Samsung BD-D6700 3D Blu-ray Disc Player (Silver)
December 12, 2011 by Cherry
Filed under Blu-ray Players
Samsung BD-D6700 3D Blu-ray Disc Player (Silver)
- WiFi Built-in
- Samsung Smart 3D TV
- Enhanced Picture Qaulity
- Slot-in loading mechanism
- 3D – 2D to 3D conversion
A sleek, slender look that packs powerful3D Blu-ray and connectivity features. The Samsung BD-D6700 bridges the gap between innovative Blu-ray Disc Player technology and compelling design. 3D entertainment is yours, with 3D Blu-ray Disc movie titles – or upconvert 2D titles from your 2D library to 3D. Built-in Wi-Fi makes it easy to connect wirelessly – and Samsung Smart TV gives you a web-enabled portal to browse the entire internet, use Samsung Apps to connect and share with friends, and even search content on your TV or online. To top it off, the sleek contours and modern look makes it instantly appealing in any room.
3D Technology Checklist This product is 3D-related. To help you get a great 3D experience, use the checklist b
List Price: $ 299.99
Price: $ 299.99
Blazing Fast Loads and play time! 2 HDMI outputs!,
Finally upgraded my 3-year old blu-ray player, and WOW what a difference! Blazing fast load and access speeds-no more waiting.
It has the very important 2 HDMI outputs. If you are using an AV receiver that is not HDMI 1.4 compatible (3-D), and yours isn’t unless you bought it in the last 6 months, then this is huge. It allows on HDMI connection with 1.4 to a 3-D TV directly with the second HDMI passing 1.3 HDMI data to an AV receiver for your audio. (A non-HDMI 1.4 receiver will not pass the 3-D video signal on to a new 3-D TV, so on a single HDMI out 3-D blu-ray you would need to use the one HDMI out to go directly to your TV and use analog audio outputs to your receiver- a significant trade-off). This is one of only a couple of blu-rays with 2 HDMI outputs, and it saves you having to upgrade an expensive receiver. This is the smart and cheaper way to make your older (or even one-year-old) receiver work.
Great and intuitive menu system with Apps for stuff like news, weather and games, plus all the video service Apps like Netflix, Vudu, Cinema Now, Hulu, etc. Streaming worked flawlessly, as tested with the free movie offered in full 1080P by VuDu.
Easy Wi-Fi connectivity, so no need for Ethernet, but it has the hard-wired option if you have that ability as well.
Beautiful design! Slot-loading with no noisy drawer. Slick, contemporary cabinet with display that can be programed to dim or be off if desired.
Great, full-featured smart remote that can run multiple devices.
I research carefully before purchasing, this is the most fully featured blu-ray you will find, period, for $300 or less. And you will love the ultra-fast loading and playing of movies. Put an end to the minutes long (in some cases) start times and black screens in your home!
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|3rd 3D Blu-Ray player, FINALLY the one I’m keeping!,
This is the third 3D Blu-Ray player I’ve brought home after our 6 year old Sony Carousel player began spitting discs, and it was quite the ordeal getting here. But that’s a whole ‘nother story, and you can read about it in the comments to my Sony S580 review, if you’re so inclined.
I’ve got the Samsung BD-D6700 connected to a 2011-model Samsung D8000 plasma screen, the 59″ model. I’m running it through a Denon 3311CI receiver, which is HDMI 1.4a compatible, using reasonably-priced AmazonBasics High Speed HDMI Cable. The player is compatible with the numeric side of Samsung’s dual-sided QWERTY remote — the one that comes with their higher-end televisions — though I don’t yet see that remote listed as an item available separately here on Amazon.
For starters, why choose the 6700 versus the less expensive 6500 (which is priced competitively with Sony’s new S580)? There are 3 differences I can tell: 2 HDMI outputs, 2D to 3D upconvert, and the obvious styling differences. Otherwise, they appear to be identical players, and I would expect my comments here to apply to the 6500, too.
Prior to the D6700, I brought home last year’s BD-C7900, Samsung’s 2010 top of the line player. Besides there being a Netflix registration issue to contend with due to it being an open-box return, I felt for the price last year’s model didn’t deliver: the menu system wasn’t quite polished, and the machine felt a bit lightweight and flimsy (particularly the slide-out DVD tray). Those are all addressed with this unit: The street price for this unit is less than the open-box price of last year’s 7900 (the D6700 isn’t this year’s “top of the line” unit, but the C7900 defining features have trickled down to this unit), the player feels much more substantially built (due in part to the slot-load design; no tray), and while the menu system is familiar, it has most definitely been cleaned up and “de-confused” with just a single scrolling icon navigation bar along the bottom, and quicker screen-to-screen transition times (last year’s had top and bottom nav bars plus some vertical elements that had the selection cursor flying around the screen.
Another complaint of mine was text entry with the included numeric-only remote, something common also to the Sony. This year’s player includes the same remote. Initially I was led to believe Samsung’s QWERTY keyboard TV remote would be compatible with this player, but have come to learn that the QWERTY side communicates via a Bluetooth link (not typical IR), and therefore there’s no way for it to talk to the DVD player. A shame. However, when entering text with the number pad, options are provided for either the 1 press=A, 2 presses=B method, or alternatively the T9 predictive text entry found on many cell phones.
Disc load times are good to excellent. I haven’t held a stopwatch to them, and I don’t have a copy of Avatar to test (which reportedly takes five minutes on some old machines), but my use of standard definition discs such as Tropic Thunder, Blu-Ray discs like Pulp Fiction and Inglorious Bastards, and the Shrek 3D discs, have spanned from “nearly instantaneous” to about 30 second load times, which is still minorly annoying (black screen eventually with a green progress bar plus the click and whir noise of the disc spinning up), yet perfectly reasonable compared to the waits some prior generation players required.
(Edit 4/19: Just upgraded my firmware and now it appears I’m getting ads during the disc load. In this case, for the Samsung iPhone/Android/Blackberry app. I’ll try that to see if it addresses my text entry issues, then update my review.)
I mention the “click and whir” noise, but it’s all I hear from the player. Once the disc spins up, the unit remains inaudible from the 6 or 8 feet away I sit.
I was a bit worried that standard def DVDs would look blocky and horrible on my 59″ screen, but was quite surprised at the up-convert capability of the D6700 after loading up Tropic Thunder. The picture isn’t super crisp with cleanly defined edges like you might expect with a Blu-ray disc, but I’d suspect if you didn’t have HD and SD content to compare side-by-side, you’d be hard pressed to tell the difference.
3D playback couldn’t be more simple: the disc is recognized immediately, the TV quickly switches to 3d mode, and there’s really no fuss other than turning on the glasses. Of course, this is a Samsung player linked to a Samsung television,…
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|Why, Samsung, why?,
Well there’s a lot of advanced functionality on here, including 2D to 3D conversion, which I haven’t been able to test yet. And I’ll update this review and rating as soon as I do.
However, I would like to address some less-than-ideal things from the get go:
CONS
1) NO DISC “MEMORY”
Okay, I’m aware such a thing wasn’t actually advertised. However, being spoiled on my old Sony DVD player, I just erroneously assumed this was commonplace.
With the Sony, if I’m watching 4 movies in various stages (e.g. one an educational video, another a movie, another an exercise thing, etc.), the player “remembered” where I was in each disc. So there was no need to try and remember, then find, my “spot” every time.
*In fact, every time you POWER DOWN the player, next time you’re starting the movie over.* Rrrg.
Samsung, if you’d like my two cents, there’s one.
2) FORWARD / REWIND SLOW
SLOW! Now why on EARTH would I want 7 DEGREES of fast-forward / rewind in tiny increments? E.g., 3 seconds, 6 seconds, then 12 seconds, then 18 seconds, etc. etc. … what on earth’s the point? You really want like “slow” (5 sec. jumps) “medium” (30 sec. jumps) “fast” (5 min. jumps) or “super fast” (10 min. jumps)
It takes a few awkward pushes of the button to get it all the way to “Speed 7,” which is still REALLY slow, and it lags while you’re pushing the button. So even at the fastest setting it’s a long journey from one part of the disc to another. And no, not ALL discs have many or intelligently placed chapters.
3) UNLIT REMOTE?? WHY, SAMSUNG, WHY?
Most people watch movies … guess where? Yes, in the dark. My TV remote (D6400 TV), which is illuminated, can control the Blu-Ray to an extent, as long as you don’t care about being able to chapter skip (i.e., |<< and >>|), or menu access, which are pretty darned important.
So your options are 1) use 2 very similar-looking remotes, 2) use the Blu-Ray remote, which you CAN’T SEE, or 3) the TV remote, which doesn’t have menu or chapter skip functionality.
Why, Samsung, why??
PROS
- 2D / 3D CONVERSION
Pretty good! Not “leap off the screen” good, but “actual depth” good, sometimes quite surprising. Seems to vary from feature to feature and shot to shot.
- CUSTOMER SERVICE
Samsung customer support answers the phone, and knows what they’re talking about (in fact, I’M GOING FROM 3 TO 4 STARS based on this alone!)
- Picture quality is terrific
- WiFi is handy as hell.
OKAY, so I really want to give more stars.
But I know product developers read these reviews, and this is my honest feedback on what I find personally frustrating.
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