Samsung DVD-1080P7 Up-Converting 1080p DVD Player

This purchase was especially disappointing because I was very pleased with my Samsung LN40A550 40-Inch 1080p LCD HDTV. I bought the upsampling DVD player to complement that TV, but it was a waste of my money. (I was replacing a progressive scan DVD player that was a few years old.)

I unpacked the player and attached it to the HDTV with an HDMI cable and got NOTHING. No picture. No menu. Nothing.

The TV recognized the Anynet device (DVD player), but found no signal.

I spent half an hour playing with the remote, reading through the manual, and searching the terrible support Web site. Finally, I was able to get a flickering, noisy, pink screen.

I had to turn off the auto setting for HDMI resolution. I discovered that the DVD player only worked in the 480 setting. The 720p and 1080i settings gave me the distorted video. The 1080p setting resulted in "no signal."

I registered the DVD player at the Samsung support site. This required typing in detailed information including the serial number that was printed in a 6 pt. font on the back of the machine.

The download area had information about a firmware upgrade. But there was no mention of what version it was or how to find out what version was on my player. Of course, there was nothing about what features this firmware added or what bugs it fixed.

The procedure for updating the firmware would have confused a hacker.
* Download the zip file containing the firmware.
* Unzip the files.
* Burn the files to a CD-R.
(not a DVD-R because the player does not read them)
* Be sure to use the ISO 9660 character set.
* Finalize the disc.
* Turn on the DVD player.
* Turn on the TV.
* Switch the source to the DVD player.
* Put the Newly burned CD into the player's disc tray.
* Answer Yes when prompted to update.
Screen shot bears no resemblance to actual prompt.
Options are "Total" and "Cancel."
* Highlight "Yes" and press Enter on remote.
(Of course there is no "Yes" to highlight.)
* The upgrade begins and the upgrade screen appears.
(The first time nothing changed on the screen when I selected "Total.")
(When the screen did appear on the second try, it was completely different than the screen shot shown on the Web site.)
* IMPORTANT: While the firmware is installing (without any feedback) do not press any buttons or turn off the player.
Unplugging the power cord, dirt or scratches on the disc, opening the tray during processing, or a power outage could cause PERMANENT DAMAGE TO THE UNIT.
* During the update, the tray will open.
* Remove the disc.
* Wait two minutes.

This information is inconsistently presented in three different locations on the Web site.

With luck and persistence, I was able to update the firmware. But it had no impact on my problem.

I tried to find some mention of others having the same problem in the FAQs. But the FAQs are not browse-able. I had to type in a question to get a list of possible matches. No version of the question produced any relevant FAQs.

I clicked on the "If you do not find the answer you are looking for, send us an e-mail and we'll try to help" link. It brings up a javascript e-mail form.

Even though I was logged in with all my personal and product information stored in their online database, I had to re-enter the model number, the serial number, the purchase date, my name, my e-mail address and my zip code.

I submitted my request for help one week ago today. I have not received any reply from Samsung, not even a "we got your request" e-mail.

This DVD player produces no better output than my old player and is a hassle to use.

The Anynet connection is slow and provides little benefit. I would not use it as a factor in deciding whether to buy this unit. I would not recommend buying this player at all. If I didn't like my TV so much, I would recommend not buying anything from a company that is so terrible at customer support.

Had the same problem others have reported -- the LED readout on the front of the player starts saying gibberish (looks like the album cover for Ghost In The Machine by The Police); which I could live with, but the player starts doing funny things such as constantly resetting to factory settings, or worse yet, not reading the DVD's at all. Its performance has been intermittent since almost day one, and now seems to have crapped out completely. I'm gonna try the firmware update but don't have too much hope that'll fix things. Either way, I will never buy another Samsuck DVD player again.

Goes perfect with the my new Samsung Plasma. Very Small. So far it has been great.

This is a really nice DVD player. it plays almost all formats. I am using HDMI cables and paired this with a Samsung 40" LCD and the picture quality is really good.
I would suggest everyone thinking of getting a bluRay try this first until BluRay matures and the prices come down.

This DVD player broke after I played it only three times. It was connected to my TV via component outputs. For some reason the component outputs stopped working. I tested multiple cables and configurations and nothing would work.

I brought it to a store to be tested. They plugged it into a TV and tried all of the outputs. They were puzzled after trying to get component to work, only to see the other ones work just fine.