No matter what you do or offer, people want to get a truly universal player that plays video well and sounds good. Well, they don’t want to buy separate devices for video and audio. Moreover, many, even having two separate devices, still want to replace them with one universal one, despite all the arguments, assurances and beliefs. And since there is demand, sooner or later there will be supply. 

In fact, it has been proposed for a long time, but until now, all attempts by manufacturers turned out to be clearly insufficiently developed. Remember the older models from Dune and Zappiti?

They had both balanced stereo outputs and “audiophile”, from the point of view of their creators, DACs, and, despite the price, they sounded like very inexpensive components - simply and without sparkle, that is, not at all worth their price. The legendary Oppo 205 also had these elements, but it started to sound really good only after an impressive upgrade, which was comparable in cost to the price of the original device.

And this player sounded right away, as they say, “out of the box” without any upgrade. And it showed its best performance in playing discs and video files, also without additional manipulations, which is unusual.

Little is known about Magnetar Audio. This is a young Chinese brand with headquarters in Hong Kong. The first mention in the English-language media appeared only at the end of last year - that players of this brand began to be sold in Europe.

A little later it was announced that there would be two players: UDP800 and UDP900. That is, this is a junior model. Moreover, both players are created on the same basis, the main part of which is the MediaTek MT8581 chipset, similar to that installed in the best Oppo and Pioneer players.

Not exactly the same, but part of that series, new and slightly modified. This is not the most powerful build today, there are much cooler ones, but as we found out earlier, this is the best solution today to build a player that reads video files with the highest quality. Moreover, to play full images of 4K Blu-ray discs and upscale Full HD video to 4K, you don’t need more power: MediaTek does this better than other assemblies with the right hardware. But in Magnetar UDP800 everything is fine with it.

Despite the fact that this is a junior model, it is made very thoroughly. The case is very heavy - total weight 7 kg. There is almost no free space inside. The power supply is pulsed, but shielded and rated at 60 W, that is, supplied with a significant margin of consumption.

The overall architecture only reminds Oppo: all the boards are different. Yes, and the set of connectors for connecting is different. For example, there is not even the option to add an HDMI input, which Oppo had. Balanced outputs for analog stereo sound are included initially, and are not the prerogative of a more expensive model

But the main thing that distinguishes this player from others is the DACs, one for each channel, which are clearly visible in the photo. These are Burr-Brown PCM 1795 , 192 kHz 32-bit chips manufactured by Texas Instruments. In combination with the MUSES8920 operational amplifiers, they seem to make the Magnetar UDP800 a very musical device.

To make conclusions about playback quality as valid as possible, the Magnetar UDP800 was tested on the same systems as all the media players we have reviewed in recent years. The most expensive multi-channel included a Storm Audio audio processor and JBL Synthesis speakers, and the most expensive stereo system included a complete Dan D'Agostino Progression amplifier with a built-in DAC and Nime Audio Design EliteOne speakers. The display devices were Sony VPL-VW5000ES, JVC DLA-X9500, JVC DLA-NZ9 projectors and an LG OLED65CX TV with native Dolby Vision support.

When connecting via HDMI, there were no surprises - soundtracks for films and tracks for concerts in any format were played to the maximum. That is, without the slightest loss in resolution, virtual volume, without rough edges and rethinking - exactly the same as on the best players on MediaTek chips: Oppo UHD-205 and its “clones” without optical drives. In terms of optics and coaxial, the picture is the same.

But having connected the UDP800 analoguely, even just through RCA connectors, the differences in sound from all previously described players, including the Reavon UBR-X200 with other Burr-Brown DACs, and the Oppo UHD-203, and even the UHD-205, become audible from the first minutes of any more or less high-quality recording.

When performed by Magnetar, music acquires what people listen to it for - soul. Overtones appear, richness of timbres appear, voices become alive. And you don’t need some rare audiophile track or only reference recordings with Diana Krall for such a discovery - almost any music sounds better, even dry and completely artificial electronics. 

Of course, the UDP800 cannot be compared with a DAC for ten to twenty thousand dollars, but its sound certainly cannot be called simple and schematic. And, gratifyingly, this applies to all recording formats: regular discs and FLAC with parameters 16/44.1; Hi-Res FLAC and DSD.

You just need to take into account that Magnetar is, first of all, a universal omnivorous disk player that plays all optical formats, including DVD-Audio, for which there are a couple of exceptions in terms of file readability, which we will discuss below.

In terms of video playback quality, this player also gave no reason for complaints, much less disappointment. In short, its quality is absolutely identical to the Oppo UHD-205, its clones and the Reavon UBR-X200. That is, it has the largest color gamut to date, the best detailing among players that play UHD Blu-ray images, and the most accurate scaling of Full HD video to 4K. Even its noise level (minimal, by the way) is similar to the levels of the devices listed above. 

The surprise was in something else - in the software. In appearance, the interface is exactly the same as that of Oppo, even the background photos are the same in places. But full support for HDR10+ is available initially, which, for example, Reavon does not have, and Oppo appeared many years later.

And most importantly, all the capabilities of the same Oppo when reading files from any media and over the network are available to this player immediately, as they say, out of the box! The player only does not accept images of SACD releases in ISO format, but in my personal opinion this is not a problem at all - it is more convenient to use separate files, and, as mentioned above, Magnetar has no difficulties with them.

Magnetar offered consumers not just a replacement for Oppo players, but a truly universal player that reproduces video at the highest level and sounds better than all currently available media players with video support.

He would also like a convenient cataloguer - and there would be no price for it.

Pors

Reference video quality, musical, emotional sound, no firmware required

Cons

No full DV support in MKV

OFFICIAL SITE  -   magnetar-audio

SoC: Mediatek MTK8581

CPU: 4-core ARM Cortex-A53

Video adapter: ARM Mali-T860 MP2

Video file formats: MKV, MPEG-TS, MPEG-PS, M2TS, VOB, AVI, MOV, MP4, QT, ASF, WMV, BD ISO, BDMV, DVD-ISO, VIDEO_TS

Audio file formats: MP3, MPA, M4A, AAC, WAV, FLAC, Ogg/Vorbis, WavPack, APE, DSF, DFF,

Maximum video resolution: 3840x2160p60, 12 bit, 4:4:4

Outputs: 1xHDMI v2.0, xHDMI v1.4 (for Audio), HDCP2.2, optical Tos-link (up to 24 bit / 96 kHz), coaxial digital RCA (up to 24 bit / 192 kHz), analog RCA, analog balanced stereo XLR

Interfaces: 1 x USB 3.0 Type A, 1 x USB 2.0 Type A, Gigabit Ethernet

Dimensions: 430x85x300 mm

Weight: 8 kg