are all bdp s5500 players a bluff?

[unhappyuser]

hi all,

few months ago, I made a rash decision of purchasing bdp s5500 player without doing previous background research. The wifi and internet streaming performance has been miserable since the very beginning. I have tried virtually everything I could think of, including:

1) upgrading to the latest firmware (from July 2015)

2) replacing my wifi access point (was using an older linksys and switched to newer ASUS router)

3) doing several factory resets on player

4) cabling the player to the wifi client bridge with powerful antennas

Despite all those measures, I can't watch videos from Youtube with any reasonable performance, and after 3-4 minutes my network connection simply hangs. To resolve the issue, I need to power off the player and start it again. I can use my laptop or cell phone without any issues at the very same spot and there are no issues with wifi connectivity for those devices.

My question to the forum members is -- is there *anything* that can be done at all for making this miserable player functioning? (Apart from the measures already mentioned above.)

Is there a way to hard reset it via specific key combination from the remote control?

If there are no ways to fix this box, I would like to return this junk to Sony without asking any reimbursment. Does anybody know appropriate return address?

Also, I would kindly ask for recommendations for getting another blu ray player and streaming device. What are your experiences with Philips or do you recommend other vendors?

[Anonymous]

Hi there

My mum has a BDP-S5500, mainly to watch YouTube.  Its connected to her BT router via a LAN cable.  Works fine.  She did have a problem with a streaming clips from YouTube - but her internet speec is rubbish.  I lowered the video quality in her YouTube settings account via a PC and its much better for her, with not much difference in quality.

Ive had her playet connected via wifi and cable to my ASUS DSL-AC68U router and its performed as expected.

So:

• Is your internet speed adequate?  speedtest.net
• Test by directly connecting it via ethernet to your router to rule out wifi issues
• Reduced video quality in youtube and test.

If you cant get on with it, you will need to contact the retailer you purchased it from for exchange/refund etc.  

Sony can help with support if needed, see HERE

Cheers

[unhappyuser]

My internet speed is 100 Mbit/s, and speedtest.net reports download speeds of 30-80 MBit/s for all devices in this room (for older devices that don't support newer wifi standards, speeds tend to be around 30-40 MBit/s, while newer devices work faster). I have also lowered the video quality in my Youtube settings, and have verified from my player debug menu that the speed of streaming is below 2Mbit/s. The player nevertheless freezes even with 1Mbit/s streaming speeds, so that only rebooting it will help, and after reboot, the device might function only for about 10-15 minutes.

I realize that using a wired connection with low streaming speeds might ultimately fix the problem, but this is not what I purchased this device for. Bdp S5500 is advertised as a blu ray player with "Super WiFi professional", specifically designed for video streaming over wireless connections. There are other and much cheaper boxes if one wants to use a wired connection only. So that's why I am saying that bdp s5500 is a bluff.

[Anonymous]

I understand about your use of Wifi and the reason you purchased it.  However its always good to test a wired connection if you have problems.  Now, if the problem still persists on a wired connection, this means that there may be a different problem than that of using wifi.  Basically this determines what troubleshoiting steps should be taken.

[unhappyuser]

I tried a wired connection and didn't experience any problems with video streaming (as expected). Also, when the player was less than 1 meter away from the router, I tried the wifi connection and didn't run into any issues either. Nevertheless, when player was moved into its original location, all issues were back again. So wifi seems to function only in the immediate vicinity of the router where you can easily use the cable anyway.

Finally, I did one interesting experiment with a lenovo thinkpad t61 laptop manufactured in January 2008 and running Linux. When shutting the player down and putting the laptop into its place (exactly same spot!), the laptop was able to display youtube videos with reasonable quality without any disruptions. This pretty much speaks for itself.