Playback of the two affected discs mentioned above revealed smooth, clear images where very noticable loss of vertical resolution occurred on the A110. However, after testing several dual layer discs, including two that have skipped in the past, I found the layer change characteristics of the A120 to be very fast and very smooth. Menu access is noticably faster than not only previous Panasonics, but every other player I have used save the Sony DVP-S7000, and the A120 is comparable in menu speed to the Sony. This feature cuts the time it takes to load a disc and begin playback by roughly half from the previous model. Now, if I close the player drawer when I load a disc, I don't even have time to make it to the sofa before the first images are displayed.
Playback quality is exceptional.
Another area I find the Panasonics to excel in is color reproduction, particularly subtle gradients and detail within color. This player has exceptional performance in black level reproduction. This is quite evident with letterboxed images with dark backgrounds, such as starfields. Of course, careful monitor calibration is very important for accurate black level and Panasonic has now made it a bit easier to calibrate a monitor. Of course, nothing is perfect, and I have a serious problem with this player.