Samsung UBD-K8500 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Player Review & Comments

Aww man. I was hoping the panasonic was going to be a clear winner. I only want plug and play as well. Decisions, Decisions. When is the panasonic review going up Steve?
 
Steve what HDR down mapping is going to work best for non HDR 4K PJ Owners - the Samsung over contrasty image or the Panny More accurate version?

Thanks
 
Panny it is for me for sure especially due to its better audio capabilities. When it comes to UHD I cannot see myself compromising at all. (within my budget of course)
 
Is it possible to connect this player up to a non UHD display and then have the player downscale UHD encoded discs to a resolution that can be viewed on non UHD 4K compliant displays? Would the absence of HDCP 2.2 compliance on the older TV cause issues with doing this?
 
Is it possible to connect this player up to a non UHD display and then have the player downscale UHD encoded discs to a resolution that can be viewed on non UHD 4K compliant displays? Would the absence of HDCP 2.2 compliance on the older TV cause issues with doing this?
Yes. It will automatically downscale to the resolution of your TV. So if your TV is 1080p then it will downscale to 1080p. This is what happened to me at first when I connected it to a non-HDMI 2.0 port on my TV by mistake.
 
Is it possible to connect this player up to a non UHD display and then have the player downscale UHD encoded discs to a resolution that can be viewed on non UHD 4K compliant displays? Would the absence of HDCP 2.2 compliance on the older TV cause issues with doing this?
As simsini says, yes you can do that. Where people are going to have issues is with 4K TVs that don't support HDCP 2.2 because then the player will still only output downscaled 1080p.
 
Aww man. I was hoping the panasonic was going to be a clear winner. I only want plug and play as well. Decisions, Decisions. When is the panasonic review going up Steve?

Steve what HDR down mapping is going to work best for non HDR 4K PJ Owners - the Samsung over contrasty image or the Panny More accurate version?
Guys, I'm going to hold off on answering question relating to comparisons between the K8500 and UB900 until I've completed the review of the latter, which will be finished by tomorrow morning.
 
when and where can i buy this player??????
 
.

As simsini says, yes you can do that. Where people are going to have issues is with 4K TVs that don't support HDCP 2.2 because then the player will still only output downscaled 1080p.

Thanks

I only ask because it is becoming apparent that many of the studios are now restricting the Atmos audio to the UHD releases and omitting the Atmos audio from both the new HD Blu-ray releases of films and even the HD Blu-ray they include with the UHD discs. Not everyone is ready to commit themselves to purchasing a UHD display yet so they may have to invest in just the player for now in order to be able to get Atmos audio.

I think this unfair of the studios to use Atmos to try force people into buying into UHD, especially when things are still not sorted out as far as HDR etc are concerned.
 
In the review it's claimed a few times that it's the player that does the tone mapping when connected to a HDR display. For example in the case of the JVC X5000:

"Samsung was still able to tone map the Ultra HD HDR content to the projector, although the peak highlights were obviously less apparent and the overall picture was a little darker due to the increased latitude in the lower part of the image."

I don't think the player does any mapping in a scenario like this. The HDR metadata tells the display what to expect. Surely it's the display's task to map the incoming signal to its capabilities?

And this bit makes no sense at all: "The K8500 also mapped the wider colour gamut on the Ultra HD Blu-rays to the X5000's native colour space very effectively"
 
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Technically it's supposed to arrive in stores on Monday but I've heard that some members have already bought units from Richer Sounds.

Quite funny - they have matched the release date exactly to coincide with the Biggest Home Film Release of the last few years at least but that film is in the old format only - opposite advertising really
 
In the review it's claimed a few times that it's the player that does the tone mapping when connected to a HDR display. For example in the case of the JVC X5000:

"Samsung was still able to tone map the Ultra HD HDR content to the projector, although the peak highlights were obviously less apparent and the overall picture was a little darker due to the increased latitude in the lower part of the image. The K8500 also mapped the wider colour gamut on the Ultra HD Blu-rays to the X5000's native colour space very effectively"

I don't think the player does any mapping in a scenario like this. The HDR metadata tells the display what to expect. Surely it's the display's task to map the incoming signal to its capabilities?
You're quite right, I didn't describe that very well, I shall reword it.
 
Just a quick one under CON you put no Dolby Vision support,but when i ask about no Dolby Vision support on the Panasonic TV,you and lot of others said it didnt matter,and gave your reason.
So change of heart ?
:)
 
Pretty much justifies my purchase of the UBD-K8500. Watched Life of Pi last night and was stunned at the HDR scenes as well as the detail. Looking forward to watching Kingsman tomorrow :)
 
Just a quick one under CON you put no Dolby Vision support,but when i ask about no Dolby Vision support on the Panasonic TV,you and lot of others said it didnt matter,and gave your reason.
So change of heart ?
:)
It isn't a change of heart, at the moment there are no Dolby Vision Ultra HD Blu-rays and hardly any compatible displays, so I think for the time being it isn't important. However I do feel I should at least point that fact out in the review, even if personally I don't think it's an issue.
 
It isn't a change of heart, at the moment there are no Dolby Vision Ultra HD Blu-rays and hardly any compatible displays, so I think for the time being it isn't important. However I do feel I should at least point that fact out in the review, even if personally I don't think it's an issue.

Thanks thats fair enough :)
 
That does make Dolby Vision almost relevant - if there is any content coming - any ideas?
Or could Dolby Vision end up being a non used option in a player / TV like High Bit Colour ?

It depends on whether the manufacturers are willing to pay Dolby the license fee it requires for them to incorporate Dolby Vision within their products? THe manufacturers are far more likely to take the cheaper option of using HDR10 and implementing their own take on HDR into their products.

There's alsoo the fact that the chipsets a player would need for Dolby Vision to be implemented aren't commonly available to the manufacturers yet.
 

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