Samsung BD-E8300 3D Smart Blu-ray Disc Player with 320GB HDD and Built-in Wi-Fi (New for 2012)
48 of 48 people found the following review helpful
A digital video recorder that doesn't record video. It is digital though..., By
Martin Smith "Martsky" (UK) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What is this?)
This review is from: Samsung BD-E8500 3D Smart Blu-ray Disc Player with 500GB HDD and Built-in Wi-Fi (New for 2012) (Electronics)
This is a desperately disappointing product. The feature list promises so much, and fits what I was looking for perfectly, but unfortunately a combination of bug-ridden software, daft and lazy design decisions and a slow and badly thought our interface instead make it next to useless.There are good points - the image quality both from Blu Ray and freeview HD is superb, and the ability to plug external storage in via USB (and apparently record to, although I have't tried this) makes the rather stingy hard drive size less important. The number of audio and video file formats it's capable of playing is gobsmacking!
However, there are far too many bad points. The main one of these is that the latest firmware from Samsung (which your box will automatically install unless you tell it not to) has broken scheduled recording - the box is simply not capable of recording a program in the future, unless you manually set the start and end times, rather than selecting it from the EPG. This is an issue that appears from various forums to be universal, and although Samsung have said they are working on a fix, they haven't given an ETA. Basically, if you buy this, DO NOT upgrade the firmware from v1003 to v1005 - wait until a new one has been released.
You can find more information and get the latest status from this forum: [...]
The other issues are less severe, but together mean I'll be returning this product even if the recording issue is fixed. First, the support is awful - closed tickets without an answer, a dozen people with the same issue being told a dozen different things - basically the standard from Samsung, from what I've not been told.
There are currently no apps for BBC iPlayer of LoveFilm - they are in development apparently. But again, no ETA, although not Samsung's fault on this occasion.
The list of things the box won't let you do when recording 2 channels is as extensive as it is inexplicable - view the EPA, access settings, use any apps... Not problems I've seen with any other DVRs - its almost as if their developers just couldn't be bothered to make things work and released it anyway.
Rewind live TV simply does not work - so technically its not a freeview + box.
As far as I can tell, the interface for the DVR, the Blu-ray player and the Smart hub were all created by different teams, who never met or saw each other's work, let alone tried to co-ordinate it! And none of them are any good... Buttons do different things, nothing looks the same and generally its quite clear they've never tested any of it with users. And the weird, inconsistent interface leads to unrecoverable mistakes - for example if watching TV that has been paused, simply hitting the guide button to see what else is on etc drops you back into that channel live - there is no way of recovering the gap between where you were and where you are, and no warning. To be fair, designing interfaces is my job, so I am more sensitive than most to this kind of thing - you may not find it quite as annoying. If, like me, you are upgrading from a Humax box though I suspect you'll be equally annoyed, as all the parts of the interface you're used to are different and worse - but seem similar at first!
In fact, bearing in mind it doesn't actually record video, I rather suspect they've never actually tested anything!
Such a great idea. But sadly, really quite an awful product.
It may well get better with revised firmware - it really seems to have been rushed out far too fast. And there is nothing else out there with the same feature list. But for the same price you can get a decent freeview HD box and a Blu-ray player, which is now my plan!
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Buggy, By
Peter (Surrey, UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Samsung BD-E8900 3D Smart Blu-ray Disc Player with 1TB HDD and Built-in Wi-Fi (New for 2012) (Electronics)
On paper this looks superb but it does not function well and many of the features advertised are simply not there.If power is lost, the recording schedule goes, so don't unplug. I had a problem where a DVD froze up inside it (no message, just black screen for 10 minutes) and the only way to sort it out was to unplug - so back to rescheduling recordings.
Advertising, even on the box, shows iplayer, lovefilm, google maps and others - none of these were loaded. Samsung said they were still in testing for release at a later date...hmmm
"Remote access from anywhere in the world by smartphone or PC", well, no actually. Doesn't currently exist. Samsung helpdesk knew nothing about it. I wouldn't hold your breath.
"Dual screen viewing through a Samsung smartphone" - did work (if both on the same router) and quite cool really, but then after my Galaxy S2's upgrade to ICS, it stopped working.
Picture in Picture never worked.
Constant error messages that don't really tell you anything and no corresponding explanation in the manual.
Mine recorded ok if I started live ie whilst watching it. But no scheduled recordings worked at all, just an error message saying it failed to record. After calls to the help desk, resets and fumbling around, I sent it back. In my opinion it just does not feel ready for release.
The picture quality was fantastic and it did seem to upscale SD well. Feature-wise, it's currently unmatched, it's just they haven't quite got it sorted out yet.
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful
AVOID THIS PRODUCT!!!!, By
NEATIE - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What is this?)
This review is from: Samsung BD-E8500 3D Smart Blu-ray Disc Player with 500GB HDD and Built-in Wi-Fi (New for 2012) (Electronics)
I had hopes for the product seemed to tick all the boxes i was looking for in a Blu ray player, how very wrong i was.On the plus side it's easy to set up and the picture quality via the TV is excellent. The machine also looks good, but that's where it ends regarding positives.
Once i had it set up i tried to watch a DVD 3/4 through and it stopped, played no problems on my PC, in fact out of 5 DVD's tried only 1 would play. As for Blu ray, they would only play in in Black and White, fine if you only want to watch the Artist. Called Samsung tech support (at my cost) and was told they knew about this issue and i needed to download the new firmware, this for a new 2012 model, not good enough! It had to wait days for the firmware email after more calls to tech support, only to find it wouldn't download to the machine, saying memory stick contained no data, not true. Arranged a return and and replacement (told i had solo faulty player).Wasted a day waiting in for the collection and replacement, more cost to me. Set up the replacement, Blu ray Black and White, again! Used the same memory stick with Samsung download, this time it worked, so first machine has other faults. Tried to play a Blu ray with the new firmware and now it wouldn't play any disc, period, so arranged another return and refund.
Seriously avoid this product, i had two in about ten days and both were faulty, so their would appear to be a faulty batch or a design fault? Spoke with Samsung 'customer service' to highlight this issue to them and they weren't interested, all they said was that this is an issue for Amazon and when i asked to speak to a manager i was told the customer service managers don't talk to customers, they just watch their staff, what is that about? Was told somebody would call me back, but nothing? So Samsung just don't care, so again i would advise people to avoid this product and Amazon should delist it until the issues with the product are resolved.
There were many other issue with this product, recording TV channels is to fussy, compared to SKY and BT Vision. Forget using this product for the internet, you need to use the remote and it's far to slow, just use your mobile so much faster. I could go on listing the problems with this product, but in by experience the main ones are it's doesn't play DVD and Blu ray discs and as for the claim you can watch BBC iplayer and Lovefilm, not true, as according to Samsung they are awaiting on updated software from both companies.
This product is terrible, AVOID AT ALL COSTS!!!! Finally, on the plus side, Amazon have been excellent in relation to their customer service and this issue, Samsung could learn a great deal from Amazon on customer service, like having a customer service department that cares. Finally, i was going to buy the Samsung Smart TV to go with this product as well as the new Samsung mobile phone, but after this experience and their lack of care or interest in their product i will go elsewhere.
Once again, DO NOT BUY THIS PRODUCT!!! Only wish i could give it minus ratings, it's that bad.
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