The Running Man

I might have to replace my Malata N966 DVD player.

I have been out of the loop as to what are the best systems out there right now.

For anyone that can help me, what is the region free DVD player right now with as good or better PAL to NTSC converter on the market?

Obviously one that supports progressive scan as well.


Thank you in advance.

FinkPish

Oppo.

The Running Man

More info please?

dollfins1

oppo

Mr. Salty

www.oppodigital.com

Pick your poison. The DV-981HD is what I have, but it's geared for HDTVs through HDMI. The DV-980H and DV-970HD both offer component.

To change the region setting on the Oppo players, go into the player's setup menu and press 9210 and then Enter. A menu will pop up allowing you to change the region.

The Running Man

How's the PAL-NTSC conversion?

And are these considered the best all region DVD players?

Spiky

Good.

Yes.

The Running Man

Ok, how good? As good as what the Malata was able to do?

And if I do that change on the setp up, does it stay that way, or will I always have to do it every time I turn the player on.

FinkPish

I just watched Spaced again the other day and it looks exactly like watching any other DVD, so it does a great job.

The one time setup has you choose NTSC or PAL output, and then will automatically switch from the other format to the one you normally watch; i.e. if you are watching on an NTSC monitor, it will automatically switch PAL discs to NTSC.

danwiz

I recently got an OPPO DV-981HD 1080p High Definition Up-Converting Universal DVD Player with HDMI - I had it shipped directly by OPPO and when I received it here in Japan one of the first things I did was check it out for region limitations to see whether or not I even needed to perform the Region Free hack. As it ends up - they shipped it to me region free!!! Don't know if they do this to everybody or not, seems like it would be a minor pain for them to ship some players as region free and others with region limitations, so I suspect that all of the DV-981HD players ship as region free - can anybody confirm this?

FinkPish

Mine was shipped region locked, but all it takes to unlock it was to punch in a 4 digit code, so it wasn't a problem.

The Running Man

Thanks a lot.

Do you need to specifically request for the region free and PAL to NTSC conversion capabilities or do all the products come like this from the website above?

FinkPish

All their products come like that. If you read some of the reviews on their website, you will see that this is one of the best DVD players on the market right now.

The Running Man

I've definitely been convinced of the quality of the player itself seeing the praises from the experts that they show off on the website.

My main concern now is just the PAL to NTSC conversion. I just want to know exactly how good it is. The player is said to be excellent, but is the PAL to NTSC conversion "excellent" as well?

mrhan

The conversion is much better with the Oppo. I have a lot of R2 Pal discs and I found the picture quality was an improvement over the 996 which I still use on occassion.

BobSolo

For less than a third of the price of the Oppo, I'd suggest the Philips DVP5982/37 ($60 at Best Buy). It does 1080p upconverting, decent PAL to NTSC conversion and can be unlocked through remote control. It also has a USB port so you can plug in an external HD or Flashdrive to watch movies. It also plays DIVX/XVID. It doesn't have the Faroudja chip that everyone swears by, but IMHO it's not worth paying $200 for.

This replaced my Malata.

Mr. Salty

Oppo's entry-level player is $169, not $200, and is a much, much better player than the Philips.

Spiky

Some people care about the picture, not about how many silly video codecs you can play.

Value is in the eye of the beholder. My player cost more than the Oppo, but then....it's better than any Faroudja chip.

Mr. Salty

I should mention the Oppo plays DIVX and XVID, as well as DVD-Audio and SACD.

BobSolo

You're obvioulsy unfamiliar with the term IMHO. It means "in my humble opinion". I know it's always risky challenging the Oppo camp, because they are very proud of thier plays (rightfully so because the players are very good), but as I said "in my humble opinion" not worth the price premium. Put it this way, you could always by a $60 Philips and put the $109 difference towards movies or better yet, a blu-ray player.

The Running Man, you can always buy the Philips and compare it the Malata to see if you are happy with the PAL->NTSC PQ. If not, you can always return it and go the Oppo route.

Spiky

Quite familiar with it. To the point that I understand that every post on the net has that term inside it, whether stated visibly or not.

Although the H is pretty pointless, since it makes the phrase an oxymoron. Humility is a non sequitur when you are willing to display your opinion publicly to the entire world.

BobSolo

Looks like someone's been reading ahead in their "Word of the Day" calendar!

Back to the topic at hand, The Running Man, what's up with your Malata? I had the same one, but it suffered from power supply problems from the start and after sending it to Canada 3 times to be repaired I gave up. I originally replaced it with the Oppo DV970HD, but when I bought my PS3, I offload the Oppo to a guy I work with and got the Philips for my non R1 stuff.

Steve Phillips

I had the Oppo 970 model, and I thought the PAL to NTSC conversion was horrible; it dropped frames constantly. My Malata and even the cheap Cyberhome 500 performed much better, so I sold the Oppo. The upconversion was quite good though, but I use my HD for that anyway.

The Running Man

I had similar problems myself about 1 or 2 in with my player. But I took it to a repair shop once and replaced some sort of power box or whatever, and I never had problems with it again.

The problem I know have with it is actually the remote control. It's been dropped so many times that two buttons don't work, one of them being the all important "set up" button. I had to take my player to a friend's house just to access it because he owns a Malta, but I can't be bothered with doing that all the time.

I'll see if a repair guy can fix the remote but I don't know.

So I am taking the opportunity to finally buy a whole new player. But now I don't know about this Oppo one with the comment that Steven made here.

Is the DV-981HD model the best player they got for DVD? Even though it says "HD" I'm assuming it's still just a DVD player right? I need it for DVDs since that's all I have now and am looking for something that plays all region with at least, if not better, PAL to NTSC conversion than the Malata. Otherwise, it's not worth it.

Steve, can you elaborate on your comments or if anyone agrees with that?

Does the DV-981HD model meet my simple requirements? How about the DV-980H model? Might look into that one since it has component connections.

SeMo

hi guys srsly im so sorry for postin wat is not related to the topic but i went crazy tryin to find out how to create a new post so my issue is i want to play divx/avi videos on my OLD phillips 727k dvd player is there anyway i can do that plz reply thx