Quote Originally Posted by Mr Peabody
I'm not trying to make more of this than what it is. Some people don't even know you need special programming to receive HD. I had to explain to some what Progressive Scan is let alone updating firmware. Not every single person will not read the manual but it's more than you would admit.
You don't have to read the manual, the instructions are on the website, and you are prompted by the player through every step. Perhaps you should admit that people are smarter than you make them out to be. Every disc comes with an announcement to keep your player updated. You choose to update or not, it is just that simple.

You can call it what you want but when my player won't play a certain movie I call it incompatibility. It's also funny how when I read a lot of the firmware updates it's many times to enable the player to play a certain movie. Even though my fix allowed me to watch Drag Me To Hell, the fix was actually for Babylon AD. Regardless, firmware updates are something that those who own BD players should know about and keep updated. Whether they choose to is up to them.
Once again, you chose a Samsung player, a player who's software coding was poor from the onset, and has to continually be updated to fix that problem. The PS3 has not had a single compatibility problem in the entire 3 years that I have owned it, and the Oppo had the latest firmware upgrade installed when I purchased it. Where you are making a mountain out of a ant hill comes from the fact that when you look at the firmware upgrade page on Bluray.com, most players have had only ONE firmware upgrade released, not many as you are trying to allude to. Not one firmware upgrade in 2009 was for compatibility issues, NOT ONE!

If any one made a mountain from a mole hil it's you and Wooch. You act like Blu-ray is totally perfect and nothing negative can be said. Actually, admitting there are firmware updates isn't even a negative. But it is part of ownership of one and you denying it don't make it any less so.
On the flip side - you act as if Bluray was so flawed that average consumers will pause before buying or not buy it at all. I say this is BS big time. Anyone who owns a computer knows how to install a patch, especially Windows users. It is no big deal anymore except to computer illiterate individuals, or people who enjoy complaining about everything. The Bluray format is much more sophisticated than the DVD format by a long way. To expect a machine as complicated as a Bluray player to work perfectly out of the box is profoundly unreasonable. Having the ability to upgrade the player in the field is a plus, not a minus. If we didn't have that ability, then HD on disc would have been delayed for years trying to chase perfection out of the box.

Your insistence that a player MUST have the firmware upgrade to play is pretty disingenious. My best friend uses his Panasonic player every day, and he has never installed the latest upgrade, and it plays discs just fine. I have a Sony BDP-S300 I use for pulling screenshots for reviews that has never been upgraded, and it has played hundreds of disc flawlessly. If it ain't broke, don't fix it is smart advice. To make a big deal out of a single firmware upgrade per player is nothing more than crying over a teaspoon of spilled milk.