Panasonic DP-UB9000 Review

Kenn Muguna Avatar

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Updated 11:24 pm

Expert Rating

95

If we could rank Blu Ray players on a scale of 1 to 10 based on their features and capabilities, the Panasonic DP UB9000 would come in at a solid 10 with no questions asked. This is because it represents the absolute most that you can get from an Ultra HD Blu Ray Player, and its price tag also reflects the same as well. Aside from having a great build quality, the high end Panasonic DP player is well equipped to handle streaming your content in HDR, HDR10 and Dolby Vision format without breaking a sweat. In terms of audio support, the UB9000 Ultra HD Blu Ray player is able to process just about everything except SACD and DVD Audio. Does it have enough features to be the best Blu Ray player of 2020? Go through this Panasonic DP UB9000 review and find out if the gadget belongs in the best Tv accessories list.

Why We Like It – Panasonic DP-UB9000

This Panasonic Ultra HD Blu Ray player is probably the greatest addition you could make to your home cinema. It’s easily capable of playing 4K Blu Ray Discs and a wide variety of other formats, and also comes with a HDR optimizer to improve tone-mapping in a High Dynamic Range picture. Do you want cinema level quality visuals? Go for a Panasonic dmp ub900.

Pros
  • Sharp picture & solid sound
  • Ethernet & WiFi for connectivity
  • HDR Optimizer for tone mapping
Cons
  • No DVD Audio or SADC support

Performance

The DP UB9000 stands tall against the XBox One S as a high quality Ultra HD Blu Ray player that’s got enough technology behind it to take your home theater system to the next level. Under the hood, the DB UB9000 Ultra HD player features a Hollywood Cinema Experience processor which allows for better color quality during 4K playback, and Panasonic’s HDR Optimiser which allows it to do efficient tone mapping – this is basically telling the player what peak brightness your display is capable of. Options include OLED, High Luminance projector, Basic Luminance Projector, & Super High, Middle, High or Basic Luminance LCD. Bear in mind that the HDR Optimiser only works with HDR10 content, and not HDR10+ or Dolby Vision. In terms of sound quality, the UHD player supports high resolution audio playback of ALAC, FLAC, WAV AIFF and DSD files, though DVD Audio playback is not supported. It’s able to easily handle Dolby Atmos and DTS:X file formats, and can decode both Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD Master audio tracks with no issue.

Design

At first blush, the Panasonic UB9000 does look every bit expensive, with a double layer metal construction as well as aluminum front and side panels, but still not as good looking as the Samsung UBD-K8500. The Blu Ray disc player takes on an elegant design, with a brushed plate finish on its front panel, and its display situated right above its disc tray. Turn the HD Blu Ray player around and you’ll find two HDMI outputs one USB port, a 7.1 multichannel audio output for analog audio, optical and coaxial digital output, and a set of balanced two channel XLR outputs.

Value

With streaming being an essential part of content consumption today, the Panasonic DP UB9000 Ultra HD player connects to streaming services such as Netflix Amazon Prime Video and YouTube, with support for both 4K and HDR content to deliver premium picture quality. On the flipside, the one disadvantage that this Blu Ray disc player also shares with the Philips BDP7501 is the lack of support for SACD and DVD-Audio playback. In spite of that, the UB9000 is also able to upscale audio files of lower resolution thanks to its High Clarity Sound premium feature, so that you’ll always be able to listen to hi fi digital audio.

Panasonic DP-UB9000 Wrap Up

There are definitely a lot of Blu ray players that support Dolby formats, are a lot more affordable than the UB9000 and have the basic function of Blu Ray disc playback. The UB9000 however represents the epitome of Ultra HD Blu Ray playback, so if you want to experience the best in home entertainment, don’t be afraid to go for it.

Kenn Muguna Avatar