Oppo DV-981HD Universal DVD Player with HDMI, 1080p Up-Converting, DivX & SACD
by OPPO Digital
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List Price: Our Price: $179.00 You Save: $120.00 (40%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Home Theater See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Oppo DV-981HD Universal DVD Player with HDMI, 1080p Up-Converting, DivX & SACD
Customer Review: Fine Player with marginal remote
Summary: 4 Stars
This player is well constructed and gives the impression of quality. It does a great job of upconverting standard DVDs. I have no qualms about the playback functions at all.
The major failing is the remote control. It is not backlit and has poorly arranged tiny buttons which are difficult to locate in a dark room. It is claimed that the buttons "glow in the dark" but this glow is so feeble that I need a small flashlight to help me find the buttons I want in my dim theater room. The important buttons you tend to use 95% of the time (such as Play, Stop, FF etc) are the same tiny size and shape as the rest of the buttons and are not distinguishable in any way, so you have to hunt for them. I will probably purchase a universal remote with back-lighting to replace the Oppo remote.
Another small problem is the inability of the system to recall where a DVD was playing when you stop the player and turn off the power. You are required to eject the disk in order for the system to recall the last played point. This is cumbersome. Or you can leave the power on (but this is probably not advisable if you plan to continue the DVD the next day or thereafter). Oppo could fix this problem with a firmware upgrade. I wonder why they haven't done this yet.
The positive aspects outweigh the annoyances, so I will keep the player. When Oppo designs a better remote then this will warrant a full five stars.
Customer Review: Great picture quality and very tweakable
Summary: 4 Stars
I have this DVD player hooked up to my Sony 60" XBR display, so picture quality was very important to me. I tried a number of players with high quality DVDs, and also with a couple of benchmarking discs that are designed to put the upconverting and various other features through rigorous tests.
This Oppo player had the best image out of all the players I tried. It has many settings which can be used to tweak your picture, and I found that finding the best setting was important for getting the most out of the player (and was also somewhat time-consuming).
But the effort was worth it. Great picture.
The only negative is that the player isn't as polished as it could be. The remote control is awkward to use, the menus and screensaver look very amateurish, and the disc tray is a little flimsy and hard to get a disc into without scratching the disc.
This Genesis/Faroudja chip is also known for having a macroblocking enhancement (MBE) problem, which isn't Oppo's fault. This means that the player sometimes enhances the rectangular blocks inherent in dark areas of compressed video. These blocks are present on all DVDs, but this player can sometimes enhance them and make them look worse. It depends on the display you are using. Some TVs will show it worse than others. It can be minimized with tweaking the brightness/contrast settings of both the player and the TV.
Customer Review: Nice....but why?
Summary: 3 Stars
The Oppo does everything that it says it is supposed to do and does it well. The question is why spend the money? I have just a couple of comparisons (and I am hooked up to a Sony 46" LCD 1080p TV)
1. There is little difference in quality between a 1080i picture on a good upconverting player (I compared to Sony DSP-NS75H now available for $50) and the 1080p picture on the Oppo. Besides, a lot of "adjustments" need to be made to get the picture "you want" whereas the Sony is basically plu-and-play. Sony now has a 1080i upconvert player for $100, too, which is less than half the price of the Oppo, and has excellent video quality. I am still staying with the $50 75H as I really can't tell much difference between the 1080i and 1080p video quality from good players.
2. Yes, 1080p is nice but its NOT HD-DVD or Blu-Ray. I am going to wait for the prices of those to come down to a couple of hundred bucks.
3. I'd pay a couple of hundred bucks if the DVD player could take input from my satellite receiver and upconvert non-HD broadcasts. They have the upconverting technology, so why restrict it to DVD input?
All in all, Oppo is an excellent upconverting player, but why spend the extra $120-$170?? I challenge Oppo (and Sony, etc) to take satellite/cable TV standard broadcast input and output in HD and sell the unit for a couple of hundred bucks.... THAT I WILL BUY!!
Customer Review: Amazing picture, quality, and price !!!
Summary: 5 Stars
This unit is amazing. My friend Dean told me about it here on Amazon. He was like this DVD player Oppo has the best reviews on Amazon for an upconverting DVD player. I was like Oppo? It sounds like some Clown's name, lol.
I read all the reviews and ordered it. It took a while to get it, as it was out of stock, but when I received it, boy was I floored.
On my Toshiba 62HM196 62" 1080p Dlp televison, ALL of my Standard Dvd's look VERY clear, clean,and sharp. This player makes my old 80's and 60's movies look good as well. Black levels are truely black, and fleshtones look natural. I find it hard to find any video noise when watching my Dvds'.
With a 19" Digital Samsung PC monitor and my top of the line Dell XPS computer, the picture doesn't look as good as they do on my 62" Toshiba Dlp with the Oppo. I am VERY impressed.
The unit itself is sleek brushed black metal, with a slim design and a nice remote(should light up, only glows in the dark, but still nice). The only thing Oppo should have done, is make the tray pop out more to place your DVD in. It only comes out about 80% of the unit, so you have to be carefull not to scratch your DVD putting it in and taking it out of the player.
This has to be one of the best products Amazon sells. Especially for the price, fee shipping,(Overnight shipping was only $3.99 with Amazon Prime) and quality. Buy it.
Customer Review: Oppo DV-981HD Universal DVD Player is worth a look
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased this DVD player to replace an old SONY DVD player that was VERY outdated. I'm not sure if the difference in the newer DVD players has me impressed or this bad boy is just the crème of the crop. The features on this DVD player are in-line with today's modern DVD players. The DIVX and SACD built-in features are nice to have for those of you that run across multiple DVD formats within your media library. The instructions were easy to read and follow, the remote could use some enhancing, but who doesn't have a universal remote these days anyway?
The most impressive thing about this player is the quality of the picture. I have a Toshiba HD DLP television and the picture is better than anything I have seen to date. It's crisp, clear, and just loosk great. I am still working out some of the setup for my surround sound stereo system but the audio quality seems up to par so far. Lastly, I purchased the black version and this piece of equipment has to be one of the best looking that I have seen. The blue LED display has a very modern and sleek look to it, and the height of the player is just what I needed, it's REAL skinny!
If you are looking for a quality, high-end DVD player that looks good, I would highly consider this DVD player. I've had it for about 3 months now and experienced no issues and my TV was already set for 16:9 resolution, so I just plugged it in and was ready to go.