samsung hd-841 owners (1 Viewer)

[allan espinoza]

could someone please tell me what the difference is between mode A and B in the dvd setup menu when using the dvi output? i contacted samsung by e-mail and they were very brief about it and said to play with it to see what i like best, but i just dont know what im looking for. any help is greatly appreciated, thanks.

oh by the way im using dvi-hdmi if that matters, thanks.

 

[ChuckSolo]

Allan, I have the Samsung player and to be honest with you I have never seen a difference in either mode. I checked the manual and it doesn't really say squat. I just keep it on mode A and leave it at that. I also have mine connected via DVI.....no difference in either mode at all.

 

[allan espinoza]

i also checked the manual and didn't find much, i guess ill leave as is, thanks

 

[allan espinoza]

when connecting the dvi do you need to have component cables hooked up as well? just curious because when you select the dvi it says component(p-scan & dvi)

 

[ChuckSolo]

No, you can have just the DVI or just the Component hooked up. The settings are P-Scan-DVI for progressive scan or DVI hookup or I-Scan-SVideo. The first is basically a digital connection setting for progressive scan and DVI hookups and the other is for analog video and S-Video settings. Note though that if the P-Scan-DVI setting is chosen in the setup menu of the DVD player the composite and S-Video ports (analog) on the player will not work.

 

[Jean D]

I was looking through the Tweeter mailer I get and saw this DVD player. Its funny cause I would like a DVD player that has upscaling, dvd-A and SACD. it says it can do all of this. What do you guys think about this model? how does the dvd-a sound? how does the SACD sound? Im assuming it does component due to the question above. is the picture quality that much better than the 480p?

 

[ChuckSolo]

Jean, I love mine. I haven't had the chance to play a DVD-A throug it yet, but in SACD mode it sounds great. I got Carol King's "Tapestry" album in SACD and compared it side by side with my stereo copy and the difference is amazing. Be cautioned though, there are a lot of SACDs out there that are in stereo only, not multi channel. On my 40" RCA HD RPTV, and hooked to the TVs DVI port, the upscaling to 1080i is excellent. I can definately tell the difference when watching a well mastered DVD on it. Yes, it does component but will only upscale over DVI, one of the drawbacks I see in this player. I have not experienced any problems with it in the 60 days I have owned it and it has played all the discs I have thrown at it except for a very scratched DVD of "WindTalkers." The only other complaint I guess I would have about this player is the remote really has to be aimed at the player almost directly to be effective. On the plus side, the remote is programmable to your TV so you can control most of your TVs functions with it too. Mine was an open box model that CC had on display, but it was not hooked to anything and it was not missing anything either so I bought it at a discount of almost 30 bucks. I also like the idea of the player coming complete with a DVI cable. I priced DVI cables at BB, Radio Shack, and CC and all of them sold a 6 foot DVI cable for $99.99. It was a relief to see that the DVI cable came in the box! Like I said, I love mine and am glad I bought it.

 

[allan espinoza]

why is it that when i select to view in 1080i the image becomes widescreen and their faces appear to be a little wider? i mean it looks so nice when converted to 1080i but i loose part of the image. can 1080i only be viewed on a widescreen to view the whole image?

 

[ChuckSolo]

Allan, the only time I have experienced what you are describing is when I watched 2 older DVDs. One was a 3 year old copy of "Firestarter" and the other was also and old copy of "GoodFellas." When I was watching those films, the picture was quite narrow on my 16x9 and the faces were a bit squashed. I used the EZ View feature on those DVDs and the picture was a lot more normal and not so squeezed. I have no idea why this has happened on those two DVDs, but the package claims they are both "enchanced for widescreen TVs"......strange. By the way, what kind of TV is the Sammy hooked up to. It sounds like you have it hooked to a 4:3 TV.

 

[allan espinoza]

well i have a sony kv-36hs420.

 

[Jean D]

my tv doesnt have dvi inputs, and its just about pointless if I cant use the upscaling. so I guess this player isnt for me. thanks anyway guys.

 

[EricRWem]

Jean, you could try and get a Zenith 318 that upscales over component video. Theyr'e running out, but if you go to Amazon, I believe you can still get one and your chances of getting an earlier than July 2004 player are still decent. This will give you 100 percent unlimited component upconversion.

I'm considering selling mine as well (Dec. 2003 build) since I've recently upgraded. Either that, or might keep it for region free play, since there's an easy hack out there that enables this.

 

[JustinCleveland]

The only thing I noticed on my Sammy 841 was that it wouldn't stablize in 1080i in Mode A and 720p was slightly off-center, but the picture quality was better. Mode B corrected both of these problems but the video quality was a little worse. That having been said, it still looks pretty good.

 

[andrew lewis]

I'm thinking of picking this player up after christmas is over. I had a Yamaha s2300, but recently got rid of it due to lack of SACD and DVD-A usage. Now I just use my Denon DVD-900 for disc playing. My 900 is acting up (had it serviced 2 years back) and I want to get a new player for a low price. At $180, the Samsung sounds like a good unit. Will it compare to the video quality a Denon or Yamaha unit put's out? What about the audio (digital vs 900, and direct out vs S2300)? How much better is an aftermarket DVI cable compared to the one that comes w/ the unit?

 

[RobinP]

I picked one of these up at Best Buy about 2 months ago and started to run into issues with DVD-Audio.

The sound kept cutting out on the Yes Fragile DVD-Audio disk at various random points - very frustrating. It also would come to the end of a track and the track counter would just keep counting!
I tried replacing the Fragile disk for a new one but it still had issues.

I tried Samsung and they said they would fix the machine but in the end I decided that you get what pay for plus I didn't want to get into a protracted repair process.

I search around and found a few others that were having similar issues.

I've just replaced the HD-841 with a Denon DVD-955S (same as DVD-2910) and this disk now plays perfectly. I also noticed a distinct improvement in the video quality and overall build quality but then again this machine is almost 3 times the price .

I also believe that the SACD stream is converted and processed by the DVD-Audio processor which if you mainly want SACD is not the best idea.

Regards,
Robin