Computer Bytes - No. 65 Bookmark this page !       Send this page to a friend!  " I would like to relate a situation that occurred at my house the other day concerning my Sharp Blu-Ray Player. Should some of you fine people happen to encounter the same situation, this might save you some time, aggravation and money. On attempting to view a recently purchased Blu-Ray DVD, I was surprised to find that after getting through all of the preliminary previews, disclaimers and other stuff they show you, about two minutes into the movie the picture on the screen began to pixel and break-up. The distortion was in a band completely across the television screen and eventually the movie stopped playing completely. Thinking I had been shipped a damaged DVD, I returned it to the purchase source and was sent a 'new' DVD. However, to my astonishment the exact same situation occurred again when trying to view the second DVD. Common sense told me this just couldn't happen twice, so I contacted the Sharp Blu-Ray Customer Service people. To my surprise, the Rep told me that this was not uncommon. In an effort to keep with current technology, the movie industry is in a constant process of changing the format on Blu-Ray DVD's. Therefore, if someone has an older Blu-Ray player, they may not be able to view the more recently released Blu-Ray movies. There was a solution. Customer Support recommended going to their main web page where there would be a link to download an upgrade for my player. Just like my computer, my Blu-Ray player needed to be upgraded. While the process to upgrade was not difficult, it was somewhat convoluted. After finding and downloading the zipped file, I had to unzip it, move the file needed out of the folder it came in so the player could use it, and then transfer the file to a memory stick so as to be compatible with my player. Once this was completed, it's back to the phone to call Customer Support where a Tech walked me through an on screen installation. Once this process was completed, I have been able to view all Blu-Ray DVD's without any problem. There will probably be another update needed at some point where this same process will need to be repeated. Good news is the updates are made available on line at no cost, and the people at Sharp were extremely nice and more than willing to help out. You may find this procedure is not necessary with your Blu-Ray player, however, should you encounter a similar situation you'll at least have a starting point. And, if you are thinking of purchasing a Blu-Ray player, make sure the player you are buying has the very latest updates. Computer Bytes Index Send Us an Email | Home Page Copyright 2007-2008. All rights reserved. Computer Bytes articles may not be reprinted, published, quoted, copied, or used in any manner whatsoever without the expressed written permission of David Moncrief.