LG - UBK80 - 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Player - Black

I genuinely appreciate that this LG 4K Ultra HD Blu-Ray player has no frills and no gimmicks. It focuses only only playing whatever disc is inserted. There is no WiFi and there are no Smart apps cluttering the menu. Insert a CD, DVD, Blu-Ray, or 4K Ultra HD Blu-Ray and it loads and plays quickly. You can also play content from a USB drive (if you so choose). My only minor complaint is that the player is about 17 inches wide - which is too wide for a lot of media cabinets. For me, this means that the player must sit on top of the cabinet. It is slim enough to fit under my HDTV, but then it gets in the way of my soundbar. Make sure you measure your cabinet/shelf before you purchase so that you can plan on where it will sit. NOTE: If you want access to Dolby Vision, WiFi, or apps (such as Netflix) you have the option of spending about $50 more to purchase the LG UBK90. But honestly, so many devices already provide access to Netflix, Hulu, Spotify, etc that most users will probably appreciate the simplicity and lower price of this UBK80. PROS: + Very Simple Menu / User interface: Plays 4K Ultra HD Blu-Ray disc quickly & easily. + Loads discs quickly (which is something that is often an issue with Blu-Ray players). + Ability to download updates through the wired internet connection (you do not need to plug in a USB drive) + Backwards compatible: Can play Audio CDs, CD/DVD ROMs, DVD, Blu-Ray discs etc. + Comes with a full function remote that is able to power on your TV's and adjust the input & volume level. + Does support 3D content - Although 3D HDTVs are no longer produced. + Able to play content from a USB drive. CONS: - No WiFi connection - No smart features / apps - 17 inches wide (which does not fit in many media cabinet shelves) - No streaming option for Music. You can only play files from a disk or a USB drive. - Difficult to control without the remote (as the face of the player only has Eject, Play/Pause, Stop, & Power buttons. - Does not support Dolby Vision - Has only 1 HDMI output - Does not come with the required HDMI cable (or with audio or Ethernet cables).

This is a good 4K BD player at it's core, but outside of playing BD's, 3D BD's and UHDBD's, it doesn't offer much more. This comes as a shock, seeing as how most devices today, are equipped as a smart device. When I first opened the box and read the instructions, I was surprised to discover, that this UHD player doesn't have access to the LG App Store.. In fact, this player doesn't have any apps at all. That's not an entirely bad thing though.. While, there are no apps, this player does let you stream media over your local internet. Not only that, but there is also a USB port that lets you play a very wide selection of media files. The LG UBK80 even plays FLAC files for High-Res audio. Another surprise was, this player is not WIFI enabled. It does have an ethernet port for connecting to the internet for software updates and BD live content, but that makes for a nuisance if your player isn't located near a router. After I connected everything and set up the wired network, I decided to take it for a spin. I popped in Wonder Woman UHD Blu-Ray and pressed play..I will say, I was extremely impressed with how fast this player loaded the movie, it loaded almost instantly! The picture quality was very crisp and colorful, everything you'd come to expect from watching a 4K BD. The sound quality was good too, Dolby Atmos really comes to life on a 4K BD. Overall, I would say that I am pretty happy with the LG UBK80 as a stand alone 4KBD player. It's a straight forward 4KBD player, that loads very fast and looks good. Although, if you're looking for an all in one streaming multimedia player, this might not be for you. PROS: Very fast loading times. Good picture quality. Easy to set up and operate. USB port for multiple media playback. FLAC HIGH-RES playback. CONS: No WIFI (Hard wired only) No built in video apps or App Store.

In a time where it feels like every video device on the market is capable of playing Netflix, and other streaming services, LG has chosen to make this 4K UHD BluRay player simply a... 4K UHD BluRay player! This is a no frills, does one thing and only one thing player. It also does this one thing fairly well. Insert a disc, wait a couple seconds, your in the movie's menu. Hit play, watch and enjoy. It is very quick and simple to use. LG has gone with a very clean and simple box layout. Just the essential buttons on the front for play, rewind, eject, stop, fast forward. There is also a USB port for plugging in a USB drive to display videos of photos. I found the internal video player supports most video files. mp4, mkv, mpeg2, avi, it plays them all with ease. It does not however, support PGS subtitles, this is limited to the blu-ray disc drive only. You need SRT files for such playback if you are one to be looking to play these types of files and subtitles. Video quality seems to be on par with the UHD standard. Colors and HDR playback looked great and well presented on my LG C8 OLED. LG has made a huge omission however by not supporting the Dolby Vision standard with this player. Given my TV supports Dolby Vision along with HDR10 (and some others) I am only able to watch HDR10 tracks from my DV bluray discs. This will not worry most people as most discs today are in the HDR10 format and most TVs still do not offer this support. For myself personally, this is a massive oversight and this player will not be staying in my main AV cabinet and will likely make it's way to a secondary bedroom TV. My other gripe with this unit is the power LED. When off, the LED is red. Great, I have no issues with this. However, when powered on, this LED goes green!!! I have an open media cabinet and when watching a movie with all of the lights out, and with the infinite blacks of my OLED, to have a green light illuminating below is ridiculous. They should have omitted the "ON" light and have it completely off. LG did this with their TV, soundbars, etc... why not with this player?? Most people won't care about this either, but to any videpphile and home theater enthusiast, this is a complete deal-breaker. Granted, tape, or a closed cabinet fixes the problem as well, but annoying none-the less. There is an ethernet port on the back for updating firmware. This unit does not have wireless so you need to hard wire to update it, or, download the updated from LGs website, put it on USB drive and plug in a USB drive to the front port. Overall this is a solid, no frills player. It does what it is supposed to do, and does it decently. This is no reference grade, 100% color accurate player, this lacks more advanced features such as Dolby Vision. Lacks wifi capability and has an annoying green LED light that is always on when watching movies. For these reasons I will likely not recommend this to any of my friends as most of them are theater / quality nuts like I am. If you are on a budget, don't aim for reference grade anything, and just want something simple and overall solid, this is a great player for you.

This 4k Ultra HD blu ray player was bought for me so I thought it wouldn't play certain DVDs like homemade disc so I happened to put in a family get together dvd and I was in tears it played pictures are crisp i enjoyed watching it,this 4k Ultra HD blu ray player is great just need a USB cord!!

DVD drive won't open all the way. Also too simple for the cost. All new Blu-ray players are made way to cheep today's days. I won't pay more then $80 for this one. Needs more options like select button left right up and downs button. Just in case the customers can't find their remote. LG customer since 2014. : -(

I had to do this review in two stages 1) with a 1080p 3D TV and 2) 4k HDR tv. I think it is great that LG kept the 3D functionality with the 4K setup as it is a really good blu-ray player for 1080p quality. I'm assuming that the market is moving towards limiting the need for DVD, Blu-Ray, and 4K Blu-Ray players as the technologically advances it is backwards compatible. However, 3D died in 2016 (no new tv's have sold with 3D feature)...so thank you for giving me hope or just rubbing it in that is dead? For 3D purposes I used my 7 year old LG 55LW5300 3D TV Full HD, @ 24p frame rate. TV Still works great and was made even better by this new blu-ray player. Watching Avatar 3D definitely noticed a crisper picture and better motion versus the Panasonic 3D player that was rated best at the time and still using today. The LG UBK80 is very basic in its use...disc content only. Your TV is already smart if its a 4K from the past year or so and to have a disc device smart seems a little redundant as there are better options if you are looking for smart capability. The UI is the same as the cheapest LG DVD player you can buy, or the Blu-ray Player that I had 8 years ago. That's not necessarily a bad thing as it's easy to navigate and very simple to get to settings. You can get customize the features to do 24p if the disc and tv support it and a few other settings. It does have a LAN port so the Blu-ray online features can be accessed. Pretty much the only purpose is for the previews. Blu-rays have a neat ability to update previews, so when watching an older movie you can actually watch a new preview for a yet released movie or other ad content relative to the today date. May be able to do a firmware update as well didn't look closely enough. But not necessary as it also has a usb port. Hooking it up to an LG 55U6100 4K HDR TV it had superb picture quality. At this point only been streaming 4K HDR content and I can definitely see a difference in it, no to mention for me lately Netflix sound has been a bit off, and so I am also getting the higher fidelity sound and higher quality picture. I used Hacksaw Ridge for my content and I did have to tweak the settings just a bit on the tv as it was a little too dark for my taste in a couple scenes. A group of men are sitting in a circle in a mortar crater, its at night, and in the distance are burning fires in barrells. The flames while not in focus drawing attention to the men, doesn't bloom around those images. Its hard to see the mens faces, but the whites of their eyes show up and the reflection of light from the sweat and oil on their skin. It is a really dark scene, one used for tests such as these. Now, most of what I spoke about has to do with the TV, but because of reading other reviews about this TV, I know the Blu-Ray player is allowing it to reach its potential. For the price this is a great Blu-Ray Player for both 4K HDR and 1080p/3D viewing. I don't think you can go wrong with this choice. And if its a smart functionality you want then I'd suggest going with a dedicated player, you will get a better experience. As the saying goes, "right tool for the right job." A quick note on size its a bit bigger and thicker than I would have thought it would be this far into having 4K Blu-ray on the market, but it could be a cooling feature for more air movement. I never heard the disc spinning in quite scenes, but my ears may have been buzzing still from the sound of war.

So I have about 7 different devices I can use to watch streaming services on my Ultra HDTV as is, and obviously didn't need yet another device for that. All I wanted was a quality 4k Blu Ray player to enjoy my growing movie collection with. LG is one of the best manufacturers out there, so I knew they would deliver. That combined with the amazing price point made this the obvious choice for the player I wanted to buy. After watching a few movies on 4k disc and on regular Blu Ray I can confirm that the playback quality is flawless. Everything is displayed in the utmost detail, HDR is handled well, loading into a disc takes 2-5 seconds, fast forward and rewind features are all handled brilliantly. Menu navigation and setup are simple and straightforward, as should be. There's even some great options for color tweaking; warm color, cold color, and a vivid color option which makes older movies in particular look a lot better. Everything about the playback and functionality is flawless. All of this is exactly what I expected, but something that completely took me by surprise is the quality of the automatic upconversion of non-4k discs: it's absolutely unbelievable. You would be in many ways hard pressed to tell the difference between a 1080 Blu Ray and a 4k disc in many ways, not only is the sharpness greatly improved but the color reproduction is greatly enhanced as well. Before I had this player I just watched Blu Ray discs on a PS3 or a PS4 Pro, the PS4 Pro very unfortunately does no upconversion at all, even though it easily could, and I could never go back to using it. Truly, this is THE player to get, and I would grab one before you can no longer find them.

This player is a base model feature wise. No bells or whistles, No clock or digital display, no apps or video programs for streaming. It comes with a nice remote. So simple Grandma could set it up and use it. It's very slim and compact. It doesn't take up much space which is nice. If you're just looking for functionality to pop in a movie and watch it, this is a great player for you.