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: Some Stars are Brighter than Others
Summary: 5 Stars
HDTV has really opened our eyes to the importance of quality components. From the moment that the picture is captured with the video camera, it is converted to digital code. Likewise for the audio component. The complexity and accuracy of this code has a great bearing on what the final product is that you see and hear. Our old JVC DVD player was just fine when we had a standard def TV hooked up. With our new Samsung HDTV, the picture quality was not as good as broadcast or satellite delivered movies were.
The Oppo has changed all of that. The ability of the device to utilize the complexity of the digital code and enhance or process it into a superior picture is really amazing. The HDMI output is a slam dunk for simplicity! Just Plug and Play, but do be aware that some care is needed when plugging into HDMI switchboxes. Be sure that the switchbox is capable of receiving 1080p and 1080i as the output of the device (in this case the DVD player) must be matched to the input of the switchbox. We recently purchased a remote switchbox to alleviate the annoyance of plugging and unplugging our Satellite HDTV receiver whenever we wanted to watch a DVD movie. It caused some consternation when my television came up with an error message saying it was receiving no signal. Once I correctly set up the Oppo output, everything worked great!
The Oppo unit is a gem, highly recommended and a steal at its price compared to many units priced much higher. Go buy one now!
Customer Review: No problems paired with Sony rear projection HDTV
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased the Oppo DV-981HD due to its excellent reviews and previous purchase of
Oppo 3x1 HDMI 1.3 switch. I was slightly concerned because of the 'most helpful'
three star review warning rear project HDTVs may have a compatibilty problem; I
have an older rear projection Sony KDL-42WE611.
After installing the Oppo (HDMI to Oppo switch and digital coax to AV receiver) and
configuring the on-screen setup, I was rewarded with a very nice 720p upscale
rendering of the "The 5th Element" superbit DVD. I tried the 1080i upscale
setting, but could not see any appreciable difference from the 720p. Since both
renderings are at 60Hz, I settled on the 720p setting.
I have a PS3 blu-ray player, so this is my reference for comparison. Although the
Oppo upscaling is excellent, it cannot add-in video detail into standard DVDs that
blu-ray movies have from the start. Just as an example, Fantastic Four Rise of the
Silver Surfer in blu-ray has around 45GB of digital information; as many people
know, standard DVDs have around 7GB. No basis for comparison. This said, I still
feel that the HD upscaling done by the Oppo to standard DVDs is excellent.
Lastly, this amazing DVD player also plays SACD and DivX disks, so I tried both and
the player operated flawlessly.
Customer Review: Oppo DV 981HD
Summary: 5 Stars
I have my Oppo 981HD connected via HDMI line to a new Sony KDL-40Z4100. If I'm playing a new release DVD, especially one digitally mastered, It's about 95% of what Blu Ray can show me. No joke!
I have looked at both a Sony BDP-S300 Blu Ray player and the upscaling Oppo 981 with the same movie; the difference is negligible. The movie was 'The Cleaner.' Obviously the format is different and I used a Blu ray in the Sony player and a "regular" DVD in the Oppo. The 981HD does not play blu ray.
I have no specs to back this claim up, but I could easily see how VERY close they were in performance. The Oppo 981HD really DOES upscale standard def video to NEAR HD. Blu Ray surpasses the upscaling Oppo in a few small areas, such as fine detail under steady motion (even with my 120hz panel.) And there is some noticible Blu Ray advantage in the area of super fine detail. Also, these observations may be more or less obvious on different movies.
Blu ray is mind blowing with some movies. When you get your Blu Ray player, check out Happy Feet if you have a HD 1080p monitor. You can see amazing detail, such as subtle air movement across fine down on the baby penguins. Eyelash color - that kind of stuff - it's seriously amazing.
The Oppo probably won't quite give you that kind of detail, but for $200 less - MAN is it close! Not to mention it plays just about every type of audio and video disk under the sun - less Blu Ray.
Customer Review: Sharp picture, great product, and a useful cable!
Summary: 5 Stars
I had been using a low end progressive scan Philips DVD player with component video connections to my Panasonic 42" 720P plasma. I didn't like the softness of the picture. I saw that this Oppo had good reviews and decided to try it out.
This DVD player performs as advertised. The picture looks great. Setup wasn't that bad, although I am not convinced I have everything tuned just right. I sometimes notice skintones can be a little blotchy in scenes with a lot of light. It could be my TV -- since my lowend player over softened everything and this player's video is very sharp.
So far I have not found a DVD in my collection that this DVD player can't handle. I have been able to detect an occasional slow chapter change during playback of some DVDs (e.g. Night at the Museum) but it isn't a long pause that would make me think there is a problem -- just a noticeable pause.
Although I am using audio out through HDMI (a nice feature) I have played around with the PCM out, and connected some old BA735 digital speakers up. It gives new life to those speakers! Speaking of audio -- there are a lot of options on this unit.
The HDMI cable is a very nice touch. It is long enough to be useful! Very thoughtful of Oppo to include an accessory that really is useful!
The DV981HD has a lot of features that I have not tried. Most important to me, though, it has done everything that I paid for.
Customer Review: Need to know info concerning HDMI and the optical digital audio output
Summary: 4 Stars
I purchased this product, and I'm overall very satisfied with it. I purchased this model with the intention of pairing it's 1080p output and standard DVD-upconversion with my Sony KDS-50A2000. My intention was to get a DVD player that would allow me to enjoy my Standard-DVD movies on my HDTV until the new HD Video format war is decided.
The picture quality of the Oppo DV-918HD is noticeably better than my older Samsung progressive scan DVD/VHS combo player. This is especially noticeable in opening credit graphics, which were best described as "furry" before. However, after plugging the HDMI output into the TV and an optical Toslink cable into my receiver I was perplexed to see that I was getting a 2-channel mixdown of the 5.1 audio.
After searching the manual for any clues I found a little note, "Due to copy-control restrictions and bandwidth limitation, full resolution audio output from DVD-audio or SACD cannot be sent through the coaxial or optical digital audio output." The upshot is if you do not have an AV receiver that has HDMI input/output you will have to run the multichannel analog outputs from the DV-981HD into the multichannel input on your receiver to get the full 5.1 audio signal. After connecting the analog connectors I was able to enjoy the full 5.1 audio signal, but setting the receiver to multichannel bypasses any of the special surround modes offered, annoying but not a deal killer.