Samsung BD-P2500 Blu-Ray Player

I bought this unit (P2500) in March. We were excited when we realized we could download Netflix movies instantly to it. We cut back the Netflix subscription because the number of movies on demand was not limited. We watched several over a period of a couple of months. Then one day we got the famous message that said our Netflix keys had been hacked. We called Netflix, who said the problem was with Samsung. The message doesn't mean what it says. It just means that the unit is no longer able to communicate with Netflix. Samsung walked us through a fix which involved resetting the unit and pressing FF, etc and we also had to deactivate and reactivate the device from our Netflix account. All was well for a few weeks. Now the message has returned. Samsung worked with us for a couple of hours to no avail. (From the Samsung forums I have seen online, this is typical for some reason. The first time you fix it, it works. After that you cannot duplicate the fix. Doesn't make sense but that does seem to be true.) They now want us to return the unit to them for repair (our cost for all labor and shipping since it's not under warranty) but they also admitted that the problem has appeared only since the July firmware update. I argued that a firmware problem can't be fixed by shipping the unit and that they should issue a firmware fix since they know it to be the cause. They then admitted hardware and firmware are two separate things. They also said it's not a big problem because only a small percentage of their customers (perhaps 3%?) have complained. One support person said the update would not be issued for another two months.

What kind of company would not care that their firmware is defective and preventing users from using one of the big features of the product?

I have a large Samsung HD flat-panel monitor. We bought a large-screen HD Samsung LCD TV at the same time we bought the Blue-Ray player. Will I EVER buy another Samsung product? NO! But now that they have my money they obviously don't really care.

I used to work for computer companies. I know that decisions about when to issue a fix are based on how much it costs the company to handle support calls versus fixing the product problem. Samsung would rather keep their costs down even if we the customers experience lots of problems.

We have no problems with the quality of the picture, etc. The unit, when it works, works fine. The problem is not with the hardwware. It is with the Samsung executives who are greedy and uncaring, and the engineers who made a BIG boo-boo.

One support person agreed with me that reinstalling the older firmware would probably fix the problem but unfortunately only the July '09 (faulty) version is available on their web site.

So after spending over 4 hours on this problem during the past two days (unplug and sit to let the unit clear itself and also press Reset and FF, etc etc etc OVER AND OVER), and another several hours in July when it first appeared, that feature is lost to us. And I can guarantee that it will happen to you too eventually. AND Samsung won't care about you either! what a way to run a company.

The only way you will be happy with this unit is if you don't have a Netflix account and don't want to watch movies on demand on your TV.

Buyer beware!