Philips DVP642 DivX-Certified Progressive-Scan DVD Player
by Philips
|
List Price: Category: Home Theater See more product details |
|---|
(Click here)
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Philips DVP642 DivX-Certified Progressive-Scan DVD Player
Customer Review: Begin watching those DiVX movies in style
Summary: 5 Stars
This unit is made for those electronics fans who want the most for the buck they spend like myself. This player is perfect if you have an average 25" tube TV, possibly with some stereo speakers and perhaps even with component video input. The player provides both stereo output, S-video output(which looks kinda like computer PS/2 mouse jack). Then there are 3 component outputs, which I didn't get to test, but you might be able to take advantage of. Now, all the DiVX movies that I tried played almost flawlessly. One of the movies in DiVX 3.11 format showed notable image aberrations, with some parts of the frame looking as if they were shot on some grainy film. I guess the video chip couldn't keep up with the video bitrate, or the file encoding was corrupt. After pressing Stop and Play buttons didn't fix this problem, I tried pressing Menu button, then pressed Play back, and voila, the image became as clear as it was supposed to be.
One drawback I noticed is that version DiVX 3.11 movies support only 4x fast forwarding, while other DiVX movies(as well as DVDs) can fast forward at 8x, which is pretty good, but not as fast as the usual 32x for standard DVD players.
One time the player didn't want to read a CD-R with a small video on it, saying there was 'No Disc'. After I finalized the disk in Ahead Nero, the player was able to load and play the disk back.
I also tried a homemade DVD-R, which worked as expected, with all the menus/subtitles, you know, the whole "DVD Experience".
I have to add I was pleasantly surprised by how cool the player looked, with a nice bright LCD(which doesn't have a lot of information on it, just a playback counter; still, it's a nice improvement over my old cheapo Apex DVD player, which looks pretty dull without the LCD), a very thin sleek silver(though pretty large in width) case and a nice ergonomic remote control.
All in all, it's about time for you guys to shell out those $60 and start watching DiVX on a big TV screen. You won't regret buying this awesome affordable and quality gadget.
Customer Review: Thought I had PROBLEMS....
Summary: 4 Stars
I'm new to DVD movies...though I can play them on my computer.
I've only had this DVD player for 2 weeks or so and had only one DVD to try with it. This DVD played.
Also some .mp3 music files played. And some pics from my digital camera burned on a CD.
Fine.
Then I borrowed some DVDs to watch...and out of a total of 6 DVDs I then had...only 2 would play....got a lot of "NO DISC" from the player after closing the tray.
All of these DVDs would play on the computer.
I was getting prepared to return the player.
So I thought to run a CD lens cleaner disc* in it. First time didn't work...but after the 2nd try the DVD player now works fine and plays everything I put in it.
*This is an audio CD with a small brush mounted on it...used dry. I run it thru the 9 or so "tracks"...one by one for 5-10 seconds each. Don't want to run the cleaner disc too often though.
Sort of strange that the lense would be dirty when new. Some assembler has messy fingers?
I am impressed by the audio when playing some lower quality .mp3 files. The ability to scan thru digital pics is nice.
Now I can watch some movies...the Dolby audio as processed thru a receiver is of good quality also.
* I did buy a 1 yr free replacement warranty. Stay tuned.....
Further note: One DVD that is pretty well scratched will still not play UNLESS I run the cleaner CD thru first...not sure what is going on here...maybe not a dirty lense, but possibly tracking problems? Maybe it shouldn't play...though it does on the computer. Seems there is a recent string of disappointed buyers.
** Intend to exercise my 1 year free replacement option soon(a $10 cost). While it will play most DVDs...it ALWAYS needs the cleaner disc run thru it first...before it will recognize a DVD. Since I rarely play more than 1 DVD at a time...this is a pain.
Customer Review: KiSS who? what? 600 dollars?? KiSS My..
Summary: 5 Stars
i totally envy how Philips took an enormous dump on KiSS' profits with this bad boy. almost 100% of the functionalty (sans network port, but who cares) at 10% of the cost! you can't beat this thing.i've noticed that a lot of people are pissy about the supposed neglect of DVD-R. let me tell you right off the bat, it works. flawlessly. i think what most people's problems are coming from is that they're buying princos off of ebay and expecting them to work. hey, you get what you pay for, and if you want to use flimsy media on your important backups and movies, you can watch them on your computer.
i threw everything i had handy at it- vcds work, svcd is supported but i didn't try it (tried an m2v, didn't recognize the extension..stupid me.), mpeg1 .mpg's work fine, divx's (AND XVID, YES.) work great, etcetera. tried a cd with both avi's and .mpg's.. absolutely pristine. i think this thing even supports .wmv's, i saw a windows icon next to a file on an old cd i burned, i don't remember if i tried it or not. not that that's a big deal, if you use windows media codecs then there's something wrong with you in the first place, but it's a nice little addition to have anyway..
to the customer below with the gelatinous looking movie: 800kb/s? are you serious? ever heard the term sh** in sh** out? the only 800kb/s's i have are the vhs's i've backed up that i could care less about other than fitting onto one cd.
on the other hand, the menus ARE a bit clumsy. especially the file browser, which stutters a bit and can be a pain.. and the character cutoff point is kind of trite as well. both extremely small prices to pay for this slim and sexy beast.
just be happy you no longer have to pay $300 and up for an earlier-named piece of junk that apparently crashes more often than windows ME ever collectively did..
pick this up while you can. i was lucky to find the last one, they're literally flying off the shelves at wal-mart.
Customer Review: Very good product
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this product for my mother-in-law so that she would have the opportunity to play home movies that she burns off of her computer without the problems and space waste associated with turning to a standard dvd format. My mother-in-law has a dvr, and many disks she deemed unrecoverable and was ready to throw away were able to play on this dvd player, even when they couldn't play on the dvd writer that wrote them! With composite, the video is ok, moving up to component is a lot better for the obvious reasons. The only real beef I have with this product is that it comes with a composite cord, but doesn't even offer a composite choice in the video selection. (s-video and component are the two choices, this might have been fixed with a firmware upgrade, but I don't know, I didn't do the upgrade yet). Either way, definately buy a component cable or s cable, everything will go much smoother, I promise.
Of course, the reason one gets a dvd player of this caliber is not for dvds, but divx and mpeg4. For those of you that don't know what that means, essentially it means that this dvd player reads video files from a data disk as well as dvd movies. Data files take up less room on a disk, so you can fit more, which means you don't have to lose video quality to fit a movie, and you can even fit a whole movie on a cd, which it will also read and play. The divx player read most of the media I had. Upon playing some of my media, it showed ridiculusly bad pixelation, however, after adjusting the video setting, this was fixed. However, at the beginning of each file the pixelation would return and I would have to adjust the video again. It did not matter what adjustment I made, I just for some reason had to kick it back into motion. This did not happen with every file, and I am hoping the firmware upgrade will fix that too. Other than that, great product at a reasonable price, specially with free shipping.
Customer Review: Best bang for the buck DVD player
Summary: 5 Stars
Got it for $40(that is good price for a progressive scan DVD player).
Here are more details: IT SEEMS TO PLAY EVERYTHING. Here is a list of things it will do and will NOTS:
Wills(in addition to regular DVDs):
1. Plays DVD-r/rw dvd+r/rw. I repeat it plays DVD-R/RW.
2. divX all versions.
3. MP3 burnt directly to DVD.
4. mp3 on CD of course
5. multiple divX on dvd. gives you a directory
6. JPEGS. Even lets you rotate the pics as they slide by.
7. can upgrade firmware via CD-R (very kewl as always) never have to worry about not being able toupgrade unit.
8. plays regular retail music cd's
9. This unit is divX certified. www.divx.com/vod
10. this unit has component out for your 480p pleasure.
11. this unit has pre programmed settings for different audio settings ex. hall, studio, etc..
12. has pre programmed settings for video ex. soft, bright, normal etc. also has custom.
13. has ability to change region VIA REMOTE
14. Supposedly macrovisionfree except when transferring to dvd-recorder.
15. has a zoom to 3x and you can move arrows to move the pic around
16. Progressive scan and has beautiful Picture for DVD's
Ok heres the not so popular features.
1. divX quality lousey. VCD quality at best. I have tried 3.11 4 and divx 5.11 before and after upgrade
2. no open tray button on remote. Later found out just hold the stop button
3. 11 character titles
4. doesn't come with component cables just standard rca and a video.
5. when forwarding through chapters display on tv just says next without giving you a chapter number.
Last but not least, you can change the title on the DVD wallpaper(you can put your name, so if some one else steals it the name is visible after they try to sell it)