Region Free Question (1 Viewer)

[Ronn.W]

Gotta love the CH 500. I almost didn't buy it because of the name, ultra cheesy. Excellent player though. If you feel you need to spend $200+ to get a quality region free player, by all means do it. If you're more reasonable then the CH 500 for under $70 is the best choice, IMHO.

One thing to be wary of though is that like most all of the Chinese players on the market quality control is not the best. There have been some out of the box probs with some of the players, so I'd suggest buying it at a B&M where you can do a quick exchange if you need to.

I do believe you get what you pay for, but I also believe that you don't always get what you overpay for. There's no reason a region free player has to be in the $200+ range.

 

[Daryl Stovall]

Luis pardon my ignorance, but what is a hackable player & how would i hack it?:b

 

[JohnS]

I wish the Ch500 did X&Y scaling

There is something going on the top of the picture when viewing widescreen movies. Right under the letterbox bar on top. I had to return the 500 because of it.

What was the problem exactly, and have other people accured this.
Does seem so, so far.

I'm stuck between the CH500 and the Malata520(because of the XY scale)

Damn, that cheesy name scares me, and I would also like to know the hacking way

 

[Mike_Richardson]

Guys -- changing regions is as simple as going into the set-up menu and pressing '1999' when there's no disc in the tray. You'll be all set in no time.

The PAL conversion is excellent and I can't get over the overall quality of the player. The colors and contrasts are better than my old Panasonic -- and I only picked this up as a spare player that could do multi-region! Now I want to pick up another as a back-up. It's THAT good!

 

[Ronn.W]

To get mine multiregion I had to:

Turn it on
Eject the tray
Press '1999' and hit ENTER
That takes you to the hidden menu to select regions.
Choose ALL
Press RETURN
Close the tray.

 

[Jeff Adkins]

I'm sure this is a fine machine. I would be concerned about using it as my main player if it doesn't have filters like the "FILM" filter on my JVC. Those filters do an incredible job of making PAL conversion look awesome. I certainly wouldn't want a player that didn't have some kind of filter.

I may go ahead and pick one of these up as a backup unit and ditch my Daewoo.

Jeff

 

[Luis S]

Doesnt need filters,the conversion is THAT good! Trust me, try it,at least if you dont like it (doubt you wont...)you can always return it if you get it someplace like best buy.
Good luck,
Luis S

 

[Ronn.W]

I would be concerned about using it as my main player if it doesn't have filters like the "FILM" filter on my JVC. Those filters do an incredible job of making PAL conversion look awesome. I certainly wouldn't want a player that didn't have some kind of filter.

The player doesn't have a filter because it doesn't need a filter. Like Luis S said, get one and try it out for yourself. If you're not happy with the conversion, take it back. The conversion is spot on.

 

[Matt Shiv]

Thanks for the tipoff guys. I had a Daewoo player that I had bought online without doing any research into the situation. It did an ok job, but I was very disapointed in the anamorphic PAL dvd's being improperly streched on my 4:3 television.

I ordered the Cyber Home 500 on Christmas Eve and it already arrived today. Got it hooked up and ready to go very quickly and it was well worth the $70. I haven't had a chance to really give it a good go, but there were two things that I wanted to check: if it could handle an RCE disc like "Snatch" (it loaded without trouble), and to check out the PAL conversion with my French edition of "Sleeping Beauty" (it played perfectly). It had auto detection for the PAL/NTSC so that relieved me. I was concerned that I would have to always change it back and forth using the menus, but it seems to have it covered.

Maybe it won't work for years upon years, but for $70 I'm glad I took a chance on this player.

 

[JohnS]

Thanks for the update Matt.
Anybody else recieve this for X-mas?

Might grab one here in about a week

 

[Steve_Ch]

Question for you guys, I read the thread and went over to Bestbuy.com however, the only $70 ($69.99) Cyber Home they have listed (with a $20 rebate) is the Cyber Home 402, which, as near as I can tell, is non Progressive (which is fine), no Optical out (not so cool, but I can put up with it). The Cyber Home 500 on BestBuy.com is $119.99 (Progressive with Optical audio out, AND BUILDIN DD 5.1, DTS decoder), no rebate.
I am confused, are all the great recommendations for the 402 ? Or did I missed some kind of sales deal on the 500??

 

[Ronn.W]

You missed the sale on the CH500. It was marked down to $69 for awhile in December, and was that price up until yesterday. Today I noticed (after being prompted to check it out in another forum) that the sale is over and the price is back up to the regular $119. Amazon is still selling it for $89, although they appear to be out of them now.

 

[Steve_Ch]

Thanks Ron, do you happen to know if the off the shelf CH500 is also Macrovision "unfriendly" ? They don't tell you that kind of stuff on CH's website . The way it looks, it does not appear to be difficult to find one in the $89 range.

 

[Ronn.W]

I've read that it does use macrovision, but it can be accidentally disabled if you stop the DVD and change the type of connection the player is using in setup, then change it back again. Like if you're using component, switch it to Svideo then switch it back to component. Press play and it accidentally doesn't do macrovision anymore. This has to be repeated each time though, and if you go back to a menu macrovision kicks back in.

I've never had the occasion to use it as I don't have to connect it thru my VCR. I can tell you that the player is RCE friendly and shouldn't have any probs reading RCE discs.

 

[Luis S]

Go to nerd-out.com and check the Cyberhome thread regarding macrovision

 

[Steve_Ch]

Thanks again, guys. Luis, I did find nerd-out.com and there's mucho good stuff there .

 

[Ronn.W]

It's also back to $69 at Best Buy again.

 

[Steve_Ch]

Thanks again Ronn. I ended up buying one off EBay (for more than $69.99). My timing is awful with this machine, as the day that I read about it and decided to get it was exactly one day after the sale and rebate ended. Now, of course, 1 day after I spent more money on it, it's back on sale again.
The reason I decided not to wait was I went to the local BB and except for a display model, there wasn't any CH500 left. I asked the guy and he told me they sold out days ago and haven't gotten anymore (yet, no idea when will they get more), the only thing they have is some 402s, which they sold a ton too.
Just to add insult to injury , one reason I paid more for it on EBay was because the person has downloaded and installed the latest 12/23 firmware as well as done the MV hack, brand new machine except for the hacks. I thought, well, OK, that saves me some trouble, worth a few bucks extra. And then after I brought it, I found nerd-out.com and found that there are some problems with the 12/23 firmware release and CyberHome has withdraw it, so now when I receive the machine, I have to re-apply the old firmware.. Hope the machine is one of the good ones, as so far it's not been one of my better moves:frowning: .

 

[Ronn.W]

Definitely reapply the old firmware. The problem with the 12/23 upgrade is that a DVD w/ DVD ROM content was read as a CD ROM, not a DVD at all. Hope this player finally works out for ya!

 

[Baqur]

With the CH - 500 i dont seem to understand something from the ads on Best Buy and Cyber home website.
It says on Cyber Home it will play


Plays PAL and NTSC Discs

and on Best Buy it says

Selectable NTSC- or PAL-format video output

NO WAY DOES IT SAY THAT THE PLAYER DOES A PAL TO NTSC CONVERSION!!!!!

So guys....does the CH - 500 which has just arrived into stock at Best Buy do a PAL TO NTSC conversion??

Playing NTSC and PAL discs ie giving PAL and NTSC output is no good , if it does not convert PAL TO NTSC?

Please help.