General Player FAQ

This is where you will find general questions and answers, and stuff that hasn't been given its own section yet.

Product Infomation

What's in the box?

  • Player
  • Collateral materials, including printed manual
  • A cardboard thingy for putting the unit out for display
  • A remote
  • Batteries for remote
  • Standard AV cable (Left, Right, Composite Video)

What is not in the box that you think would be?

  • HDMI Cable
  • Component Video Cable

Where is the product page?

Where is the manual?

  • Available from the product page (12MB pdf)
  • Note that the pdf manual has "DUO Player" on it, but the printed one in the box says "BluRay Player"
  • Also note that the manual has a slightly different part number on it (there is a difference in the extension)

Free HD-DVD and Bluray disc offers

Can I get both?

  • You can try
  • Some people have had a bit of success.
  • Others have not because the player is not listed specifically with the vendor as a qualifying player for the deals

Could I end up with neither?

  • Yup, like me, who also got denied the 10% of coupon

Manufacturing Information

Known Manufacturing Runs

October 2007

  • System Reports SW version 071020.01_1020_0924.11_XAA
  • Main Board Date Of July 2007, Version 1
  • Manufacturing Plant "C"
  • known serial A00328F
  • When updated to current SW version reports 071108.02_1020_0924.11_XAA

November 2007

  • System Reports SW version 071108.02_1114_0924.11_XAA
  • Main Board Date of October 10, 2007, Version 2
  • Manufacturing Plant "C"
  • known serial ending 00902N

Assumptions about the S/W version string based on above

  • Four values separated by the underscore "_"
    • Main Software
      • Date is YYMMDD
      • Version is .##
    • Build Date or some sort of manufacturing date stamp
      • MMDD
    • Date of bootloader / firmware upgrader
      • Date is MMDD
      • Version is .##
    • Region / model information
      • X for HD-DVD region, meaning no region which is not used yet
      • A for Bluray region
      • A for DVD region. Letters substituted in for the region to prevent a number on the end that could look like a version number
  • Example, 071108.02_1114_0924.11_XAA
    • Main Software version 02 dated November 8th, 2007
    • Built on November 14th (year assumed as this only happens once)
    • Bootloader version 11 dated September 24th (year assumed as this is only loaded once)
    • HD-DVD no region, Bluray Region A, DVD region 1 (A)

Disc playback problems

Reports of certain discs not working

  • All Fox Titles, but if one plays, then they all play.
    • Something about some DRM thing (conjecture)
    • This does not happen for everyone.
    • This is a developing issue and has been encountered on other players.
    • This may be a network connectivity issue similar to the Transformers one below, with regard to downloading some sort of cookie or something (conjecture)
    • Titles include
      • Live Free or Die Hard
      • Mr and Mrs Smith
      • Fantastic Four Rise of the Silver Surfer
  • Hangs on Transformers
    • "Web Enabled Update" loading never quits.
    • This has been seen on the Xbox360 (by me and others)
    • Deleting the persistant memory (8MB) for Transformers cleared this on the 360
    • This is probably some sort of network connectivity glitch, possibly on the studio end (conjecture)

Random Stuff

Load times?

  • About 11 seconds from power off to the Samsung Logo.
  • About 50 seconds total to get BD playing from power off.
  • About 40 seconds total to get HD playing from power off.
  • About on par with most recent players, as far as I can tell.

Auto standby?

  • Yes.
  • I think around 30 minutes.
  • Not defeatable in the menus.
  • Will do this if paused.
  • Doesn't seem to take a long time to load from this, however.

Resume playback from stop? From power cycle?

  • Yes, on both DVD and Bluray only.
  • HD-DVD does not support this directly, but (thanks Nomb!)…
  • You can use HD-DVD bookmarks by pressing the "B" button on the remote at any time while watching. You can later go back to these bookmarks by visiting a discs' "scenes" menu.

Is there a similar player on the market?

Print / Online articles about the player

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License