While we've become accustomed to Blu-ray players being released every six months, it's a little ridiculous when we're forced to
wait for a new player longer than it's on the market. Eventually we expect the cycle to slow down -- like when BD Live players are out for example -- and many believed that the Samsung BD-UP5000 could be one of those players based on
promises when announced. Once you have an Ethernet port for internet content, REON video processing, internal decoding and bitstream support for every codec, discrete analog output, as well as HDMI 1.3, what else could possibly warrant a mid year revamp? We suspect the problem is that
the player isn't delivering, and on top of that, we don't think it's Samsung's fault. You see, just like the LG
BH200, the
BD-UP5000 is based on
Broadcom's Reference design BCM97440, and the word on the street is that it isn't ever going to deliver. So it'd make sense that Sammy would change the platform for one that's actually able to get the job done. So yeah, this Broadcom bit is just speculation, but we did contact the outfit to figure out what the deal was, and while it was very responsive at first, as soon as we asked about the troubles with the BCM97400, it must'a lost our email address (or maybe its servers have been down for a week). The good news is that
Samsung doesn't see the
BD-UP5500 as a replacement, and promises a suitable replacement for the high-end dual-format customer in the second half of '08.
**Update** Samsung says that the date it'll be discontinued is subject to change.
posted Jan 23rd 2008 12:05PM
I don't see a loss here. Samsung has been garbage for players so far anyway.
I don't think that is excusable though. They either sell a player that does what it says on the box or they shouldn't sell a player at all. It is unacceptable to sell something which has obvious issues with both formats.
Well, I almost bought that clunker but after reading user comments on a few forums, I realized that Samsung, again, shipped a sub-standard player. A friend as the Samsung 1200 and he finds it frustrating to return his Blu-ray rentals because they won't play on his machine. apparently, the 5000 has the same problems plus others mostly related to the various audio codecs. I'll wait for the Panasonic 50 when it comes out in a few months and I'll keep my old Toshiba A1 for the dozens of coasters I own.
Eddie speaks what few of us are unwilling to talk about, that behind the scenes "Sony" is in fact the true "sith" of this format war. We know Sony created BDA, but everyone knows BD is Sony's "license" baby. If the DVD consortium approved BD rather than HD-DVD, BD may have been "perceived" differently. But Sony worked around the DVD group and created their own group, obviously to push the BD format.
What's at stake here is millions/billions of licensing money going into Sony's hands in the future. I think that future, to the minds of some people, is downright scary. Especially since Sony "owns" movie studios. We all agree that the harder DRM (BD+) is going to make it harder to allow "fair use" for disc backups, or legally storing the movie on your hard drive, or using BD on linux OS.
Eventually Dual format players are still the best way to go. Problem now is the technology for dual format is not mature, and priced too high. Give it a few years folks, let the dust settle a few years and when teh prices for HD media is DVD level, it'll be a better deal.