My search for skipping and freezing 4k discs led me to your channel. Your pro tip actually worked. I was beginning to get frustrated with 4k discs but have renewed my faith. Thanks. Newly subscribe.
Thanks for covering this. Bad QC has long been discussed on the forums but the reality is a RU-vid video these days always brings more awareness. To expand on what you said, almost all North American Blu-ray discs in recent years are pressed at the same replication factory in Mexico. That's why most US releases are plagued by scratches (Scream/Shout Factory, Criterion, major studios alike; although SF & Criterion do appear to be disproportionally affected). I personally estimate at least 30% of the discs I receive are scratched. Fortunately, European releases are mostly pressed in Europe, where quality control has been much more stringent, so a vast majority of the time imported discs arrive in pristine condition. This also applies to Arrow's US releases and, interestingly, recent Paramount releases because they've moved replication to Germany.
My brand new Batman Begins 4K disc, purchased a few months ago, has a not too shallow scratch around the disc, deep enough for the movie to stop at the 100th minute and not be able to go beyond that point. It's a disgrace the way they treat buyers. A wonderful and very instructive video. Greetings from Spain.
If you research... the Sony UBP-X700M has specific issues when playing discs at the 1 hour 40 minute mark, which exactly matches what you said here. It's the player, not the disc. Look at forums and you'll see this issue.
I've only had a couple of problematic discs, the biggest ones being The Batman and Star Wars. The Batman skipped multiple times despite cleaning it. The other was Top Gun Maverick but after a cleaning, it worked perfectly. I have a Sony X800m2.
Just recently I noticed the off gassing and lubrication on a disc. I also noticed finger prints and it was a brand new disc I was inspecting before playing. Then I come across your video and was happy to now know why but at the same time irritated to know how wide spread the issue is. Great video!
This is such an appropriate video, because I just had that problem yesterday watching "Puss In Boots: The Last Wish". The disc wouldn't play properly at first, as has sometimes happened with Universal disc. I had to open and close it a couple times and it started playing, it did freeze but was able to continue, unlike previously where I had to unplug and replug the power. I do have that Sony player, but this is the first freezing/non-playing problem that I've had in a while and I use that player almost daily, so I don't think it's the player, it's likely the discs, like you say.
I did also look at the back of the Last Wish disc, and yep, there are markings on it. Several almost fully circular lines, that I assume are left from the pressing of the disc.
The disc is a dual layer disc. Panasonic does a much better job switching layers than Sony does. My UB820 has not frozen yet, but my X800M2 and X700 both freeze occasionally.
This always worries me since my primary 4K player is a relatively ancient Oppo 205. Fortunately all of the new releases I've purchased have played flawlessly. Fingers crossed this player lasts me until I'm dead! I'm also slightly amazed everytime a new disc plays without issue.
I have the oppo-203 and it’s better than 95% of current top players. I’ve had to exchange several 4k discs. Always check physical media immediately after buying. The new exchanged discs worked flawlessly. Don’t know why but I blame the manufacturer of the Disc.
I've gotten into the practice of checking my discs before putting in these days unfortunately. Lots of off gasing coming from everywhere lately. Great video man!
I tried your work around for my sony blu ray player and turned off the 4k on the player and now no more skipping on any of my 4k disk. Thanks again for the tip.
Owning Panny 820,and it started freezing,pixelating some 4ks.Cleaning disc or reloading player didn't worked.Bought another player Sony x800 and it plays all those problematic discs with no problem,as well few blu rays wich panny couldn't read for some reason
I have started putting all of my discs including video games, DVD, Blu-ray and 4k in paper sleeves in the case instead of clicking them into the actual case. It saves the inside of the disc from eventually cracking (especially DVD) and avoids the plastic off gassing onto the back of the disc. Paper sleeves are super cheap. I found 2 boxes of 100 each for only $3 at a thrift store and that solved my problem.
I think most of the problems with dvds or bluray sales right now because of people opting to look at more Netflix and the like,because of the Covid 19 lockdown rather.’
Thank you for this video. My Universal Soldier 4k disc froze in 2 places, i got it second hand from Cex. However, the disc looked immaculate, cleaning it the way you shown resolved the problem. I use a PS5 as a player.
I've got a Sony x700, too. When I first encountered the problem, I thought it was just the disc. But as it happened more, I thought it was the player until I noticed that it seemed to happen the most on Warner titles. So, I then thought it was a label issue until I then started seeing the problem crop on other labels as well. Anyway, I've tried all the methods to various degrees of success or more often failure. At least so far, I've found the best success using Zeiss pre-moistened lens wipes that are safe for coated lenses.
No problem! That's exactly what I was going for with this series... I wanted to try and cover some of the issues that come up with physical media that people don't necessarily always talk about a whole lot. Thank you for watching and subbing! I really appreciate it. I'm glad I could be of some help.
Whenever a 4K Disc froze on me, on very close inspection, the culprit was a SINGLE speck of dust. Each time simply blowing that tiny speck away fixed the issue. Never had smudges, scratches or fingerprints on new discs.
So glad to have found your video here. I have Panasonic's DP-UB9000. It's a very expensive player and the only reason I bought it was because I didn't know if the freezing was the disc or the player. Recently bought Criterion's 4K of The Rules of the Game and today just received from Amazon Dunkirk 4K. Both have a glitchy/freeze issue. I don't think I've ever had an issue with a standard Blu-ray but I've learned to check my 4K's as soon as possible. I pop the disc in the player and play it all the way through on the fastest search speed. I look for freezing or glitches. I'm going to try the microfiber cloth on these two and hope that does the trick, thanks!
Rules of the Game looks like it may be okay now. Dunkirk looks better though I may try cleaning it with soap and water (this is what Criterion suggested when I e-mailed them about my issue.) I've never heard of off-gassing residue before. I wonder how many 4K discs get returned when all they needed was to be wiped down. Wouldn't it make sense for the manufacturer to do a rinse or something before shipping them out? Anyway, thanks again for the video!
Subscribed. Very informative! I've had problems with both 4K's and regular Blu-Rays when ripping them, and found that washing them with dish soap and lukewarm water and then letting them thoroughly dry seemed to cure the issue. Now I know why!
How funny. My player has skipped 4k movies ever since I got it. I saw this title to see what was going on, and the player I have is the one you mentioned has been a good one, Sony X700. Most recently Reservoir Dogs and Jaws skipped for me. What worries me is, if it's not the unit then over half of my 4K discs are defective ... and if that's the case, what's the point of even buying physical 4k movies? My thought had been "at least I've got the collection and can enjoy them better when I have a better player". I've collected DVDs and Blu rays for years, have thousands of movies, take great care of them, and clean them carefully. Never had an issue, until I moved up to 4k. Even after cleaning the 4ks with microfibre cloths, the same issues occur. The only way I can watch the scenes that skip or freeze is to turn off the player and then go to select a scene and play it from there. Quite annoying, really. So go figure 🤷
Interesting. I don't think half the 4K discs are defective... Most of the time, my discs play fine (including on my Sony X700). But I too have noticed there are more issues with 4K discs from the factory than I ever had with blu rays or DVDs in the past. It seems to me like 4K is definitely not a perfect technology, even under the best of circumstances. I've noticed even Panny UB820 players can have problems sometimes, and those players are considered the gold standard for many people. As for other freezing/performance issues on your Sony, there are a couple other things you can do that might resolve the issue: (1) Do you have the 4K upscaling setting turned on in your X700 "screen settings?" If so, I would keep that turned off and not use that function on the Sony players (just let your TV do any blu ray upscaling -- Sony upscaling isn't very good anyway, in my view). (2) Also under the x700 "screen settings," you might want to try setting the Cinema Conversion Mode to "Video" and not "Auto." I've heard those two settings can affect performance on the X700, and that tweaking these may resolve any other freezing issues the X700 has been having (that's what I keep mine set to, and it's run very well for me -- I almost never have any problems). Thanks for watching and weighing in!
@@TheOriginalFuzzmy issue with sony x-700 it will not play any DVDS or special features on blu ray or 4k discs. Any idea what I can do will be very welcome.
@@mikefisher2673 Weird. I haven't had any problems playing DVDs on my X700 (although I've only tried a few, since I almost never watch DVDs unless it's like a music or film documentary or something). I know the X700 supports DVDs (and a bunch of other disc formats), so they're supposed to play on that unit -- Unless maybe they are from a different region? That's the only thing I can think of. The standard X700 model is region-locked for blu rays and DVDs (unless you have the multi-region version, which I do), so you wouldn't necessarily be able to play DVDs and blu rays from other regions. And I'm always able to watch the special features just fine on my X700, whether they're in HD or SD, on blu ray or DVD. But I do have to switch the region on my X700 for some European discs, because the special features are often included on a region B-locked blu ray. The standard x700 units don't allow for that, but I paid a little extra for multi-region capabilities. Otherwise, if that's not the issue, then I'd probably wonder if maybe there's a problem with your specific player, because I haven't heard of others having problems like that with their X700 units (outside of the region coding issue).
@@TheOriginalFuzz Thanks for responding it might need an update that will be my next test, but it's all dvds region free. It played them when first used the player then just quit playing DVDS.
@@mikefisher2673 Oh weird.... yeah that is definitely not supposed to happen with the X700. Sounds like a good plan... definitely try an update and see if that resolves the issues. And if you're still having issues, you can also try just doing a total factory reset on the player, restore it back to the way it was when it was brand new (I can't remember how to do a factory reset, but it's in the manual, or you can google it).
I rip all my 4k disks to a full 4k iso and play it on my zappiti or zidoo media player its actually better than a 4k bluray player..Full menu and atmos dolby vision HDR10 plus.. regarding your x700 you can actually play a BDMV folder from a HDD or usb. Great 4k bluray player
I feel like physical media (movies) have gone to shit. Loose discs, scratches on new discs, fingerprints on new discs, this oily “stuff” lol inside boxes and on the discs. This stuff isn’t rate either. It happens often and it’s annoying af.
Can this be the same situation with standard blu-rays? I've had some discs recently start to really glitch out. These are films that I've watched several times. Not excessively, but definitely more than twice, but they have been sitting around, on my shelves for years. Over the past year I've had Godzilla(2014), Monsters, Drag Me to Hell, and even more recently The Conjuring all freeze up and stop working quite a way into the film.
I haven't really found this to be the case with my own blu-rays much (unless they had some kind of smudge, debris or scratch or something on them... then yes, they can definitely be affected by those things). Did you try cleaning those discs with a micro-fiber cloth to see if it solved the problem? Otherwise, if cleaning the disc doesn't fix the issue, then it's possible it could be due to the age of the discs, depending on storage conditions, environment, etc. My last video was on the topic of "disc rot" and possible scenarios with aging discs. You can check it out here if you'd like: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--4GSVnlJkmU.html
Some very good tips here! I've have noticed that even a brand new microfiber cloth can leave very light hairline scratches on CDs and DVDs. I collect and sell a lot of classic video games on this media. They aren't enough to harm the disc, but some buyers are not happy unless the disc surface looks pristine. I went from using the microfiber cloth to a drop of liquid soft soap and some warm water. Then I very gently clean it with a hand. Now the important part.. I rinse it thoroughly, then blot it dry with a tissue. Then I finish with some canned air to clean any lint off and ensure it's 100%clean around the inner ring. I don't do this on every disc, but maybe for example, on a game that is worth several hundred dollars. Then pristine matters more.
Good stuff! I've not personally needed to do too much more than I laid out in the video, but yeah, some good ideas here. I've not had any problems with light scratches using the microfiber cloths I have, but I am definitely VERY gentle when wiping. And I totally agree -- it's important to be super careful when cleaning these things so as to not leave any hairline scratches, etc.. In fact, I wish I'd emphasized that a little bit more in the video than I did. Thanks for watching and weighing in!
I have had the skipping problem with my Back to the Future Part II and Part III from the 35th Anniversary set where they both skip around the 30-40 minute mark on my PS5. I have used lint free cloths to clean them, same method you have described, and I can't see any visible marks on either disc. But it's made no difference. I have found cases of other people having the same issue with these two movies in at the 30-40 minute mark. So I wonder whether this could be a manufacturing error literally in the disc code?
Yeah there have been circumstances people have described like that where I'm genuinely perplexed and don't necessarily have a good answer. So I'm thinking maybe there really was some sort of manufacturing error, like you suggested. I'm sure sometimes, there really are legitimately "defective" discs that have some sort of problem that we have no control over. Perhaps that's what's going on with your BTTF discs. I can tell you I have that same BTTF box set, and I didn't have any of those problems with my discs, playing it on a Sony X700. Thanks for watching and weighing in!
@@TheOriginalFuzz thanks for replying. I do want to get a dedicated player eventually, as the PS5 doesn't support Dolby Vision. I will consider the X700. I've also had the same problem with UHD of Tenet.
I've been running a Sony X800M2 for a couple months now, upgrade from an Xbox One S. Haven't had any skipping issues with it yet. I don't get the hate some have on for these units.
I have started with the Sony X700M. I just got into 4K about two weeks ago. I’ve had no trouble with my Sony either. I think the gripers are those that just don’t know how to set it up properly and they don’t know how to customize the settings on their TVs. The only trouble I’ve had with 4K was with a disc, not my player.
It's funny, just after I posted this comment I had my first skipping issue while sitting down watching Back to the Future I, but I think the issue was with the disc than the player. I've watched 10 more discs since without issue.
I had another disc issue with "1917" 2 nights ago - sure enough I pull out the disc and there's a couple lines of grit on the disc. Brand new unopened movie too. Meanwhile 12 4K discs played between Back to the Future & 1917 played fine. Universal must be having quality control issues.
Shout Factory and Criterion are definitely the worst. It's a shame that at this point I expect to get scratches when opening their products. And Shout will only replace it if the scratch is a certain length lol. Pretty ridiculous but people keep buying so they are going to keep finding ways to cut costs.
Exactly! And that's the main reason I don't buy from Shout directly. If I'm going to get a scratched up disc that I have to return, I'd much rather deal with Amazon than Shout for returns.
I've had 2 discs that skip on a Sony X700, both at the 3rd layer change, but they rip perfectly in an Asus drive on my PC. The 2 are: The Ten Commandments and Beastmaster. All of the forums I read indicate the same problem at the same time stamps on both movies leaving me to believe it is a problem with the player and some form of buffering issue when the 3rd layer change occurs.
Interesting. Yeah I'm sure the third layer change is a factor sometimes in some cases. I just kind of chalk that up to an imperfect technology doing glitchy things on occasion. But I haven't personally found BD100 discs to pose as consistent a problem as the quality control issues I've been noticing on the factory discs. I can't remember the last time I had any layer-switching issues with a BD100 disc, but it probably has happened once or twice. That said, I don't have the 10 Commandments 4K (I still gotta pick that one up!), but I do have that Beastmaster 4K from Vinegar Syndrome... I've only watched it once on my Sony X700, but I didn't have any problems with it when I did. So it's possible it might not even be a problem the next time you play those discs.
Almost all people reporting disc freezing have pristine discs. No finger prints. No scratches. Spend some time on hardware specific forums and you’ll see. It’s 100% the players, and most of the timing being reported is about the place where layer changes happen on the disc. This has been known for years.
Thanks Fuzz! Got in a brand new copy of the Mario movie yesterday and had these issues and the disc wouldn’t play. Your recommendation helped get it going.
Just got my freezing copy of Beverly Hills Cop 3. I cleaned the disc and it still freezes in the same spot. This is a defective disc. Sent it back to Amazon and received a replacement that worked!
I have a panny ub820 and on some discs they freeze up. However if I take the same disc and put it in another 4k player it play fine. So I would say something is up with the player. Maybe the laser is misaligned a hair. I don’t know. It’s random. When it happens I check the other player and disc plays fine.
I know exactly what you're talking about. I've had that happen with a few discs on my Panny UB820... I would get a freeze-up on the Panny, but then the disc played fine on my Sony player. It doesn't happen often on my UB820 (maybe like 3-4 times total since I've owned it in the last couple years), but whenever it has, I've found that replacing the disc seemed to solve the problem. It's not a perfect technology, and little glitches can happen from time to time. But overall, I've found my Panny UB820 to be a very solid player, and it hardly ever gives me any problems.
Everything he said is 100 for last several years. I always check every disc the worst I’ve seen has been the latest 4k remaster reissue of Star Trek original movies as well as the new box set next generation. So much oily residue I took the whole thing apart using lens cloths and 1:1 ratio of ipa and distilled h2o cleaned all discs and case. The residue in the cases is very hard to remove. I have the oppo player so I know it’s not the player. I ran the gambit over the years replacing hdmi cables tv’s now I’m like you 100 it’s the discs. Right now the only pressing plant I know with good qa is German look on the shrink for pressing in Germany. I know when I see that the disc quality is good. The cases though that’s another story.
I have a Blu-ray disc that appears blank, it used to play ok, I didn't watch it for a while, then when going back to it, none of my players would recognise it, and basically appears blank, oddly enough, the second bonus disc is the same. I can't find any info on Google that can explain why this could happen, does anyone have any idea what could have caused both discs to do this. Thanks in advance.
I've never had anything like that happen before, so I'm not really sure what the problem is. That's very weird indeed. About the only thing I can think of would be some kind of "disc rot" or decay over time from how the disc is stored. But I don't even know if that's the issue or not. I guess it would just depend on the title, how long you've had it, the long-term storage conditions, etc. Was the title exposed to direct sunlight or extreme temperatures or something for an extended period of time? I'm just kind of spitballing here, since I don't think I've ever encountered this situation personally. Actually, now that I think about it... I did have an issue once not being able to play an old DVD that hadn't been stored or cared for properly (and I wasn't the original owner of that particular DVD release). So I just assumed that's why I was having problems in that particular case.
That off-gassing can be bad at times. My Rocky set was awful!. The case itself was clean but the flip-tray that held the additional discs was heavily coated. I had to wipe it down along with all the discs.
I've usually run into problems due to disc glitches, not the player. These glitches appear always in the same exact spot, proven by my buying three different copies of the same film. (I have a 3 strikes policy on returns.) Said glitches also only appear either right after the half way mark or towards the last part of most movies. (Never had a 4K play for 5 or 10 min and then bam - a sudden glitch.) Thanks for the advice on cleaning, since I used to go crazy with alcohol lens cleaners, etc.
Yeah I've heard there is one plant in Mexico that handles a good chunk of the discs released in North America. I agree... would like to see them manufactured here in the U.S.
Yep, Scream Factory has been the biggest offender of scratched discs. I have tried buying the 4k of Halloween 15 plus times, and every single time, the disc has had scratches
This is a great topic to talk about I have Gemini man on 4k and it has skipping and freezing problems in one of the scenes tried all 3 of my 4k players all the same results I'll try this out thank you 👍 I'll see if it works or not on my Gemini man 4k disc
When I switched from my Sony X800 to the Panasonic UB820, every single disc skipping/freezing problem disappeared. So it's one point of anecdotal data, but it sure seems to me that it is the player. I cleaned every problem disc with microfiber from center out. BTW, I am not some sort of anti-Sony fan. Quite the opposite in fact. Nearly every other component of my home theater is Sony.
That's cool. That hasn't really been my experience with the Sony players. My X700 has been a solid unit. I've only owned my Panny UB820 for about 5 months, but even that has had an occasional issue with this weird pixelating/freezing thing (something I've heard other Panny owners mention on occasion as well). It's only happened with like 3 discs on the Panny for me, but when it did, I switched the discs over to my Sony X700, and they played in the same spot without any issues. Also anecdotal, but a little different experience, it sounds like. So I guess I'm leaning more toward the "imperfect technology" viewpoint here. But I do think that checking and cleaning the discs -- for those who don't already -- can cut down on a lot of potential problems with freezing and skipping, etc. Thanks for watching and weighing in.
I am surprised more people don't use their PCs to validate disks. MakeMKV will instantly stop reading the disc if there is a problem - using this you can validate that you have a bit-perfect copy and it is totally hands-off. If it can't read perfectly, that's an immediate return from me! It's rarer with new discs, but I'd say around 5-10% of discs I buy used have issues and require replacements.
Likely Most people aren’t ripping so they won’t have the software or hardware setup. People probably don’t want to spend time validating, and just watch the film, and This also doesn’t take into account the disc surface contaminants.
Interesting to here about these issues that I wasn't aware of. I clean my discs in the same way as you. I actually do believe the issues I have are with my player 99% of the time. I'm thinking of buying the Panasonic to replace it. I currently have the LG 970. 7 out of 10 discs either freeze or digitally (go blocky) corrupt and freeze. Worst offender being Die Hard 4k.
Yeah you might be right about that. Now that you mention it, I have heard of other people having similar problems with LG players. My dad had one too, and he had a number of repeated issues with his LG player. He ended up upgrading to a Sony X800, and he hasn't had any problems since. The Panasonic players are good units too. I do like my Panny UB820.
Now I'm worried. (note: I own thousands of optical disks, so I'm not a newb) I store my UHDs in binders. Recently, I had issues playing back The Godfather. I had bought the set and watched the first film some months before, so it was only my second viewing. Checked it, made sure there were no fingerprints , etc. Tried it multiple times, no luck. Got a replacement and it worked fine. One disk, I figured, no big deal. I got a cleaner / microfibre cloth for any future problems. A short time later I took out Reservoir Dogs (which I bought and watched not long before) and it skipped. After cleaning and cleaning, it was still skipping, so I put it aside and replaced it. Hmm, weird, 2nd disk. Tonight, I was watching It Happened One Night and it started skipping. Uh oh. I've had this disk a few months but hadn't watched it. I got very concerned. Pulled out Jaws and fast forwarded thru it. It froze. Oh, shit. The Final Countdown, froze. I'm thinking all my disks are thrashed now. I haven't found a working one yet. I've had almost zero problems playing a new UHD, and I have hundreds of them. Is it the disk? My new copies of Reservoir Dogs and Godfather don't seem to have the issue. Is it the player? The problems seem to occur in the 30-50 minute range. Layer change? (The player is a first gen Samsung.) The binders? Could the material be causing fine scratches or contaminating the disk somehow? Any advice would be appreciated. I'm a little beside myself.
To test whether my binders could be scratching the disks, I took Jaws (which heretofore was played once when new and then inserted once into the binder) and shoved it in and out of the binder sleeve MANY times in all orientations, even dragged it around inside the sleeve. If my disks are getting so easily scratched, surely this would have added many more scratches. Nope, still hiccups at the same point, around 46 minutes in. My UHDs have been kept in good environmental conditions and not exposed to extremes or abuse, so the only disk-centric problem I can imagine is something like the delamination issue that struck early Universal 2 layer DVDs. Stacking them all together in a binder is mechanically stressing them, perhaps? But I've not had issues with regular Blu-Rays which I stack even more tightly. Maybe my player is just getting tired and is tripping on things a newer player wouldn't....
@@andyhutton7736 Honestly, I think it may be the player. I also have one of those old first gen Samsung 4K players, and they're not very good units (and Samsung doesn't even make 4K players anymore). In fact, I stopped using mine altogether within a fairly short time... it was my first 4K player, but I've since upgraded to a Sony X700, and then a Panasonic UB820. The Samsung players weren't very good for consistent, stable performance, and I suspect that they could be having problems with the layer changes, etc. I think because they're pretty low-end players, they tend to have a harder time with the 4K technology (especially with 100 GB discs)... at least in terms of reliable, consistent performance. While I'm not a fan of binders and wouldn't necessarily recommend using them, I don't think those are the problem here. If your discs still visibly look good and relatively clean with no/few scratches -- then I don't think it's the binders that are the source of the problem. You may want to consider investing in a little better player. Hope this helps a little. Thanks for watching, and feel free to reach out with any other questions.
I bought Superman the Movie on 4K, looking utterly spotless and cleaner than a lot of other discs I own that work great and it freezes and pixelates when Clark goes to the North. So, its problably a mastering issue and doesn't have anything to do with what you're talking about.
Sometimes there are just bad discs... even if they look clean. I've had that happen a few times. I would return it and replace with another copy if you're still able to. Most of the time when I have any issues like this (which is very seldom), returning and exchanging seems to take care of the problem. Do you have a Panasonic 4K player?
I NEVER have skipping or freezing. Definitely the player. I use a run of the mill $400 Phillips player that i bought in maybe 2017. Honestly, I can't remember a freeze or skip since the DVD days. Might have happened once or twice, but not enough to remember. And I watch lots of discs and have 1000s in my collection.
I've just bought the 4k disc of the obiwan kenobi series. It won't play on either my ps4 or my blu ray player. Do you actually need a 4k player to play these, or will they play on any playstation or blu ray player?
Yes you need a 4K player (and a 4K TV). 4K discs won't play on standard blu-ray players. It's a totally different format, even though 4K discs are technically a type of blu-ray disc (Just like how we can't play blu-rays on an old DVD player). For example, here's a decent 4K player I have that doesn't break the bank: www.amazon.com/Sony-Ultra-Player-Dolby-Vision/dp/B07L6PL4D6
If you were to watch current videos from "this guy," you'd find 4K releases of both Robocop 2 and Robocop 2014 sitting on his shelf (both of which were only released this year -- in fact, if you take the time to look around the channel instead of just doing a drive-by hot take on a video that's over a year old, you'll find reviews of them on this channel).
I have the Sony UBD1100es and experienced some of the freezing/skipping on the 4K copy of Back To The Future. I adjusted the settings that you suggested and it has cured the problem so many thanks!
Are you referring to the picture/logo in the intros of my videos (and in my channel banner), with the stylized text and cartoonized image of me wearing shades?
If the built-in 4K upscaling is causing problems too, thats a lot of mess for soending all that money on a player and the media to use it. I giess i will continue to stick with regular Blu-ray and let my TV do the enhancements. Way cheaper and still a decent picture.
I didn't buy the 4K player for its upscaling abilities (I already have upscaling with my 4K TV)... I bought the player to play 4K discs, which it does wonderfully. The built-in upscaling is only causing skipping/freezing problems when you're playing a 4K disc with it turned on. It seems like that should be common sense to leave it turned off when playing a 4K disc, because one doesn't need upscaling at that point -- It's a 4K disc! The whole point I was making with these particular players is that the upscaling function is something that needs to be manually turned on/off depending on what type of disc you're playing -- a lot of people don't think about that and just leave the upscaling turned on all the time, and that's why they have issues. On top of that, I personally just don't think the Sony upscaling is very good anyway for blu rays (my Panasonic is much better). But some people really like it for upscaling DVDs or what not. So it really just depends on the individual and their eyes. But I'll also admit, 4K is not for everyone. It's really for people who are passionate film enthusiasts and want the best quality possible. Blu ray is still a great format (and still constitutes about 60 percent of my own collection)... but on average, a good 4K restoration/presentation will absolutely blow away previous blu ray releases of the same film.
@@TheOriginalFuzz I got the point. Just sounds like some hassle involved for something that should work/detect automatically, especially considering the cost involved.
I have Sony x800m2 player,most of 4k blu rays where skipping, didn't have much problems with freezing, after last software update my all discs are working flawlessly,no skipping or freezing,it seems that this was an software issue on my player, cause those problems started after 7,8 months of using it,it wasn't a day one problem,so it seems that one software update started to causing these problems and this last one fixed the problem,at least in my case,I have 4k upscaling turned on and everything is working great for now and I hope it will stay for a long time, great player btw
Thanks for this video man. I bought a pana 824 as well and the disc drive was very loud at blurays and 4k discs so I decided to give the Panasonic 9000 a try. Its so expensive but you should try it out if you can - the unit itself and the disc drive are way better and graveyard silent. And now I always be wiping of my discs bevor I put them into my player 👍👍 I always done it wrong because of the ⭕️ motion what I have done 🫢🙈
Astonishing that in 2023, the industry still goes out of it's way to maintain Piracy as the 'Gold Standard'. Every CEO should be concerned, but alas, they couldn't care less. I'd almost say it's a conspiracy to keep people hooked into the scam that is 'Streaming'... but even then, the quality never comes close to a 4K physical release. The only good thing is all my regular 1080p Blu-rays are still good, and is all things you can't get on streaming/or special editions. Thanks for the video!
Hello, I bought a Panasonic 420 last week and I've been having lots of issues... Some blurays are freezing with imagen distorsión... Pixelating I would say... Some times the same disc works and sometimes it doesnt. I am gonna try the micro fiber solution. Can you give me some settings? I have a Sony X80k, a Sony Strdh790 and the Panasonic 420. Thank you so much
I have a Panasonic UB820, which is the big brother to the one you have, and I am aware of the kind of issues you're talking about. It doesn't happen very often with mine, but it has happened a few times, where I get this freezing, pixelating lag. As far as I can tell, in all cases, it was an issue with the disc. My 4K copy of Total Recall, for example, always froze and pixelated at one spot. So I eventually bought a second copy on 4K, and that one played fine. So it could be related to the discs and due to some of the issues I discussed in this video. Definitely try cleaning with a micro fiber cloth... it may help with the issue on some discs. As for Panasonic settings, I don't really have a whole lot to share, but another RU-vidr put out this video for a few settings, some of which may help: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ab2h30eQ4bg.html Thanks for watching!
I still like my Sony UBP-X700 I picked up last year for €109,- it's a steal, plays all formats included SACD. Not yet any freezing problems and 4K uspcaling is off. Upscaling is done by my AVR
Yeah that's been my experience too with the X700. It's been a solid player for me. And yes, I do love that you can play pretty much any kind of disc on it... including SACD (which I believe the higher-priced Panasonic UB820 does not allow for, if I remember right). Thanks for weighing in!
Decided to finally buy a 4K player and grabbed a less expensive LG unit and a film froze on that so took it back and paid a bit more and picked up a Panasonic DP-UB420 and no issues plus find it does a much better job with the quality. Highly recommend. Only issue for me is the remote and button placement. I do not think the issue is discs on these 4K discs - to me it is the player and the fact some of the less expensive players just do not read them as well, especially with them changing layers. There may be some issues on the odd disc but do not think it is the big issue as They Live froze for me and I wiped off and kept freezing is same spot on LG player but no issues on Panasonic player. Just find they do not make these players as well as they did with early DVD players.
Yeah I think you're spot on. I've heard a lot of horror stories about LG 4K players. My dad even had one and had issues with it... he ended up upgrading to another player. The lower-end players just don't seem to handle the 4K tech as well. I had the same problem with my old Samsung 4K player. Also, I've heard the Panny UB420 is a great unit (I have the UB820). But I totally know what you mean about the remotes on these. I ended up buying a UB9000 knock-off remote on eBay and it works with my 820 much better than the one that came with it. The button placement sucks on the remotes that come with the Pannies (except for the Panny Ub9000 -- that one is decent). Thanks for watching!
i just watched my dead silence and tthe case came with this really wrinkled plastic under the slip cover. the movie towardds the end froze and glitched saw it has some scratchs non stop i find scream factory discs with that weird stuff alll over the cases and discs they need to pull it together scream has been goin down in qaulity
I'll give it a go, and come back. I own Panasonic bd820. Issues ONLY arise with Paramount translucent top discs. Never had issues with discs that have a later of graphic/not see though disc.
it’s frustrating. It seems to only happen with my rental disks and it’s not on every one. I go through periods where I’ll have 10 or 20 rental movies and they all work perfectly fine then a month or 2 later 4 out of 6 disks crap out on me.
I just started a Game Fly account and the first 2 disks I got froze up. I cleaned them myself and now when I get a new disk the first thing I do is clean them before playing because it appears Game Fly doesn't I have the Sony X800M2. Only a few times have I had to unplug it to open the drawer. I have had it since Jan 2021. It's been great I never blamed the player for issues it's always the disk. Thanks for telling me to turn off 4K scaling for 4K disks. I had no idea a new disk has minor scratches. I bought used disks and they had minor scratch imperfections too and assumed that they came from the orginal owners. It's amazing how dumb blu-ray player owners are. If a player plays a disk perfectly and then freezes on the next disk 100% it's a disk. It needs cleaning.
I have two Sony machines a 800 and an 800 M2 the M2 is multi region. Up to a few months ago both played new discs straight out of the box without problems. However the earlier player began freezing on new discs especially Warner as others have noted. However the 4k discs pressed in Europe seem to be slightly better. First thing I did was clean the laser lens with an air brush. I now clean every disc with a micro fibre cloth and breath. If that doesn't work I use spectacle lens cleaner I now do this every time now. The other problem I have come across concerns multi layered discs usually 100g l had 3 copies of Giant before 1 got one that worked without freezing on the layer change.
The Sony’s are fine but I never like that you have to manually switch DV and HDR depending on the disc. I have a Panasonic 9000 and I’ve had very few issues with playback.
Hello- being a 4K disc collector i think sometimes it is the player. for instance The Fablemans is my favorite of 2022 and was delighted when the 4K disc was released. the first time i played it toward the end of the film when Sammy and Monica are dancing at the prom the disc freezes for a split micro nano second then skips a frame and the disc continues. but if i shut down the player then restart it and play that scene the freeze frame and skip doesn't happen.
Yeah that's a fair point. I think that's just the nature of the tech. Sometimes there are weird little glitches or what not that aren't necessarily a result of something on the disc surface. And even in the best of circumstances, weird stuff just happens sometimes with 4K. I think there's just a lot more information on the 4K discs, so the tolerances are a lot lower for any kind of errors that affect playback. Thanks for watching!
Yeah it sounds like an issue with the disc. That happens sometimes with 4K. You can try gently cleaning it with a micro fiber cloth like I showed in the video. Or if it still persists, maybe return it and exchange for another if you're able to.
My Phillips 4K player with Dolby vision has been flawless for three years. It will play anything I throw at it. I never hear anyone mention it but if you find it cheap on eBay it’s a great little player with just a few apps. But it’s much better than the two cheaper Sonys that I had to return. Those were awful players. And those were new. My Phillips player came in a smashed up box!
Insidious on 4K was the Worst! I seriously exchanged the movie 3 times. With a less than year old Panasonic UB820. Tried gently cleaning the disc with a little dawn soap on one of them and it made no difference.
The Dunkirk Blu-ray that I recently bought had a lot of off gassing on 2 of the discs in a 3 disc set. The case had some greasy residue. I've never noticed this on other discs before. Now I need to go through all my discs to see if this a problem with recent purchases. I was playing a new 4k last night, Alita Battle Angel and it froze in the middle of the movie. I checked the disc and it looks fine. This is frustrating.
@@Mark-ro5zg Two things here. First off, yeah try cleaning the disc with a microfiber, like I talked about in the video. But also, have you checked out my companion video on Sony 4K players yet? There are a couple settings tweaks you can make to your X800 that may help with this issue. Check it out here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Sym8ayOpL-4.html
I stopped buying 4K discs, unless it's a film that I absolutely love, since I had to send back one in five discs because of these freezing and skipping issues. I don't even want to bother cleaning a new disc. CDs, DVDs or Blu-ray Discs never gave me such problems. 4K discs are still a flawed concept, giving the consumer more potential issues than rewards. I truly love to watch a film in 4K, but it gives me anxiety to a point that I can't even enjoy watching a new release the first time around, since all I can think about is "please don't have any errors".
Let’s give the guy some benefit of the doubt & assume he’s not chucking his new 4K discs into his player haphazardly, and is making sure the underside of the disc is free of any smudges or residue from the inside of the case itself. If he’s got a cheap player or isn’t using a dedicated standalone 4K player, this could be an issue. Besides, the standards for UHD disc authoring are far more complicated & more nuanced. Some players have issues with reading past a certain layer. Needless to say, there’s definitely more to it than just “clean your disc”.
Appreciate your comments but I'm in the camp of player issues over disc. Yes disc can have issues but there's a couple reasons I think my Sony 800 is the source of most the errors. 1. I never have problems with DVDs or Blu rays. It would seem odd to me that manufacturers would consistently knock it out of the park with these older formats but 4ks they just haven't figured out after 5 or so years of production seems somewhat unlikely. Manufacturing is basically the same just with higher capacity disc. 2 most of the time I see skips and freezing after the 2hr play time. That seems to again point towards the player. It may be, like any computer, just getting bogged down with the amount of data it's processing. 3 if you shut down the machine and start playing again in the same spot on the disc and it works fine then it isn't a smudge or scratch on the disc. There are a few other reasons, I have, but basically I think the machine is pushing so much data it just crashes sometimes. Some times it is the disc and yes inspect and keep those disc clean. I think the Sony 800 is a fine machine but they push a lot of data to your TV when playing 4k UHD movies and we just have to accept that they will glitch occasionally. I hope the next generation players will master these issues.
Have an honest question I'd love to see a video on. Just acquired a Panasonic UB820. Great player, but it has one disturbing flaw. In order to turn it on, I have to power everything down, then power up the UB820 via either the remote control, or the power button on the 4k player. Is this normal, and can it be fixed? Configuration is UB820 to Nakamichi Shockwafe 9.2.4 Earc soundbar to Hisense U6G 50" TV via arc port.
Honestly I've never had that problem with my UB820. I do use the eArc connection between my receiver and TV, but I have my UB820 connected directly into another HDMI port on my 4K TV. I don't run my UB820 through the receiver first. When I turn on the power on my UB820, it automatically turns the power on everything. But I do not have to power down anything to turn my UB820 on... if I'm on a different input, everything just automatically switches over to the Panasonic when I power it up on the remote. Maybe try running your Panasonic into your HiSense directly (into a different HDMI port than the eArc port on your TV... just leave the eArc port connection between the soundbar and TV, but don't run the Panny through the soundbar first. If you run it through the TV instead, the audio should route back out through your soundbar). I don't know if that will make a difference or not, but it might be worth trying.
Every dvd i have ever bought i have a quick check for any scratches or dust or fingerprints before i play it. I always hold it at the edges and if need be, give it a carefull wipe with a clean cloth. I only buy new discs and have done so for more than twenty years. I used to notice video cassette flicker or interruptions too which annoyed me until i got a dvd player. but Interesting that 4K may have problems. I still buy dvds if bluerays are too expensive, unless its a desired boxset or feature worth spending on. No 4K player or discs yet for me.
Way way too many brand new sealed 4k disc's are coming in with greasy mold release film all over the inside black case and then also on the laser side of the disc. I've had to return alot of disc's to Amazon because of this issue (I don't buy from 3rd party sellers only Amazon). The quality control to ensure the cases get cleaned after injection molding is a big issue.
So I switched those two settings around and it seems the issue is still occurring on my brand new army of darkness 4k disc. The disc is new and in good shape. Are there any other settings you would recommend me change, Fuzz? Thank you
Not really... If you've tried the settings changes and tried cleaning the disc, then it's entirely possible you just got a bad disc. That has happened to me a few times. Are you still able to return it and maybe exchange it for the same thing? I believe Army of Darkness is a Scream Factory disc if I remember right, and I have had these issues with some of their discs occasionally in the past. Usually exchanging it for another copy seems to take care of the problem.
@@TheOriginalFuzz funnily enough, I had already bought two copies, the regular and the steelbook. The freeze and lag did happen once after changing the settings, but after I unplugged and replugged the system back in, it’s been running very smooth. Hopefully it’s better now, otherwise, the fault is just on scream factory discs. I did have one question tho, if the disc has Dolby vision, will that still show if the Blu-ray player setting has Dolby vision switched off?
@@lydiawoolfy8952 No I don't think it shows up without DV activated. But I don't have access to Dolby Vision because I have a Samsung 4K TV. So I've never turned it on.
@@TheOriginalFuzz thank you for you help! It’s all fixed for me now. I cleaned the disc on both sides and I uncapped the fps on the system. Apparently it was capped at 24p by default
My Sony UBP-X700 just started acting buggy after 18 months of pretty consistent performance on 4k discs. Superman: The Movie froze up and skipped about 3/4ths of the way through the film. Had to switch to the digital copy, which was a bummer. I was about to get the Panny until I saw this video. We'll see if the microfiber cleaning trick works before I invest in a new player. I hope it works.
I received a brand new 4K Old boy Steel book shrink-wrapped. I checked before playing and there was a massive greasy fingerprint on the Disk. In most cases I find cleaning the Disk sorts out any issues however in some cases I find it could be a very poor quality disk. One such Disk? Deadpool 2 4K. The disk is so thin the print is visible on blank side!
I have a few seconds of distorted image on my 4K Cat People (Scream Factory). Trying a careful cleaning, thanks. Player is a Panasonic DP-UB420, no problems with any other disc.
Are you getting these weird like pixelated- spots on the image for those few seconds? My Panasonic Ub820 occasionally does the same thing... and I haven't completely figured out why yet (though when it has happened for me, I seem to remember it mostly occurring with a less-than-pristine Scream Factory disc).
@@TheOriginalFuzz I'd say that's a good description. Kind of a splatter for a few seconds. It's not doing it now, I think the thorough cleaning did the trick. Thanks!
I just had the same problem. I took my scream factory 4k bride of Chucky back to Best Buy as it kept glitching and freezing. I though it was the disc that was defective and took it back for an exchange and the new one was even worse came with 2 deep 1/2 inch scratches had the same problem. I’m gonna try turning off the 4K upscale and see if that helps.
Thank you. I’ve had some issues with 4K playback and have noticed oily residue on my discs. This video confirms my suspicions. It’s not my Sony player.
Great video, but the biggest issue I have encountered is the dreaded triple layer discs! I have the Sony x700 the Panasonic UB820 and a PS5. The Sony player was awful at first but a firmware update greatly improved things, however the player still struggles with some triple layer discs and I've also had audio sync issues. The Panasonic player is better but it still has issues with some triple layer discs. The PS5 is proving to be the best player as I have yet to have any playback issues at all. In my experience there are bigger issues with the format than just dirty discs and I doubt anything will be done about it. Although I enjoy the 4k quality I sometimes wish I had just stuck with standard Blu-ray.
Yeah it's definitely not a perfect format, and I don't mean to suggest it's always the disc every single time. Electronics can be weird. But I haven't personally had too many issues with BD100 discs. Both my multi-region X700 (my primary player for about 2 years before getting my Panny) and my Panny UB820 seem to play them just fine. I'm sure that can be a factor sometimes, but it's just not something I've personally run into a whole lot. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I had any issues with layer switching when playing a BD100 disc. Thanks for watching!
