just because Blackhawk Down is almost out..

I've heard there are some decent ones in the $100 range.  

Is that crazy?

... [b]tool[/b] - the last far gain bastage to buy a DVD?


... Do it bro!

Circut City has the Apex AD1200 for about $65. The Apex players are cheap seem to be well liked and play cd with MP3s on them.

I've got a 5 disc panasonic carousel with all the goodies including fiber optic outs. Its sweet. Paid ~$250.00 for it 4 months ago. Watch for sales to get deals.

Btw, [b]tool[/b], I love that screen name!! LMAO!! [:D]

-T.

Make sure that you have a surround sound amp with 5+1 speakers and either a DTS/Dolby Digital decoder in the DVD or the amp. I've got the Sony NS500, it is on sale at Crutchfield for $180

Get an XBox!  Its a great DVD player and the best gaming system.

[url]http://www.vcdhelp.com/dvdplayers.php[/url]

If you're interesting if it can play CD-R's etc. this is the thing to look at.

Its also nice since in most cases you can see an average price.

Consumer Reports rated the Sony single disc DVPNS300/S as one of the best single disk non digital ready DVD players.  It was not a CR best buy though, that went to the Toshiba SD-1700 and the Samsung DVD-M201.
Three of the 14 single disk players were rated excellent in all catagories tested, those were the Sony DVPNS300/S, Toshiba SD-2300 and the JVC XV-S45.
Fred Meyer has the DVPNS300/S on sale right now for $149.99, it retailed for $200.00 not more than three months ago.
I bought the Sony.
I think that just about everyone of these DVD players are in their respective manufacturers mid-range level, and that by the end of this year or next year these DVD players will be going for under $100.
I saw a couple at Wally-World for under $100, I would stick with the Sony.

If you think you may want to play foreign DVDs, then be sure to buy one that you can trick-out to bypass the regional restrictions

If you want a simple inexpensive (50-90$) DVD player, or you want a DVD player that can disable Macrovision and Regional Encoding, then the APEX series is for you.

Just do your 30 minutes of homework first here:
http://www.nerd-out.com/darrenk/
http://www.nerd-out.com/forum/

APEX is carried by Circuit City, Walmart, KMart, and many others.  Circuit City has them on sale for Father's Day

As mentioned previously they are also useful for playing mp3s, VCDs, and SVCDs that are on CDR or CDRW media.

I read an article recently that said the cheap ones tend to break within a year or so.  Probably in the Seattle Times.

I'd suggest spending a bit more and getting a progrssive scan model, if your TV has inputs for it.

[FYI/FWIW: I work for Philips Semiconductors. We make chips for DVDs, our parent company Philips own patents on DVD systems and sells DVD players, and several DVD system engineers are 3 or for cubicles down from me, along with the local DVD lab.]

The cheaper DVD players can't always handle complex DVDs (scene selection, deep menus, etc.)

I bought an Apex 1200 $60 cheapie for my cousin's kid (which makes him a cousin too). Brought it to our DVD lab - we were able to 'crash' it in just a few minutes. Plus, it wouldn't recognize certain audio disks it was supposed to, etc. The tray didn't lock during play, and the player - when tilted - would let the tray slide out while playing!

I have an Apex 600 (?) at home. It is OK, but with a few quirks (remote can't always turn it back on after turning it off), and a power supply that's a bit flaky (out of balance DVDs w/painted logos overtax the pwr supply a bit
and cause tracking errors. Prob a few software bugs I haven't encountered because I don't watch fancy DVDs (Fight Club, I hear, is a good test).

So pay a few dollars more and get a name brand.
I'd of course recommend Philips, but Sony, RCA, Matsushita/Panasonic, and even Samsung are all good.

BTW: you can sometimes find basic Philips DVDs down to the $100 area on sale. After turning back in the Apex at Fry's, I got a nice Philips for $129 - after my employee rebate it'll be around $100.

You get what you pay for. While all DVDs prob use chipsets from one of a half-dozen different vendors, internal firmware (software) quality is quite variable, as well as mechanical quality of the "loader" (physical DVD drive mechanism).  Paying a few extra $$ gets you a better quality mechanism, power supply, etc.

Bill Wiese
San Mateo, CA


 

The APEX is a hunk of SHIT apparently better used as a trot line sinker! You can read review after review on the web and everyone of them says the same thing.....its a CHEAP hunk of shit....so everyone...go ahead and (invest??) in one of these cheap hunk of shit and then get on a forum board and whine about it....{by the way Larson and Jennings pistols are a good buy!!} [:D]

  My Apex AD600's DVD drive went BO last night trying to play The Nightmare Before Christmas SE. The decoder/brains of the player still work fine. Now I have to prowl Ebay for a replacement drive. I see Toshiba's are rated good.

The Apex AD600 is a great cheap player. Mine cost <$70. and will play anything from anywhere. (After extensive brain surgery.) On the other hand the drive is junk and the unit can't do Progressive Scan playback.

I see Sony has a DVD Walkman on sale now. Yikes.