Panasonic - DVD-S77

MPEG Maker: Matsushita MPEG Model: MN2DS0004AP Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI-2310 LF     MSRP: $249.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

The Panasonic DVD-S77 was a bit of a surprise for me. I just recently reviewed the updated S97 flagship player that seems to be almost exactly the same as the S77 . . . well at least from a build and chip standpoint. Both players use just about the exact same components to deliver the goods, but the S97 is a bit more refined in the end.

The S77 is a two-chip-based player. For its core processing, it relies on a Matsushita MPEG decoder that is pretty much shared throughout the Panasonic DVD player line. What separates the S77 from the lower priced options is the inclusion of the Genesis/Faroudja FLI-2310 video processing chip. This chip not only offers spectacular de-interlacing performance, but also top-of-the-line video scaling for up-conversion to high definition resolutions.

De-Interlacing

The S77 uses a new chip from Genesis called the FLI-2310-LF. I had heard rumors that Genesis and Faroudja had figured out the dreaded “macroblocking” issue that has been so rampant with the latest Genesis chip. Since this chip seemed to be a new iteration of the 2300, I thought for sure this player would not have macroblocking. Unfortunately, that is not the case. In fact, it is worse in this regard than its big brother the S97. Using my tried and true reference scene, Chapter 22 of A Bug’s Life, macroblocking was clearly evident through almost the entire scene. I don’t know why we haven’t seen this problem fixed yet, but it has become more and more frustrating for everyone. As with all FLI-2310 based players, I don’t recommend the S77 if you have a display that shows the issue. Unfortunately we don’t have a list of what displays those are, but we do know that Panasonic plasmas are one of the worst offenders. On a positive note, none of the Sony Cineza (HS-20, HS-50, HS-51) based projectors show the macroblocking bug at all. I cannot comment on the rest of the Sony line.

Aside from the macroblocking issue, the Faroudja continues to be one of our favorite de-interlacing/scaling solutions. It is one of only a few true 10 bit video processing chips available, and its diagonal line processing is still the best in the industry. Since the S77 has an HDMI output, it can deliver a true 10 bit video signal if the output is never converted to DVI. There is a common misconception in the electronics world that DVI and HDMI are identical except for HDMI’s ability to carry multi-channel audio signals on top of video. This is not true. DVI outputs 8 bit RGB signals only and cannot carry 10 bit video like HDMI can. In fact, HDMI is actually capable of 12 bit transmission as well. What does this buy you? Well if you are lucky enough to have a display with an HDMI input, you can significantly reduce the contouring artifacts that are commonly associated with digital displays. A lot of this may depend on the internal processing of your display though too. This is one of the gripes I’ve had with DLP based projectors and displays. Most are DVI- based and only incorporate 8 bit processing internally. So contouring in gray ramps is quite evident. You’ll also usually see it in skies and underwater scenes. If you are lucky enough to have a display with an HDMI input, and with high bit processing, this is pretty much eliminated.

Like most other Panasonic players, the S77 has three distinct video modes; Auto 1, Auto 2, and Video. Auto 1 and 2 are identical except for 2-2 processing. Auto 2 is the only mode that features this processing since it requires a different tap setting in the Genesis chip. This mode is great for video-based DVDs and some PAL material that is flagged incorrectly for video. The video mode is pretty much useless as always.

The Genesis settings seem to be right with this player. The cross color suppressor is defaulted to OFF, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to turn it back on. The chroma filters are all turned on appropriately as well, and this player does pass all of our chroma up sampling tests. The drawback to this is that Faroudja’s filters truncate the vertical chroma resolution. This was clearly evident using the vertical chroma sweep on AVIA Pro. This is one of the only drawbacks to the Faroudja design.

Core Performance

I always find it amusing when a higher end player in a manufacturer’s line doesn’t perform to the level of a lower end unit. At the same time I had this player for evaluation, I was testing their low priced S29. The S29 is a fourth of the S77’s retail price so one would expect the S77 to be at least equal in every respect to the S29. Well, that is not the case. The S77 exhibits the same slight trace of Y/C delay that was present with the S29. It also has some minor pixel cropping, but in this case it affects all sides of the image and not just the sides.

Another issue I found was the S77's black level. For some reason, the S77’s component output is at 7.5 IRE, and I couldn’t get it to output 0 IRE. It does pass a below-black pluge though. Like the S29, the analog white level of the S77 is much too high at 110 IRE. However, the HDMI levels seemed to be right, so this is only an issue via component video output.

Usability is the same as most of Panasonic’s line of players. Menu navigation and chapter skips are quick and painless and the layer change is the standard 1 second for the entire Panasonic line. Build quality is slightly higher then Panasonic’s lower line but not near the level of most other manufacturer’s top end products. Panasonic has seemed to abandon flagship designs like its previous beasts the H-1000 and 2000. That is too bad.

I was impressed to see that this player supports the newest version of HDMI; the 1.1 spec. This version allows for high resolution multi-channel PCM support from DVD-Audio discs. Some other high profile players on the market don’t yet support this. Panasonic also has a digital receiver that accepts this signal and will decode DVD-Audio. Very impressive given the price point of these products.

Conclusions

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-S97

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: 2050004AP Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI-2310     MSRP: $299.00 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-XP30

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN677531KA Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI2200     MSRP: $299.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

Deinterlacing

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-RP82

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN67753IKA Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI2200     MSRP: $229.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

Deinterlacing

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-RP56

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN677533MP Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI2200     MSRP: $299.00 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This player was a surprise. Coming so soon on the heels of the RP91 (reviewed above), we expected it to be similar, and use the hybrid flag-reading/cadence-reading Genesis chipset of that player. Instead, we found that it uses the Sage/Faroudja chip, which is amazing in a major brand player at this price (around $230 street). The box and front panel don't say anything about Faroudja or DCDi, but it's in there. And except for a few minor hiccups, it's all configured correctly.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-CP72

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN67753IKA Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI2200     MSRP: $279.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This player has been widely assumed to be the equivalent of the well-regarded RP82, only in a 5-disc changer form factor. We found this to be largely true, though with a few minor disappointments.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DMP-BD10

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: Deinterlacer Maker: National Semiconducter Deinterlacer Model:     MSRP: $1299.99 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

The Panasonic DMP-BD10 represents the second Blu-ray player that I’ve reviewed so far. Like the Samsung BD player, I will be following this benchmark up with a full review on how it performs as a Blu-ray player, but for this review I will be focusing on how the player does as a standard DVD player. Since the majority of movies on the market are still being released in standard definition, it is likely that this player will be used a lot for standard definition DVD playback as well.

In the past we’ve been very impressed with Panasonic DVD players. Sure they’ve had their misses, but some of the better ones still rank up with the best we’ve seen to date in terms of video quality. Stacey Spears, the former Benchmark editor for Secrets and the creator of the DVD Benchmark, still uses the Panasonic RP-82 as his reference video transport, which says a lot if you know Stacey.

The DMP-BD10 continues the tradition of excellent video quality for Panasonic, with a few caveats. The DMP-BD10 is quite a complex machine when you open it up. Instead of finding one main decoder, you’ll find two. Panasonic has opted to use its own MPEG decoder (MEI) for standard DVD decoding rather than the Sigma Designs decoder they’re using for Blu-ray decoding. This is also only the second player I’ve ever seen that uses the National Semiconducter video processing chip for its main de-interlacing and scaling duties (both SD and HD).

The player as a whole has very attractive styling and above average build. Aside from the H-1000 and H-2000 DVD players released some years ago, I would say this has the best build I’ve seen from Panasonic to date. The front panel flips down to reveal the tray as well as the standard operating controls, and the back panel supports both analog video and HDMI outputs. You’ll also find a 7-channel analog audio output for newer multi-channel support.

The HDMI output supports 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p video resolutions. The component output will only support up to 480p with standard definition DVDs. As I mentioned before, this player uses the National Semiconducter chip for its I/P conversion and video scaling. This chip is very capable and is one of the few out there that will handle 1080i-to-1080p transcoding properly. For SD video, the National chip does quite well, but has some limitations compared to some of the other high line video processing chips on the market.

Using our standard DVD Benchmark de-interlacing tests, the BD10 did quite well. It passed the majority of our tests with no problems at all, and I was impressed with the quality of the scaling that the National chip provided. The BD10 does fail our tests for material mastered with a 2-2 cadence, as well as our bad edits test. I was actually surprised that it failed our 2-2 test since the other player that uses this chip passed just fine in our preliminary testing (Classe CDP-300, review forthcoming).

The National chip does a decent job with diagonal line processing. This is a feature that was widely popular with Faroudja and their DCDi processing, but has moved into other solutions on the market such as the Realta HQV, Gennum VXP, and ABT chips. I would say the National chip is in the same league as the Gennum processor in this regard and not quite as good as the ABT or Faroudja solution. You will still see a tinge of jaggies on very extreme (near 90-degree) angles.

The National chip recovers quickly from a change of source material. If the material is film based and then switches to video based material, the player recovers the cadence in about 10 frames. This is faster than Faroudja-based players but slightly worse than some of the higher end chips.

Cliff Stephenson, a former DVD reviewer for DVDFile, was kind enough to point out an artifact that I was able to reproduce using my player. For some reason, the National chip is creating what almost looks like vertical banding in reds when SD DVDs are upscaled pass 480p. This was quite noticeable watching Star Wars Episode 1 on DVD in quite a few scenes. The artifact was pronounced when the output was set to 720p or higher but was completely gone when the player was set to 480p. Hopefully this is a problem that can be addressed with firmware. It is unclear how much this will affect overall viewing of SD DVDs as it may be software dependent.

The MEI MPEG decoder did fair in our Benchmark testing. We can’t stress enough how important the core functions of a DVD player are in the overall image quality. This player outputs YCbCr 4:4:4 via HDMI and clips the head and toe room of the intended image. Essentially below-black and above-white information is truncated. Adjusting the player’s contrast and brightness settings resolve this issue but at the cost of dynamic range. If you adjust these settings, subtle to severe banding is noticed in the image, using gray ramp patterns. We would recommend leaving the player as is. Again we hope this is something that Panasonic can address with a firmware update as it has been a common issue with other players that have later gone on to fix the issue (most recently the Toshiba HD-A1 HD DVD player). The component output retains the full signal and does not clip head or toe room.

The DMP-BD10 is not cropping any pixels from the active image, and Y/C delay was not detectable via HDMI or component video. The MEI chip also does a great job in regards to chroma upsampling. It passed all of our tests with the exception of 4:2:0 ICP, which requires a chroma filter. The video analog frequency response of this player was also quite good and nearly ruler flat. The analog output does have a low default white level output of 95 IRE though.

From a usability standpoint, this Panasonic is the best I’ve seen to date from any true high definition player regardless of the format. The remote is along the lines of Panasonic's other offerings with the exception of the buttons required for the new Blu-ray format. Menu navigation and chapter skips could definitely be faster, but the player doesn’t have the delays in power up and disc loading we’ve seen with some other next generation players. My biggest gripe in this department is the player’s layer change, which is a bit sluggish. Using a full bit rate layer change test, we clocked this player in at about 1.75 seconds.

Conclusions

For standard definition DVD playback, the Panasonic DMP-BD10 is in a completely different league than the Samsung Blu-ray player. While it is not quite as good as what we’ve seen from Panasonic’s dedicated DVD platforms, it is good enough that I think most people would be more than happy using it for their SD DVDs as well as Blu-ray discs. While this is a more expensive option than the Samsung Blu-ray player, and represents the most expensive next generation player to date, it is the best I’ve seen from the Blu-ray camp so far. I will be covering its performance as a Blu-ray player (audio and video) in an upcoming full report.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-RP62

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN677533MP Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: FLI2200     MSRP: $179.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

Deinterlacing

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-S52

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: Unknown Deinterlacer Maker: Unknown Deinterlacer Model: Unknown     MSRP: $99.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

The DVD-S52 is one of the least expensive HDMI-based DVD players I’ve tested to date. At this price you wouldn’t expect much in terms of features, but Panasonic delivers a decent package of options here for the budget minded consumer. Not only does it offer an HDMI output, but this output is HDMI v1.1 compliant, and the player supports full playback of DVD-Audio. This means you can use one cable to deliver both standard DVD video and audio plus high-resolution PCM audio from DVD-Audio software. The player also supports upscaling of DVD via HDMI to 720p and 1080i. While this isn’t the first time Panasonic has offered these features to the consumer market, it has never been quite this inexpensive.

The S52 is based on a Matsushita (Panasonic) MPEG decoder. I did not see any other video processing chips when I opened the player up, and the video performance doesn’t suggest that Panasonic is using any. In the past we’ve been big fans of Panasonic’s MPEG decoders. In fact, the Panasonic MPEG decoders found in the RP-91 and RP-82 continue to be our standard to this day. Those players are over 5 years old now! This new chip does not live up to that same standard, unfortunately. The implementation on the digital side is good, but the analog output of the chip needs quite a bit of work.

I started my tests with the HDMI output. I fed a Panasonic AE-900 LCD projector directly and also put a DVDO VP30 in between for some of the tests. The VP30 allows me to verify the output color space of the player plus do some more extensive CUE testing.

The core performance on the HDMI side was quite good. The S52 is not cropping any pixels via HDMI and retains the full dynamic range of the luma signal. It does not clip below black or above white information in the image. The player also doesn’t have any signs of Y/C delay via HDMI, which helps with the overall sharpness of the image.

The S52 does suffer from some slight flickering in our CUE testing with alternating 3-2 cadence based material. This cadence is common in some of the early Pixar and Disney DVDs and can be noticeable at times. All of the other CUE tests were passed, including the 4:2:0 ICP test which means this player does some chroma filtering.

The core performance of the component (analog) outputs was completely different and not nearly as good. There is some mild pixel cropping with 2 pixels missing from the left side and 3 from the right, and there is over a full pixel of Y/C delay. All NTSC video is transmitted with both black and white (luma) and color information (chroma) placed on top of each other. They are separate and distinct signals, and if they are not overlaid exactly on top of each other, you will see outlining or “ghosting” around the image on one side. This player delays the chroma, so you will probably see a faint outline on the right side of objects.

The overall white level of the analog output was also extremely low. Using a horizontal gray ramp and a digital oscilloscope I measured the full IRE sweep of the player from 0 to 100 IRE. If the player’s output were correct, the respective 0 and 100 IRE points would measure as such on the scope. In this case the 100 IRE point measured REALLY low and came in at 91 IRE.

The analog frequency response of the player was good, with a fairly flat curve throughout the full video bandwidth.

From a usability standpoint, the Panasonic was about average. Menu navigation and chapter skipping were quick enough and never distracting. Disc load times were also good. The layer change was a tad sluggish at 1.5 seconds, but livable given the price point. I wasn’t that impressed with the advanced setup menus. Settings for HDMI output and de-interlacing mode were a bit hidden, so some users may have difficulty finding them. The normal setup menus were easy to use though.

I would have liked to see more attention to detail on the analog side of this player, especially since the HDMI (digital) output was so good.

Moving on to our de-interlacing tests, the S52 starts to show the limitations of one-chip mass-market MPEG decoders. The S52 offers three separate de-interlacing modes; Auto 1, Auto 2, and Video. Video is a forced video mode that will not lock onto any cadences or switch into a film mode. This results in a much softer image than the Auto modes but will result in very little, if any, combing. The only real difference between Auto 1 and Auto 2 was the latter’s ability to lock on to a 2-2 cadence correctly. This is only important though if you know you are going to watch material mastered with this cadence. Some TV based DVDs use this. Otherwise, we would suggest just sticking with Auto 1 (default), as it handles most of the film-based cadences.

The S52 does not handle breaks in cadence or mixed cadences very well at all. It is also not motion-adaptive, so it will not handle video-based material very well. This pretty much defines the bottom end of video de-interlacing in mass-market progressive scan players. Even our medium difficulty tests tripped this player up, resulting in drops to video mode and loss of overall resolution. It did perform nicely at recovery from video to film mode as cadences changed. At this price point I wasn’t expecting much better, but I hoped that Panasonic delivered performance closer to their players that cost just a little bit more.

Conclusions

It would be hard for me to recommend this player to anyone. The video processing is on the weak side and will result in a softer image with poorly mastered material. I was impressed with the feature set considering the price point, but that doesn’t make up for the other issues. For those using component inputs, you should steer clear of this player, as its core performance using that output needs a lot of work and there is a lot better to be found in this price range.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-S29

MPEG Maker: Matsushita MPEG Model: MN2DS0003UP1 Deinterlacer Maker: Matsushita Deinterlacer Model: MN2DS0003UP1     MSRP: $69.00 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

The Panasonic DVD-S29 is one of Panasonic’s newest entry level players. The design is simple but maintains a few of the cosmetic touches of their somewhat pricier upper tier. A few years ago Panasonic was at the top of our DVD Benchmark ratings and they released a string of affordable DVD players that offered superb video playback; unfortunately those days have come to an end. While the upper tier of Panasonic players such as the DVD-S97 and S77 offer excellent video performance for the price, the S29 groups itself into the mainstream norm of average-at-best players.

The S29 uses a proprietary Matsushita MPEG decoder. This single chip is the heart of the player and performs all of the video processing duties as well as audio decoding. Like most one-chip solutions, the Matsushita offering is decent enough with film based DVDs, but lacks the more advanced video processing that is demanded by today’s DVDs.

De-Interlacing

The S29 features three separate de-interlacing modes; Auto 1, Auto 2, and Video. This is pretty common with Panasonic designs, and the results are nearly always the same with this chipset. Auto 1 is essentially a film based mode and lacks the capability to deal with a 2-2 based video cadence. So, if you don’t find yourself watching a lot of TV shows now available on DVD, you may just want to stick with this mode. Auto 2 is exactly the same, except that it features 2-2 processing. I didn’t see any signs of compromise with film based material (at least compared to Auto 1), so this is a safe mode to leave the player in if you want. Last and definitely least is Video which I found essentially useless for the most part. No flag or cadence detection at all. Since Auto 2 deals with video based material just fine, I would recommend sticking with that.

This player had quite a bit of difficulty with cadence errors and was quick to drop into video mode. This resulted in lots of combing during our tests. This is pretty much the norm on the market today despite the decade of DVD technologies that have been developed. It seems that the consumers just don't demand enough from the manufacturers, so why should they bother spending money to fix problems?

Core Performance

Unfortunately, this is where most players come up short. Since typical video processing chips will handle a basic film cadence for I/P conversion, most of the deficiencies you see in DVD players today are from problems in the core areas of video playback. This includes Y/C delay, video levels, chroma up-sampling errors, and more. The DVD-S29 again did about average in this department, but had some major oversights in my opinion.

The biggest oversight is the default level of white in the video signal. Our pass criteria is a level of 102 IRE or lower, with 100 IRE being the ideal. The S29’s white level is 110 IRE as measured with our oscilloscope. That is outrageously high. The Panasonic does have picture settings that will help out, but this shouldn’t be an issue that the consumer has to deal with. On the plus side, the S29 does pass a below black pluge signal and the black level of the player can be adjusted for both 7.5 and 0 IRE.

There was some slight Y/C delay measured, but the player was still in the consumer spec of less then 5 ns. When I evaluated the player on my display, I didn’t see any trace of the Y/C delay in normal viewing. The Panasonic had a very good overall video frequency response that remained flat for the most part with only a slight nudge down in the mid-frequency band. Using a resolution chart on AVIA Pro showed that the S29 did indeed resolve the highest resolution DVD was capable of.

Like most DVD players, the S29 did have issues with a few of our chroma up-sampling tests, i.e., the 4:2:0 ICP test, which requires special chroma filters to resolve, and the 3-2 alternating cadence CUE problem. Both of these are very common but won’t show up on a lot of material you will see in real world viewing. The 3-2 alternating problem will show up occasionally on some of Disney’s animated DVD fare.

Pixel cropping was a tad excessive on the left and right sides of the image, mainly the right which was clipping 5 pixels from the video signal. Since the S29 doesn’t use any chroma filtering, the player retains the full vertical chroma response.

Usability of the player is high. Response times were high and menu navigation and chapter skips were breezy enough. The player’s layer change clocked in right about 1 second which is decent. I wasn’t impressed with the overall build of the player; especially the tray, which seemed a bit flimsy.

Conclusions

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DMR-HS2

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: Deinterlacer Maker: Deinterlacer Model:     MSRP: $999.00 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This is a DVD recorder, but we only looked at the performance of the video section while playing back pre-recorded DVDs.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-RP91

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN67753IKA Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: gmVLX1A and gmAMFC     MSRP: $699.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This player has a lot of things going for it. It has many useful features, including auto-scaling of letterboxed movies so they fill a 16x9 display in "full" mode. It's fast, has excellent video quality, and has no chroma bug. Unfortunately, the player uses the inferior (in our opinion) Genesis chipset, and while Panasonic has done an admirable job of squeezing the last ounce of performance out of it, it still can't match up to the Sage or Silicon Image chipsets.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic

Panasonic - DVD-H1000

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: Unknown Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: gmVLX1A     MSRP: $2999.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This player has been around almost as long as the Toshiba 5109, but it’s still hanging in there, and it’s still a contender. This player is the only one to use the Genesis gmVLX1A without the gmAFMC, as far as we know. The player implements its own film detection, which seems to boil down to looking for the standard film flag sequence. If it sees that sequence, it goes into film mode. Any deviation from the standard sequence causes it to go into video mode, except the alternating progressive_frame flag material, which is still recognized as film.

Panasonic - DVD-H2000

MPEG Maker: MEI MPEG Model: MN67753IKA Deinterlacer Maker: Genesis Deinterlacer Model: gmVLX1A and gmAMFC     MSRP: $2499.95 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

This player is essentially the same player as the RP-91 from a video standpoint, as far as we could tell. The deinterlacing test results were the same, as it uses the same hybrid flag-reading/cadence-reading Genesis system. The menus were the same, except that the H2000 adds separate R, G, and B gain and bias adjustments. We didn't spend very much time with them. Under normal circumstances, we'd prefer to adjust RGB tracking on the display, and these controls were much too coarse to do any real calibration with. The H2000 includes an additional remote that has direct access to many of the video specific options.

Panasonic - DVD-S27

MPEG Maker: Panasonic MPEG Model: unknown Deinterlacer Maker: Panasonic Deinterlacer Model: unknown     MSRP: $79.99 Website: http://www.panasonic.com

Ah, Panasonic! I remember the good old days when Stacey and I would test the RP line of players and really get excited about what they were bringing to the table. Unfortunately those days have gone and Panasonic has moved on to a more mass market approach, that, like Sony, is built by them from the ground up.

This player uses a Matsushita MPEG decoder, but I was unable to get the serial number off of it. Unfortunately this is not the same chip that we saw in the late great players that did so well in our Benchmarks before. This MPEG decoder suffers from all of the chroma issues and failed all of the corresponding tests.

The player crops a few pixels on the left and right side, 2 and 5 respectively and also suffers from a full pixel of Y/C delay. The S27 passes below black information, and its white level just squeaks by a pass with a measurement of 98 IRE.

The player has a very intuitive menu system for setup that is easy to use. Menu navigation on this player is extremely fast, but I found chapter skips to be a bit on the slower side. The layer change clocked in at 1.25 seconds, which is OK.

For de-interlacing, there are three different modes; Auto 1, Auto 2, and Video. The only difference between Auto 1 and 2 comes from Auto 2’s ability to handle a 2-2 cadence. This is great for PAL discs or for DVD handheld recorders that use this cadence. This de-interlacer is a flag reader and tends to trip up a lot with poorly recorded video. The video mode is exactly what it says, and forces video. Unless you watch a lot of PAL discs, I would recommend just leaving it in Auto 1.

I know there are a lot of high hopes for the upcoming Panasonic S97. I too am hopeful, but I realize that Panasonic is geared more at the mass consumer and not the videophile. While this shouldn’t preclude them from creating a great DVD player, it seems it makes most companies a bit less staunchy with the performance of their end product. The S27 is a pretty average budget player overall, but nowhere near the greatness of its predecessors.

Video Frequency Response
Panasonic