over the past couple of weeks, I've been researching DVD players. I want to get a recently released machine, since the nth generation technology seems better. I've decided to purchase the new Philips DVD Q50, which is quite a nice player... they had a couple problems with the initial batch, but rang Philips NZ, and the players shippped here are the ones after the 2nd firmware release. Not many magazines/sites have reviewed it yet, since it's so new...

I was keen on a Sony 735D or 7700 but since they own movie companies, and restrict RCE movies on overseas players, I decided to boycott them :)

Jaidev

where are some good places to find decent technical reviews of DVD players?
I'm going to give my trusty old apex to my parrents for xmas, and get a nice new one for me. :)

If you are in the market for a PROGRESSIVE SCAN dvd player, you absolutely must not take another step until you have read these articles:

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_7_4/dvd-benchmark-part-5-progressive-10-2000.html

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_8_2/dvd-benchmark-special-report-chroma-bug-4-2001.html

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_7_4/dvd-benchmark-progressive-shootout-12-2000.html

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_8_3/dvd-benchmark-progressive-shootout-2-8-2001.html

I am currently in a quandary trying to decide on which progressive-scan player I'm going to get this year. I've got a thread about this subject right here:

http://www.hometheaterspot.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic&f=6&t=000697

Those are incredible articles Tony.

Calvin

Yes, they sure are.

It's amazing how BAD some of the DVD players on the market are. The de-interlacing bugs are pretty darn awful on some of the players.

You can look at DVD player reviews in magazines where they put up a test pattern and measure the sharpness and color balance. Big deal. What really counts is how well they decode the DVDs in your collection and whether or not there are any bugs in the MPEG decoders.

The articles I linked are the only ones which really "tell it like it is" instead of just going through the motions. Stacey, Don, and the rest of the gang at hometheaterhifi.com are really top-notch techs. They know their stuff. Read and re-read those articles until you really understand the bugs in these players.

My quandary is that I really want the RP56 because of its image quality. The DCDi feature makes it so that when there's a bad cadence break in a film, even when the player drops to video mode, you don't notice it.

Unfortunately, I can't have the RP56 because my widescreen television is a generation too old. When I feed it a 480p signal, it locks into anamorphic widescreen mode. Well, that means I'd have to manually switch the player to interlaced mode in order to watch a non-anamorphic disc.

The JVC players, on the other hand, have an auto-scaling feature which makes the movies play at the proper aspect ratio without me having to do any intervention. So I'm seriously considering one of the JVCs...

Awesome set of links Tony. That is by far the best DVD player info I've ever seen.




I had no idea that Eva Marie Saint was a walking chroma upsampling test pattern...

The things you learn from reading this board...

Awesome set of links Tony. That is by far the best DVD player info I've ever seen.

Yup. I haven't found this (arguably critical) information anywhere else.

Yea, I was concerned about the nasty Chroma Bug in the Philips DVD Q50, however I rang Philips NZ they said that,it only affected initial shipments of the player to the US, and has since been fixed with new firmware in new players, and NZ only started getting them in Oct.
So I may very well purchase one tomorrow! :)

Jaidev

I hope that they update those reviews soon. I have a progressive player myself, and the review of it is "great for commercial/hollywood films" but sucks for lower quality films because you can't control the progressive behavior. The company upgraded the firmware to support this, so some of that info is out of date. :-p

Calvin

I assume you're referring to one of the players using the Mediamatics chip? What was it... the Kenwood? Yeah, they know about that one.

I have the Harmon Karman DVD 50.

Calvin

Right, now I remember. That's the one. Yeah, they know about the fact that the firmware was updated for it. They just didn't get one with updated firmware to test.

If I recall that's a Mediamatics player, essentially the same thing as the JVC units.