DVD Player Guide
New DVD players give you lots of choices. Here's the latest on what's available to help you with your buying decision.Michael Gowan
If you're shopping for a new DVD player, be prepared for a bountiful harvest of players from an ever-growing list of manufacturers. The good news is that prices for DVD players--especially for basic units--have dropped over the last year. New players come in different configurations, and they are compatible with more formats than before (regular CDs, MP3, CD-RW, and so on).
In addition to standard DVD players, you'll find high-definition units, DVD/VCR combo units, DVD recorders, and portable players, from big-name companies like Philips, Panasonic, Sony, and Samsung, along with some lesser-known brands, such as Apex and CyberHome. There's more good news: Compared to last year, DVD recorders are now more affordable.
Not sure what kind of DVD player to buy? We didn't test individual units, but we will help you figure out the different product categories. We'll highlight the common features and specifications that you're likely to encounter as you shop around. We include product examples along with the manufacturers' list prices, but in most cases, you're likely to pay less, depending on where you buy.
Getting Started
Basic DVD players start at around $50 and go up from there. With a basic player, you'll get good picture quality, a remote control, and on-screen controls, which vary in ease of use from manufacturer to manufacturer. You may want to check out the remote-control options in a retail store before you buy, to make sure you're happy with the remote that comes with the unit. (Are the buttons too small or hard to find, for instance?)
Basic players connect to your TV through a simple composite cable (one video cable and left and right audio cables) or with a higher-quality S-video cable. An S-video cable separates color and brightness into two cables, instead of combining them as a composite output does. This improves picture quality because the TV doesn't have to separate the two picture qualities itself.
Basic players now come with everything a high-end model was equipped with two years ago, such as the ability to read multiple formats, including CD audio, MP3 and WMA, CD-R, CD-RW, and Video CD. When you step up the price ladder by about $50 or more, many DVD players, such as Toshiba's $129 SD-3950, can handle DVD-R discs; other players can also handle the hi-fi DVD-Audio format. These DVD players can double as the music center in your home theater system. (DVD-Audio is one of the new music formats fighting to replace the CD. Similar to Dolby Digital 5.1, DVD-Audio takes full advantage of all your home theater's speakers--it uses six channels for playback--but the actual encoding is different. A regular CD is designed for a two-speaker stereo setup.)
An important feature you need to consider is scan type, namely interlace scan and progressive scan. Scan type relates to image quality and how the picture looks on your screen. Progressive scan produces a much sharper picture, and it reduces flicker--it's like the difference in sound between an old cassette tape and a CD.
Here's what's happening behind the scenes: A screen is divided into horizontal lines, and each picture is created by "drawing" the image one line at a time, from left to right, line by line down the screen. A standard analog television sequentially draws the odd-numbered lines and then goes back to the top and sequentially draws the even ones; this is an interlaced scan. Some inexpensive players, such as the $50 Apex AD-1600, offer interlace scan only.
If you bump up to the $100 level, you'll see players offering progressive scan, like the Toshiba SD-3950. This technology fills in the lines--one, two, three, and so on--without skipping lines. Another benefit: Progressive-scan DVD players come with component video outs, which separate the signal into three parts (red, green, and blue) and result in an even better picture than a non-progressive-scan player. (Even if you don't have a progressive-scan-compatible TV, you can still use component cables to connect your player to your TV to get better picture quality.)
But here's a secret behind the hype: You can only take advantage of progressive-scan technology if you hook up your DVD player to a TV that can support the progressive-scan signal. Any digital TV--an LCD TV, an HDTV, and so on--has component inputs that support progressive scan. Older televisions (the cathode ray tube or CRT kind) can't handle the signal, but the newer tube TVs (often flat) probably can, depending on the model. So if you're planning to buy a digital television at some point, you might as well spend a little more to buy a progressive-scan player now, even if you can't take advantage of the technology yet.
Going High End
Some people are early adopters of the first degree, and they were probably the first on your block to own a high-definition television. If you're ready to go all out on home entertainment, it might be time to invest in an HDTV. It blows away the quality of a standard television by upping the resolution to as many as 1080 horizontal lines by 1920 vertical dots--about six times more picture information than an analog TV can handle.
If you are planning to use an HDTV, you'll need to buy a progressive-scan DVD player (with its component cables) to connect to your HDTV to get truer picture quality. But you can get an even better image with a digital video interface connection.
A standard DVD player uses a digital-to-analog converter to change the digital information on a DVD disc into a format that an analog TV can understand. Even a high-quality converter will lose some data during the process. The digital video interface sends digital data directly to the HDTV, which speaks the same digital language, so you get the best picture you can. A DVI connection is included with Samsung's $300 DVD-HD931 player (you also get the other cables, too). Like the Toshiba SD-3950, the DVD-HD931 offers advanced music playback--it can handle DVD-Audio discs.
Can't Let Go of VHS?
If you're not ready to completely sever ties with your VHS tape collection, you can opt for a pricier DVD/VCR combo player, so you can get the best of both worlds. Starting at $200, these units allow you to watch both DVDs and VHS tapes, and enjoy better picture quality than if you just had a regular VCR. You'll also overcome a weakness of standard DVD players: With a combo unit, you can record your favorite TV shows onto VHS.
Most of these combo players support progressive scan, too. The $250 JVC HR-XVC25U includes a four-head stereo-sound (or hi-fi) VCR recorder in the unit. (Four-head VCRs offer better image quality; almost all VCRs use four heads these days.)
Record on DVD
Standard DVD players can't record shows from TV, but newer DVD recorders can. DVD recorders debuted on computers a couple of years ago, and they've migrated off the PC into home theater scenarios, replacing the VCR, CD player, and DVD player. This luxury will cost you: Sony's RDR-GX7 runs $800, and even the cheaper DMR-E50K DVD Video Recorder by Panasonic will set you back $350. Our guess: Expect prices to drop over the next few years as this technology relegates the VCR to the closet forever.
DVD recorders are more complicated than VCRs. At the moment, you'll have to sort through five different formats: DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, and DVD-RAM. Check out "DVD Burners Hit Prime Time" to read more about these competing formats. Sony's RDR-GX7 obviates much of the confusion by supporting DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, and DVD+RW.
DVD recorders offer more options than a VCR. You can rewrite a DVD+RW or a DVD-RW disc more than 1,000 times without losing any quality; a VHS tape would be dust by that point. Most recorders include an IEEE 1394 port (also referred to as FireWire or I.Link) so you can transfer directly from a digital video camera onto a recordable DVD disc. And with rewritable formats, you can even edit material directly on the disc, so you don't have to sit through the dull spots of your home videos again.
Take It With You
Portable DVD players are usually small and light enough to carry around with you, but they're not for everyone. (If you're not impressed with your airline's movie options, for example, you can bring your own DVDs.) Most portables weigh two or three pounds and come with screens ranging from 7 to 9 inches. Look for a unit with a big screen, long battery life (around three hours), and a wide viewing angle--you want to be able to see the screen clearly even when you're not directly in front of the unit.
The $700 Panasonic DVD-LA95 Portable includes a 9-inch LCD screen and a rechargeable battery that should last through an entire movie. The unit weighs just over two pounds.
Portable DVD player makers are enhancing the audio capabilities, so you can also let your portable act as your audio player. The DVD-LA95 can read CD audio, MP3 CD, and even DVD-Audio discs--a nice plus when you're laying down that much money.
However, at the end of the day, $700 is a lot of money for a movie and music player. Think of it this way: For just a few hundred dollars more, you could buy a laptop instead.