Samsung BD-D5500 3D Blu-ray Disc Player (Black) [2011 MODEL]

by Samsung

Product Features

• Samsung BD-D5500 3D Blu-ray Disc Player
• Fast booting and loading time
• Multi-format disc playback
• 3D, Samsung Smart TV

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Product Description

Amazon.com

3D Technology Checklist

This product is 3D-related. To help you get a great 3D experience, use the checklist below to ensure you have everything you need. 3D viewing requires:

	A Display First, you'll need a 3D-ready display--whether it's a 3D HDTV, 3D projector, or 3D computer monitor. These displays have more processing power than standard 2D models for displaying 3D images in rapid succession.
	A Source Your display may be ready for 3D playback, but you'll still need a device to read 3D content. This can be a cable box with a subscription to a 3D channel, a 3D Blu-ray Disc player, or a PlayStation 3 system.
	3D Content 3D content--the actual entertainment, in other words--will be played back using the source mentioned above, whether it's a 3D broadcast from your cable provider, a 3D Blu-ray Disc, or a 3D video game.
	3D Glasses For now, the vast majority of 3D HDTVs require glasses for 3D viewing. Many use powered "active shutter" glasses, others polarized "passive" glasses. You'll need one pair per viewer, and they'll have to be compatible with your display, whether they're the same brand, or a pair of "universal" glasses designed to work across brands.
	HDMI Cable To connect your source (such as a 3D Blu-ray Disc player) to your display, you'll need a high-speed HDMI cable. Cables with this designation feature bandwidth speeds up to 10.2 Gbps (gigabits per second), for carrying the 3D signal without any loss of quality.
If you want to get more information about 3D, shop our 3D products, watch videos, or interact with other customers, we invite you to visit 3D 101, our customer center about everything 3D.

Internet-Ready Devices

Internet-ready devices use your broadband connection to deliver dynamic content to your television, whether it's streaming video from Netflix, new music from Pandora, or a quick glance at today's weather forecast.

Although there is overlap, each manufacturer offers a unique bundle of free or paid services, including streaming video and music, social networking apps, online photo galleries, news and financial updates, weather info, sports scores, and a variety of other smartphone-like applications.

Manufacturers continue to add new content to their offerings, keeping customers current through firmware updates, and making a bit of research a prudent step in your buying decision.

Learn more about Internet-ready devices and HDTVs, how they work, what services are offered by different manufacturers, and exactly what you'll need to get started at our Internet TV 101 customer center.

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February 2011
Add another dimension to your viewing experience with the Samsung BD-D5500 Blu-ray Disc Player. 3D technology lets you enjoy cinema-quality 3D Blu-ray titles--or upconvert 2D Blu-ray Disc titles into 3D, for new levels of enjoyment from your existing 2D library. Then, explore new dimensions of connectivity with built-in Samsung Smart TV. Browse the Internet, access Samsung apps, and search content on your TV or online. Or connect USB or DLNA certified network devices for further entertainment options. The BD-D5500 features a sleek, stylish design, to fit into nearly any modern living room.

3D Blu-ray playback, Internet connectivity, wide format support, and more.

Add Another Dimension to Your Viewing Experience

Blu-ray 3D Playback

Enter a new dimension in home entertainment with 3D video. Samsung's 3D products offer a truly immersive viewing experience, with the power to fill your room with images you can almost touch. Connect to a 3D TV to enjoy the latest 3D titles, or upconvert regular 2D content to near-3D image quality.

Samsung's 3D products offer a truly immersive viewing experience, with the power to fill your room with images you can almost touch.

Access digital content like videos, sports, games, social networking, and much more with Samsung Smart TV.

Enjoy media from connected USB devices such as thumb drives or digital cameras.

On the 2D front, you'll enjoy full HD entertainment with multi-channel, high-definition audio, along with Blu-ray features like Bonus View for extra features, and--thanks to the BD-D5500's Internet connectivity--BD-Live downloadable bonus content. You can also play back recordable BD-RE/R discs. And with all of the above, you'll get an improved graphic user interface and ultra-fast boot/load times.

Still have a large DVD collection? The BD-D5500 will play back all those DVDs, including recordable DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW discs. And you can play back your audio CDs and burnt CD-R/RW discs. Finally, the increasingly popular AVHCD format is covered, for the home movie buffs.

Smart TV with Samsung Apps

The BD-D5500 gives you access to Samsung's Smart TV service, for a wealth of added entertainment options. Pull up the Smart Hub, a simple menu system for connected features, and you can easily search for movies, shows and videos via online services and across connected devices, plus access a wide variety of apps from Samsung Apps.

Samsung Apps is a growing collection of apps specifically built for your TV, connecting you to your favorite digital content like videos, sports, games, social networking, and much more. With web-connected apps on your BD-D5500, you can stream movies from Netflix or Blockbuster, TV shows from Hulu, videos from YouTube, Next Level sports information from ESPN, music from, Pandora and view updates on your Facebook or Twitter accounts.

Wi-Fi-ready

The BD-D5500 features an Ethernet port for a wired connection to your home broadband network, but if you'd like to go wireless you can add a Samsung wireless adapter and enjoy connectivity free of cables--great for those whose Blu-ray will not be close to their router.

USB and Networked Entertainment

Connect compatible thumb drives, digital cameras, MP3 players, or other USB devices quickly and easily via the BD-D5500's USB port. An intuitive, user-friendly interface allows access to videos, music, or pictures via the remote.

You can also play videos, music, and photos saved on your DLNA-compatible devices (such as your PC or network-attached storage) through a network connection.

The BD-D5500 supports AVI, MKV, WMV, MP4, and MPG video, with a wide variety of codecs (including DivX). You can also enjoy your MP3/WMA audio files, or display JPG-format photos.

High-Definition Audio

The BD-D5500 is also ready to take advantage of the high-def audio delivered by Blu-ray Disc, with decoding of Dolby Digital TrueHD and DTS Master Audio--enjoy multi-channel theater sound when connected to your receiver via HDMI. Standard two-channel audio outputs are also provided, of course.

BD-D5500 Select Specifications

Supported Media
Disc Formats:	3D Blu-ray, BD-ROM, BD-RE/R, DVD, DVD+R/RW, DVD-R/RW, CD, CD-R/RW, CD-DA, AVCHD
Video File Formats:	AVI, MKV, WMV, MP4, MPG
Audio File Formats:	MP3, WMA
Image File Formats:	JPG
Connectivity
HDMI Connections:	1
USB Ports:	2
Ethernet:	1
Digital Audio (Optical):	1
Weight and Dimensions
Dimensions (WxHxD):	16.93 x 1.54 x 8.27 Inches
Weight:	3.75 lbs.

What's in the Box

BD-D5500 Blu-ray Disc Player, Remote Control With Batteries, A/V Cable, Documentation

Product Description

A new dimension of 3D entertainment in one Blu-ray Disc player. Add another dimension to your viewing experience with the Samsung BD-D5500 Blu-ray Disc Player. 3D technology lets you enjoy cinema-quality 3D Blu-ray titles – or upconvert2D Blu-ray Disc titles into 3D, for new levels of enjoyment from your existing 2D library. Then, explore new dimensions of connectivity with built-in Samsung Smart TV. Browse the entire internet, access Samsung apps, and search content on your TV or online. Another aspect of the BD-D5500’s attractiveness: the sleek design, which fits right in to nearly any modern living room.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

107 of 114 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Honest Review After Three Days Of Use May 30, 2011

By Leining Lu

Amazon Verified Purchase

I just received this player from Amazon three days ago. There are certain features of this product that exceed my expectation.
1.The Blu-ray disk reading is very fast. This is compared to the Panasonic DMP-DB60 Blu-ray that I had previously. This one is almost 10 times faster than the Panasonic DMP-DB60. I am very pleased by its fast reading capability.
2.You can connect a mass storage device to this machine to the USB port. I initially thought the USB ports were for small storage devices such a flash drive or thumb drive, like many earlier version Blu-ray/DVD players. But after I tried to plug a 500GB external hard drive into it, all the multi-media files on the drive were quickly recognized by the player. The reading was fast. I was pleasantly surprised by that.
3.Besides its high quality video output, the audio output is also very powerful. I connect this player to my "Logitech Z-5500 THX-Certified 5.1 Digital Surround Sound Speaker System", which is the best PC audio system that I have had so far (perhaps the best in the market). The sound is much more powerful than if the PC output is used. I had to tune the volume down by 1/3 of the normal level so that it won't shake the wall too much.
4.It plays many video formats and supports many codecs. It's the first Blu-Ray/DVD player that plays mkv video file that I've seen in the US market.
Please note that in order to have the subtitle of a video file to be read by the machine, you have to make sure the file name of the subtitle (with the extension of .sub or .srt) must be the same as the video file name. I didn't do that earlier. After I tried to play several video files, I figured it out myself, which made me more pleased with this product. I changed my rating from 4 stars to 5 stars.
I bought this player along with "Samsung UN55D7000 LED TV", which has several USB ports by itself. After a few days of use, I realized that the USB capabilities of this Blu-player and the TV are overlapped. But I was still impressed by the new technology.

83 of 88 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Does the Job January 19, 2012

By Stoney TOP 500 REVIEWER

Amazon Verified Purchase

PERFORMANCE
The (high definition) Blu-ray movies played on the DB-D5500 are fabulous. (Standard low definition) DVDs are much clearer than played on my old DVD player. Nothing more needs to be said.

PROS/CONS
1) The BD-D5500 has a loading tray, which encourages proper handling of the disks by the edges. (Many more expensive players are "slot loading")
2) Despite the complaint of one reviewer, it is the standard width (17"), exactly the same as my old DVD player and my receiver.
3) The controls are illuminated, and so, easy to operate even in a dark room, but the controls are identified only by symbols. Seeing in the dark is good, feeling in the dark would be even better---that is, with my old Sony DVD player, the button on the far left was on/off, the button on the far right was open/close---so I did not even have to look at the panel to know what button to push. In my opinion the Sony was more ergonomically designed.
4) The controls are touch (not buttons)---sometimes a quick tap is good enough, sometimes it is not. I greatly prefer the tactile feedback of buttons. I find it very annoying that if I tap too quickly, nothing happens; if I tap too slowly, it "double-reads", e.g. "open-close" and never opens; or "on-off" and never turns on. Note that "tactile feedback" could be supplied by a built-in clicker that you would both hear and feel---simple cheap technology.
5) Although I don't need it, I think that it is absurd that the optional wireless adapter costs as much as the player, when Samsung could surely build-it-in for $5 more.
6) Sometimes the player remembers where you paused a movie, sometimes it doesn't.
[regarding this: the following is a comment to a different review that I copied here.]
"J. Stewart says: This is not an issue unique to this player but the blu-ray format in general. You can't compare it to other DVD players because, again, the issue is specific to blu-rays. I bet you will find, for example, that the 5500 DOES remember where your conventional DVD's left off, just not your blu-ray discs. This has to do with the way the Blu-ray association defined the format and use java for the menus and features. Super dumb I know. The oldest discs can't remember place at all. Most discs have a middle ground. You can "bookmark" your place before you press stop or power down by using the green button on your remote. Some of the newest blu-rays finally found a way around this and have programmed features into the individual discs to remember place without bookmarking." I have also noticed that the player remembers its place with the newest bluray movies I've purchased.--Stoney
7) Getting the player to play DVDs and Blurays is easy. The "Smart" internet services (e.g., Netflix) etc. are another matter. Assuming the setup process is identical to setting up a Samsung TV for the services---then the process is very frustrating. Entering passwords, codes, etc with the remote is extraordinarily frustrating. That said, from what I've read regarding other brands, most are just as bad. Besides which, you really don't have any choice. Setting up ANY Samsung player will be exactly the same. Setting up a non-Samsung player to work with a Samsung TV will be worse.

GENERAL PROBLEMS
This is the first generation of 3D TVs, players, and movies. These TVs/players are NOT simple "audio-visual components" that you can "mix and match" with impunity. Instead, they are very complex sophisticated computers. They MUST "talk" to each other, and "talk" to your router, and your Internet service. The simplest way to assure that your TV and player "speak the same language" is to match TVs and players of the same brand and generation.

Most of the problems reported by other reviewers sound to me to be:
1) Units manufactured in 2010-2011 which needed firmware updates.
2) Caused by connecting the units to non-Samsung TVs with conflicting settings, or to older TVs which were unable to support some of the player's features.
3) Caused by poor wireless LAN connections. Wireless connections can be very tricky, and are subject to interference from other electronic devices (computers, wireless doorbells, fluorescent lamps, microwave ovens, etc.).
4) Caused by using the wrong cables---specifically either the unfortunately included low-definition component cable (which does not support HD or 3D), or an old HDMI cable which cannot support the most recent features.

If the BD-D5500 were as problem-plagued as many rabid reviewers claim, Amazon would be glutted with hundreds of "refurbished" or "opened box" units at deep discounts---but as of January 2012, there is no glut of "refurbished" DB-D5500s. I have streamed movies (Netflix), played DVD movies and blu-ray movies (including 3D) and have had ABSOLUTELY NO PROBLEMS.

FIRMWARE UPDDATES
Don't get freaked by the "firmware update"---I did't update my player firmware (because it isn't connected to the Internet and I have had no problems with it), but I did update the firmware in my Samsung D8000 TV. It is as simple and easy as a software update on your computer. If you have an Internet connection (see below), you just go to settings and select "update". That's all. No big deal. (But see "Connection Quality" below, update only when you are sure you have a good connection).

COMPARED TO OTHER BRANDS OF BLU-RAY PLAYERS
Among the Blu-ray players which can fully support the latest TV features (e.g., 3D) I've concluded that the Samsung BD-D5500 player is the best match with recent large Samsung TVs, particularly the 2011 models (e.g., the D8000 series). Compared to other brands, for example:
1) The Samsung TV and player remotes are very similar, and both can control both the TV and the player.
2) If you select the player from the TV source menu, the player automatically turns on and begins play. Alternatively, if you insert a disk in the player (or turn on the player with a pre-loaded disk), the TV turns on with the player set as the "source", and begins play. If you turn off the player, then the source reverts to the TV.
3) Many functions of the player and the TV will sync with each other---you don't have to worry about the player being in one mode while the TV is in a different mode. For example, there are a variety of "picture modes" (which are preset suites of tint, contrast, brighness, sharpness, etc.) called "dynamic", "movie", "natural", etc. on the D8000 Samsung TVs (and probably other recent Samsung TVs). If the "source" is a Samsung player, then the "picture mode" "BDWise" is available. "BDWise" is ALWAYS the best picture---but you do NOT have that option if the TV and player are different brands.
4) The logic of the TV and player is identical, so you only need to learn one system.
5) You don't have to worry about possible conflicting functions which might result from mixing different brand players and TVs. This is particularly a concern with 3D.

Neither the latest Samsung TVs nor Samsung Blu-ray players support Blockbuster or Amazon Instant Movies currently, but may in the near future. While you can get these services on with other brand "smart" players, the best solution for now may be a Roku streamer Roku 2 XS 1080p Streaming Player Alternatively, Internet chatter suggest that you may be able to access these services indirectly though the Internet browser app---but I haven't tried.

COMPARED TO OTHER SAMSUNG BLU-RAY PLAYERS
When comparing Samsung players, DO NOT assume that a higher price or higher-model-number means more features---MOST more-expensive higher-model-# Samsung players have FEWER features than the DB-D5500. For example: the DB-D5700 apparently does NOT support (true) 3D. The DB-D6500 does NOT support simulated 2D to 3D (albeit, you don't need that it if your TV can do the conversion). The Samsung website has a function which compares Blu-ray players, but no function to tell you which features you'll get (or loose) with specific TV-player combinations. Most features are redundant because they are already available on your TV (if it is only a few years old)---but a few key features (such as 3D) require support on BOTH the player and the TV. Among the several Samsung Blueray Players which support 3D, the DB-D5500 is the cheapest (~$80), and probably the most loaded with features.

If you have an older TV, which lacks internet connectivity (and doesn't support 3D), and you need a wireless connection, then a DB-D5700 could be a better choice. Except for the built-in wireless adapter and lack of 3D support, the BD-D5700 is identical to the BD-D5500. My experience with true 3D (Owls of Gahoud and Avatar) is that although spectacular---it gives me a headache and I have no plans to purchase any more 3D movies. If I had to replace the BD-D5500, I'd strongly consider a BD-D5700.

LAN (INTERNET) CONNECTION
There are two ways to connect to the Internet, by connecting the player to your router: with an Ethernet cable, or "wireless". Virually all routers support BOTH "wireless" and Ethernet cable connections. You don't need "wireless" connection in order to support the remote control, 3D glasses, etc.---while these are "wireless", they are different systems. The BEST and cheapest way to connect the player to your LAN (home network) is with an Ethernet cable. If your home is wired for Ethernet, use those connections. Even if you don't need a LAN connection, at least temporarily connecting the player (by Ethernet cable) to your router to the Internet for an automatic firmware update when you first setup the player (or anytime you have a problem with the player) is probably a good idea. The following 25' cable is only $6. Read more ›

102 of 126 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Great player May 4, 2011

By Tacoloft

Owned it for about a week so far. I read the other reviews and have not seen or experienced any of the same issues they have had with regards to apps and disc playability. There were however two firmware updates that I downloaded automatically after bootup and installed - these probably fixed the issues that others have seen. So far it has been a great player with fast loading and nice apps. It interfaces well with my Samsung HDTV and have only experienced good things with it. I tried many different Bluray discs including Avatar and have had no problems. I would recommend.
(UPDATE 7-7-11)
Downgraded from 5 stars to 1. The player took a dump on me...in a general sense. A couple of blu-rays were not playing back well (or at all). Mr. & Mrs. Smith had constant juttering of the picture, Knight and Day would give us an error saying that a software update was required by the manufacturer (had the latest firmware btw). I called Samsung customer support and they had me jump through all the hoops to determine that something was wrong with the player and they wanted me to mail it to them for repairs ect... Instead I called up the local store where I bought it and exchanged it for the Sony BX-58.
It was a very nice player until it wasn't.