Maybe B&O dont want to adopt blue ray or samsung! just yet here is a review- not good reading!
More debatable is an issue seen in all of the initial Lionsgate titles that have opted to include regular DTS audio instead of PCM. When you choose the DTS soundtrack, the video becomes noticeably jerky, a problem that goes away if you choose Dolby Digital instead. Until we get a larger representative sample of players from other manufacturers, I can't say whether that's a flaw in the Samsung BD-P1000 or the disc, but there's a good chance it's the player.
I tested the BD-P1000 over both HDMI and Component Video. In order to switch between these, you have to push a button on the player's front panel; there's no option to change output by the remote. I've read some user comments that claimed Component Video was superior to HDMI on this player, but I don't share that experience. In my testing, HDMI was visibly sharper and provided more saturated colors at both 720p and 1080i resolutions. Even after careful independent calibration of each output, the difference was far from subtle. I'm not able to test 1080p output at this time, so I suppose it's possible that there's an error in the 1080p processing that further degrades the HDMI video, but I can't confirm that. From what I've seen so far, HDMI is definitely the better option.
The player will output High Definition video at your choice of 720p, 1080i, or 1080p resolutions. 1080p is only available over HDMI, and is only enabled if the startup handshake between your components confirms 1080p compatibility in the display; otherwise that selection is grayed out in the setup menus. As I mentioned earlier, 1080p from this player is produced by decoding the original 1080p disc data to 1080i and then deinterlacing it later to reassemble the 1080p frames. It's a roundabout process to get right back where they should have started, but at least in theory it should be relatively easy to perform losslessly. How well Samsung's implementation follows through on this promise I can't yet validate, unfortunately.
Under normal circumstances I'd advise setting the player's output to match the native resolution of your HDTV display, but when I directly compared several Blu-ray movie scenes at both 720p and 1080i output on a native 720p projector, the 720p option was noticeably softer in fine object details. The scaling process to 720p seems to be flawed. The Toshiba HD DVD players have a similar issue (theirs involves jagged scaling artifacts rather than softening). For both formats, I recommend 1080i output from the player regardless of your HDTV display type.
Audio Options and QualityHere's where things get really messy. The HD video revolution has brought with it the potential for several new high-resolution audio formats including high bit-rate Dolby Digital Plus or lossless Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. HD DVD has embraced DD+ as its mandatory base-level standard, while offering limited support for TrueHD (only 2-channel decoding) and DTS-HD (downconverted to standard DTS) in the current hardware. It's a good start, with obvious room for improvement in the second-generation players.
[Update: On August 25th, 2006 Toshiba issued a firmware update (version 2.0) for their HD DVD players that upgrades their audio sections to Dolby TrueHD 5.1 capability.]
Blu-ray meanwhile allows all of these same audio formats as optional additions, but does not require any of them in the hardware or software. Regular Dolby Digital and DTS are the only mandatory audio standards. Unfortunately, all of the first-generation players, including this Samsung BD-P1000 and the upcoming models from Sony, Pioneer, and Panasonic, do not support any of these new audio formats at all. The players have no decoding circuitry, and no ability to transmit the bitstreams to external A/V receivers for processing either (for that you'll need an HDMI 1.3 connection, but only HDMI 1.1 is currently available). As far as Blu-ray is concerned at this point in time, DD+, TrueHD, and DTS-HD MA are out of the question. HD DVD's support may be limited, but Blu-ray's is nonexistent.
So what do we have? Well, of course there's normal Dolby Digital and DTS, so at a minimum Blu-ray will offer the same audio quality as traditional DVD, without improvement. These can be transmitted by the Toslink or coaxial connections as well as HDMI. Although the player also has 5.1 analog outputs, its internal Dolby Digital decoder is limited to 2 channels and it doesn't have a DTS decoder at all. If you want surround sound, you won't be using the analog connections with DD or DTS soundtracks.
You're probably wondering what the 5.1 analog outputs are good for, then. Because Blu-ray isn't ready to step up to the plate with any of the new audio formats, Sony has decided for its software releases that the next best solution is to provide the soundtrack in PCM 5.1 format. PCM is uncompressed and therefore should offer very high audio quality. The downside, as I mentioned earlier, is that an uncompressed soundtrack swallows up a huge chunk of the disc's bit budget that could be used to improve video quality instead. With the limited space on 25 gb single-layer discs and MPEG2 compression, it becomes a matter of priorities. Do you sacrifice picture quality for sound? For the first wave of Blu-ray releases, Sony's answer has been yes. Discs from Lionsgate, on the other hand, have foregone PCM in favor of standard DD and DTS, with some visible benefit to the video.
When you do want to listen to a PCM soundtrack, your connection options are HDMI to a compatible receiver or 5.1 analog (PCM requires too much bandwidth for a Toslink or coaxial connection, and will be downconverted to 2 channels if you try to use those options). For multi-channel analog, the BD-P1000 has some serious limitations. While the player will allow you to set your speaker types to Large or Small, it has no ability to adjust speaker distances or volumes. Test tones are nonetheless available anyway, but Samsung programmed them incorrectly so that the tones come from the wrong speakers. And since the player has no internal DD 5.1 or DTS decoders for the analog outputs, you can't use a DVD calibration disc either. It is therefore impossible to calibrate your audio when using the analog outputs. I'm not sure what type of DACs Samsung has built into the unit, but the PCM tracks I've listened to so far have been a little bright and harsh in comparison to standard Dolby Digital or DTS decoded by my receiver.
On the other side of the format war, HD DVDs have chosen to maximize their video quality with VC-1 compression and still get a lot of bang-for-the-buck with Dolby Digital Plus audio (some discs are also already encoded with the losslessly-compressed Dolby TrueHD 5.1, which offers audio transparent to the studio master without compromising the video quality by taking up as much space as uncompressed PCM). For half of the BD-P1000's list price, the $499 Toshiba HD-A1 has high quality SHARC DACs, full support for DD+ (and now TrueHD 5.1 as well), and all of the setup options you'll need to calibrate its 5.1 analog outputs. There's really no comparison here. For a $999 player, the audio capabilities of the Samsung BD-P1000 are really just shameful.
Final ThoughtsMake no mistake, the Blu-ray format launch has been truly unimpressive. The $999 Samsung BD-P1000 has fewer features and lesser quality than its HD DVD competition at half the price. The first wave of software releases are also decidedly inferior to those on the other format. Even as a big High Definition fan, I cannot recommend this player for purchase. It is simply not worthy of the large investment.
I've tried to give it the benefit of the doubt by putting the player and discs through their paces, but my judgement is clear. In terms of quality, Blu-ray has lost this first battle in the format war. Is it down for the count? I doubt it. The format is still backed by a larger selection of manufacturers and movie studios, at least at this time. Support may change in the future if one side goes under (witness Fox and Disney's migration to DVD after the competing DIVX format from Circuit City floundered back in 1999), but I suspect that this format war will drag on for a while before a decisive victor is declared.
In order to survive, Blu-ray needs to both dramatically decrease its hardware costs and dramatically improve its software quality. Consistent production and usage of dual-layer 50 gb discs (assuming that's possible) will be a step in the right direction, but even more importantly the format sponsors need to dump the antiquated MPEG2 compression for a better codec. Players and discs should also start offering support for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, and DTS-HD Master Audio as soon as possible. Blu-ray backers have been shouting from the rooftops about their format's great potential, but the reality has not lived up to the hype. If that changes in the future, we're certainly prepared to re-evaluate the situation at that time, but as things stand right now Blu-ray is a bust.
More debatable is an issue seen in all of the initial Lionsgate titles that have opted to include regular DTS audio instead of PCM. When you choose the DTS soundtrack, the video becomes noticeably jerky, a problem that goes away if you choose Dolby Digital instead. Until we get a larger representative sample of players from other manufacturers, I can't say whether that's a flaw in the Samsung BD-P1000 or the disc, but there's a good chance it's the player.
I tested the BD-P1000 over both HDMI and Component Video. In order to switch between these, you have to push a button on the player's front panel; there's no option to change output by the remote. I've read some user comments that claimed Component Video was superior to HDMI on this player, but I don't share that experience. In my testing, HDMI was visibly sharper and provided more saturated colors at both 720p and 1080i resolutions. Even after careful independent calibration of each output, the difference was far from subtle. I'm not able to test 1080p output at this time, so I suppose it's possible that there's an error in the 1080p processing that further degrades the HDMI video, but I can't confirm that. From what I've seen so far, HDMI is definitely the better option.
The player will output High Definition video at your choice of 720p, 1080i, or 1080p resolutions. 1080p is only available over HDMI, and is only enabled if the startup handshake between your components confirms 1080p compatibility in the display; otherwise that selection is grayed out in the setup menus. As I mentioned earlier, 1080p from this player is produced by decoding the original 1080p disc data to 1080i and then deinterlacing it later to reassemble the 1080p frames. It's a roundabout process to get right back where they should have started, but at least in theory it should be relatively easy to perform losslessly. How well Samsung's implementation follows through on this promise I can't yet validate, unfortunately.
Under normal circumstances I'd advise setting the player's output to match the native resolution of your HDTV display, but when I directly compared several Blu-ray movie scenes at both 720p and 1080i output on a native 720p projector, the 720p option was noticeably softer in fine object details. The scaling process to 720p seems to be flawed. The Toshiba HD DVD players have a similar issue (theirs involves jagged scaling artifacts rather than softening). For both formats, I recommend 1080i output from the player regardless of your HDTV display type.
Audio Options and QualityHere's where things get really messy. The HD video revolution has brought with it the potential for several new high-resolution audio formats including high bit-rate Dolby Digital Plus or lossless Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. HD DVD has embraced DD+ as its mandatory base-level standard, while offering limited support for TrueHD (only 2-channel decoding) and DTS-HD (downconverted to standard DTS) in the current hardware. It's a good start, with obvious room for improvement in the second-generation players.
[Update: On August 25th, 2006 Toshiba issued a firmware update (version 2.0) for their HD DVD players that upgrades their audio sections to Dolby TrueHD 5.1 capability.]
Blu-ray meanwhile allows all of these same audio formats as optional additions, but does not require any of them in the hardware or software. Regular Dolby Digital and DTS are the only mandatory audio standards. Unfortunately, all of the first-generation players, including this Samsung BD-P1000 and the upcoming models from Sony, Pioneer, and Panasonic, do not support any of these new audio formats at all. The players have no decoding circuitry, and no ability to transmit the bitstreams to external A/V receivers for processing either (for that you'll need an HDMI 1.3 connection, but only HDMI 1.1 is currently available). As far as Blu-ray is concerned at this point in time, DD+, TrueHD, and DTS-HD MA are out of the question. HD DVD's support may be limited, but Blu-ray's is nonexistent.
So what do we have? Well, of course there's normal Dolby Digital and DTS, so at a minimum Blu-ray will offer the same audio quality as traditional DVD, without improvement. These can be transmitted by the Toslink or coaxial connections as well as HDMI. Although the player also has 5.1 analog outputs, its internal Dolby Digital decoder is limited to 2 channels and it doesn't have a DTS decoder at all. If you want surround sound, you won't be using the analog connections with DD or DTS soundtracks.
You're probably wondering what the 5.1 analog outputs are good for, then. Because Blu-ray isn't ready to step up to the plate with any of the new audio formats, Sony has decided for its software releases that the next best solution is to provide the soundtrack in PCM 5.1 format. PCM is uncompressed and therefore should offer very high audio quality. The downside, as I mentioned earlier, is that an uncompressed soundtrack swallows up a huge chunk of the disc's bit budget that could be used to improve video quality instead. With the limited space on 25 gb single-layer discs and MPEG2 compression, it becomes a matter of priorities. Do you sacrifice picture quality for sound? For the first wave of Blu-ray releases, Sony's answer has been yes. Discs from Lionsgate, on the other hand, have foregone PCM in favor of standard DD and DTS, with some visible benefit to the video.
When you do want to listen to a PCM soundtrack, your connection options are HDMI to a compatible receiver or 5.1 analog (PCM requires too much bandwidth for a Toslink or coaxial connection, and will be downconverted to 2 channels if you try to use those options). For multi-channel analog, the BD-P1000 has some serious limitations. While the player will allow you to set your speaker types to Large or Small, it has no ability to adjust speaker distances or volumes. Test tones are nonetheless available anyway, but Samsung programmed them incorrectly so that the tones come from the wrong speakers. And since the player has no internal DD 5.1 or DTS decoders for the analog outputs, you can't use a DVD calibration disc either. It is therefore impossible to calibrate your audio when using the analog outputs. I'm not sure what type of DACs Samsung has built into the unit, but the PCM tracks I've listened to so far have been a little bright and harsh in comparison to standard Dolby Digital or DTS decoded by my receiver.
On the other side of the format war, HD DVDs have chosen to maximize their video quality with VC-1 compression and still get a lot of bang-for-the-buck with Dolby Digital Plus audio (some discs are also already encoded with the losslessly-compressed Dolby TrueHD 5.1, which offers audio transparent to the studio master without compromising the video quality by taking up as much space as uncompressed PCM). For half of the BD-P1000's list price, the $499 Toshiba HD-A1 has high quality SHARC DACs, full support for DD+ (and now TrueHD 5.1 as well), and all of the setup options you'll need to calibrate its 5.1 analog outputs. There's really no comparison here. For a $999 player, the audio capabilities of the Samsung BD-P1000 are really just shameful.
Final ThoughtsMake no mistake, the Blu-ray format launch has been truly unimpressive. The $999 Samsung BD-P1000 has fewer features and lesser quality than its HD DVD competition at half the price. The first wave of software releases are also decidedly inferior to those on the other format. Even as a big High Definition fan, I cannot recommend this player for purchase. It is simply not worthy of the large investment.
I've tried to give it the benefit of the doubt by putting the player and discs through their paces, but my judgement is clear. In terms of quality, Blu-ray has lost this first battle in the format war. Is it down for the count? I doubt it. The format is still backed by a larger selection of manufacturers and movie studios, at least at this time. Support may change in the future if one side goes under (witness Fox and Disney's migration to DVD after the competing DIVX format from Circuit City floundered back in 1999), but I suspect that this format war will drag on for a while before a decisive victor is declared.
In order to survive, Blu-ray needs to both dramatically decrease its hardware costs and dramatically improve its software quality. Consistent production and usage of dual-layer 50 gb discs (assuming that's possible) will be a step in the right direction, but even more importantly the format sponsors need to dump the antiquated MPEG2 compression for a better codec. Players and discs should also start offering support for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, and DTS-HD Master Audio as soon as possible. Blu-ray backers have been shouting from the rooftops about their format's great potential, but the reality has not lived up to the hype. If that changes in the future, we're certainly prepared to re-evaluate the situation at that time, but as things stand right now Blu-ray is a bust.
More debatable is an issue seen in all of the initial Lionsgate titles that have opted to include regular DTS audio instead of PCM. When you choose the DTS soundtrack, the video becomes noticeably jerky, a problem that goes away if you choose Dolby Digital instead. Until we get a larger representative sample of players from other manufacturers, I can't say whether that's a flaw in the Samsung BD-P1000 or the disc, but there's a good chance it's the player.
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