot about the P3. HT magazine did mention that the P3 was really fast with the loading of DVDs

 

[dobyblue]

The PS3 is pretty fast with just about any media - SACD, BD, DVD, CD.

 

[StiMpACk]

yeah i got the ps3 and its pretty quick. I've tried almost all the mainstream blu-ray players and a lot of them are pretty slow as far as loading, skipping, and going through the menu.

so sad hd-dvd had to go out, quick...and menu was accessible while watching the movie

 

[EJ1]

yeah i got the ps3 and its pretty quick. I've tried almost all the mainstream blu-ray players and a lot of them are pretty slow as far as loading, skipping, and going through the menu.

so sad hd-dvd had to go out, quick...and menu was accessible while watching the movie

I can access the menu while watching a BD on the PS3.

 

[aberkowitz]

In this month's HomeTheatrer Maagazine is a review of three Blure Ray players from Denon, Panasonic, and Samsung. They all got more or less good reviews but they differed from the feature sets. The one thing that was mentioned that the laoding and menu navigation for BluRay discs is frightfully slow and cumbersome. This was escopially true for the Denon, not so bad fopr teh Panasonic and the Samsung approached loading/navigation speeds of a standard DVD.

Is there really that much of a slow down in loading.navigation of the disks compared to that of standard DVD? Does it annoy you to th epoint where you regret having purchased a BR player? To me, its seems that HTR is going on about somethign that is trivial.

There's nothing I regret about the purchase of my PS3. Aside from the stuff that's been mentioned, the other top notch quality is the fact that it supports wireless internet. My router is nowhere near my HT, and it would really piss me off to have to either a) move my player to a different room for updates, or b) run a long ethernet cable.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I have the Denon DVD-3800BDCI.

I also have the Toshiba HD-XA1 HD DVD player, which is even slower than the Denon.

It has never ever bothered me at all.

And I sure don't regret buying either one.

To me, performance and aesthetics are a lot more important than load time.

 

[tcarcio]

This morning Radio shack had the Samsung 1500 for $199 and I bought one and now it is off the site. I got an email confirming the sale so it should go through. If I get it I will post here how I like it.

 

[Stripes]

I would say that the load time isnt even a factor for me, with all that BR has to offer a little bit longer of a load time seems trivial. But I will say that my
PS3 is super loud, before I put it in my closet it could get real annoying during a quite part in a movie. Also the price of BR disks seems to scare people away, so my solution is Netflix and then I only buy the ones I know Im going to want in my collection, aka. ones that I can watch over and over without getting tired of them

 

[aberkowitz]

PS3 is super loud, before I put it in my closet it could get real annoying during a quite part in a movie.

I know some folks have said this, but I've never even heard my PS3 make a noise unless I accidentally leave it on overnight (fell asleep during a movie and forgot to shut it off before going to bed). Were you keeping it in an enclosed cabinet?

 

[j_garcia]

I rarely notice the fans on my PS3 either.

 

[ParadigmDawg]

Mine is loud and bothers me somewhat.

 

[Seth=L]

I would say that the load time isnt even a factor for me, with all that BR has to offer a little bit longer of a load time seems trivial. But I will say that my
PS3 is super loud, before I put it in my closet it could get real annoying during a quite part in a movie. Also the price of BR disks seems to scare people away, so my solution is Netflix and then I only buy the ones I know Im going to want in my collection, aka. ones that I can watch over and over without getting tired of them

I don't know about this though, I have never heard a loud PS3. Others have mentioned their 40GB PS3s are loud. The 40GB I use is not very loud at all. The 360 is loud, even the new 360s (which have improved noise output) are still much louder than the PS3. My friend's Toshiba HD-A2 HD DVD player's fan is louder than his PS3 he noted.

 

[gus6464]

If you have a loud 40GB you should try a fan test. Reports from people online have said that it fixed the loudness problem which seems to apply to first gen 40's.

 

[j_garcia]

I just sold my A2, but it was definitely louder than my PS3. The 40G does seem to be the model that generally people complain about the fans the most, but it also has to do with where you put it. Mine is in a closed rack with no back and perforated sides, so unless it is a really hot day, my fans stay on low. If you have it somewhere where the fan noise is going to be contained, it is going to sound a lot louder and if you have it in a closed spot where the heat has no way to escape, then it is also going to run hotter and thus the fans will run on medium or high.

 

[Panjsheri]

In this month's HomeTheatrer Maagazine is a review of three Blure Ray players from Denon, Panasonic, and Samsung. They all got more or less good reviews but they differed from the feature sets. The one thing that was mentioned that the laoding and menu navigation for BluRay discs is frightfully slow and cumbersome. This was escopially true for the Denon, not so bad fopr teh Panasonic and the Samsung approached loading/navigation speeds of a standard DVD.

Is there really that much of a slow down in loading.navigation of the disks compared to that of standard DVD? Does it annoy you to th epoint where you regret having purchased a BR player? To me, its seems that HTR is going on about somethign that is trivial.

I actually don't mind it at all as long as I am getting the best pic and sound for the money I spent then I can wait a few minutes....it adds to the anticipation When we all go to the theaters we have to wait and watch those stupid commercials before the trailers. So in this case I dont watch the commercials I just wait and get my popcorn ready and if the trailers come then I have the added option of skipping them all and getting straight to the movie BUT!!! The only thing about the Blu Ray players is once every few months or so you have to update the firmware which can be somewhat annoying depending on your mood but I have become accustomed to it and now again it adds to the anticipation So basically you get use to it

 

[Geno]

I have an older Panasonic BR, and it works flawlessly. The load times don't seem to be any longer than my SD DVD player. I don't understand some of the nit-picking I read here about the performance of these players. Just enjoy! It'll be nice when the movie prices come down, though.