not recommended

very poor,not built well,better spending money on a fine whisky,at least you get more out of it,does not like some disks,will not play extras on some disks,like other reviews like to freeze which is so annoying,try another brand,just placed an order for Sony at Amazon,so hope that is better,one or two disks-not burnt say bad disk which is a load of crap,please get your act together Philips

Fantastic, just what I needed a USB connection

Based on the reviews, I brought one of these for my mum & dad so I could easily give them .avi files to watch. It worked like a dream, so much so that I've brought 3 more for my sister, my neighbour and myself.
Can't recommend this highly enough, and can't fault Pixmania-UK.
I use it in conjunction with a"Buffalo RUF-C8G/U2 - 8GB USB 2.0 High Flash speed" which works perfectly and fast.

Brilliant - and what a price!!

I bought this player in January 2008 and it has performed brilliantly, both on battery or mains power. Although the white outer case does look cheap it does it's job of protecting the vital bits inside perfectly well.

My 80gb 5th Gen video ipod works without problem and the screen quality is great. I've also hooked it up to my tv and again the picture quality is still very good indeed.

For the price, it is an amazing good peice of kit - I'm sure you could spend three times as much and get something that's 1% better, but why would you??

It's NOT multi-region

Picture fine, sound fine. But lots of wires trailing round the car. Abd I share the concerns of the reader below about the plastic stalk that could break.
But to me, the key thing is that this is locked to region 2. I never knowingly accept this kind of nonsense, and wouldn't have bought it if I'd realised.

CRACK LITTLE DVD PLAYER

Received the DVD player as a christmas gift from my wife. A big mistake on her behalf. NO it's not a bad product, far from it is great quality item. The mistake is that I now stick my headphone on plug in and switch of to one of my own DVDs, very unsociable (but I love my own time).

* Really clear screen
* Feels well built
* Good sound through my earphones (plenty of volume and clarity)
* Good quality remote contol

If I really look for a fault maybe a bigger screen would be nice but then no it would be more bulky and I can watch it from 6 foot away on the 7" screen. So faultless so far and I suspect for quite a while to come.

OK, not great

Pros:
records and plays a wide range of formats.
eighty quid or thereabouts, so the price is fine.

Cons:
Remote control and menu system are far from intuitive.
Machine seems slow - both to respond to the remote and to do things.
No freeview.
The occasional whirring noise which suggests that it won't last forever.


Conclusion:
If you want a low cost DVD recorder from a well known brand name, to last you until the analogue switch-off, then this might be for you. But ... you might do better to spend more and get something better. If you just want something to replace the VCR - just to record and watch stuff on your own TV - there are better products elsewhere.

I should add that also I have a freeview hard disc recorder (PVR) which sells for about £50 more that this, and is intuitive, very easy, faster, and can record and play back two different things at the same time. So I may have been spoiled !

So good we've got to buy another

We purchased this DVD player to use in the car last March. It was so good we took it every time we went on a long journey until the inevitable happened - it was stolen from the car - so we have to buy another. No gripes with it at all and no hesitation about getting the same again especially as it has gone down £30 on Amazon in the last 10 months. It is a life saver for the kids on journeys in the car.

Great. Does exactly what it says on the tin

I received this last week and am for the most part thrilled with it. I will start with the 2 minor things that i have a problem with. The first being that the plugs on the end of the speakers are too big to go through the body of a speaker stand so bear this in mind when buying stands. I managed to get the plugs off and then thread the wire through but this is not ideal. Secondly if you are going to play an IPOD through it its not as loud as you would like if you like to play your music a lot. All in all though these are minor things. for the money it is FANTASTIC value and it is really easy to work and set up. I particularly like the fact that it isnt unsightly and in your face like some other types of home theatre as the speakers are relatively small and easy to place round the room. This is a great system with great sound for those on a budget and i have to say is more than loud enough if you live in a semi with neighbours attached like me. Highly Recommended.

Good picture quality and easy to use but has recording problems

I was pleased with everything about this DVD until I discovered that mine had a couple of faults (not sure if these are common faults). When recording, it often doesnt switch off after the selected program has finished recording and so it records the next program until it uses up all the disk space, then the disk keeps spinning and gets hot, and you can only stop it by switching it off at the mains. Also there is no way of knowing how much room you have available on the disk and it will accept a recording request when there is not enough room on the disk. I'm afraid to say I will be taking it back.

What a simple and outstanding machine

Having never had a home cinema system before, I was a bit daunted by the idea. Was recommended this unit and it has one of the best sounds I have heard from a TV home cinema system. Very easy to set up and use, the upscale of normal (non HD) disks is really impressive. All in all if you want supberb sound very few wires and a machine that is easy to use look nno further

does not dub dvd to vcr!

not a bad player - BUT I got caught this unit only dubs from dvd to vcr not the other(useful) way round - which is fine if for some unknown reason you want to copy dvd's to tape!

Picture quality

I bought this DVD player but took it back as the picture quality stored on it was poor! I found the instructions difficult to understand and I was very disappointed in not being able to tune my digital tv into it!

Great Idea, but I may take an axe to it!

To start, I really got ripped off by Currys, who were (I found out later) £100 more than Amazon. Why didn't I look first!?
The Music centre is a great concept, and sounds quite good, with a nice range of features, but using it is a NIGHTMARE. Setting up the wireless network properly means diving into advanced network settings and even then, it will work one minute, and not the next. The support from Philips is woeful with useless advice from Indian call-centres that do nothing to even approach the real problems. My unit then starts to spontaneously re-boot, and has random interference. They suggest changing the wireless channel, but the recommended settings don't allow this, so where do you go from there? I'm not a network consultant, for goodness sake! Contacting Phillips again just left me with"Oh, it must be faulty, then, send it back and we'll repair it" I said, no, it's a brand new unit, but their advice was just to contact the retailer, who, after literally about 20 menu options at their call-centre left me with the message"Due to reasons beyond our control, we can't connect you, goodbye" Why on earth do consumers have to put up with garbage like this? I feel like throwing the thing through Currys window then dumping the pieces on Phillps' doorstep. Be warned BUY ANOTHER MODEL!!!
If anyone from Philips or Currys read this, I'd like to say how dare you treat your customers like this? You take the money and walk away, it's disgraceful. I am seriously considering legal action. I'm a minnow in the world of big corporations but sometimes minnows have to bite back. This is typical of so many aspects of modern life. You hand over your money, and are then left to rot. Sadly, it can only get worse.

Great... for two months

I didn't expect much for the price but hoped for at least a year of use before any problems surfaced.

I've had it two months and now it fails to play the majority of discs (disc jams for 4-5 seconds at a time).

I've tried brand new discs and also used them in other players without any problems so it's definately the machine that's at fault.

You get what you pay for I suppose.

well designed player let down by screen

Great looking player including remote & car adapter. Easily changed to Multi region which was my main reason for choosing this one. Video displayed on external TV is good, but internal screen has difficulty displaying text and subtitle captions clearly, the screen is a disappointment so overall just 3 stars.

first impressions

I just received this today, courtesy of amazon.

It was very easy to setup with my philips flat screen tv, just a couple of cables, and up you go.

I lived in many countries, and therefore have an extensive collection of DVD from many regions. Thanks to the web, I was able to find very rapidly the code to key in on the remote control to have this unit enable for region 0, and all my DVD works fine...

I can see the difference with the upscaling factor, in terms of image quality... The sound quality 'sounds' great. I have tried multiple movies, like lord of the ring, and star wars, and the 'experience' is definitely better, visually and in terms of sound, than when using my old DVD player and my TC speakers..

A few comments:

* There is no HDMI cable in the box, but there is a SCART cable, and a couple of others, for example to connect the TV audio out to the device.
* The connection for external audios are conveniently located on the subwoofer, reducing the number of cables to connect to the main unit.
* The support for the main unit is too high to fit in my tv cabinet. It is easy to remove it, but there is no simple/lower replacement for it. The unit can just be put down like it is, at a small angle, but I would prefer to have a more stable support.
* Not sure yet about the fact that this system is supposed to 'mimic' a 5.1 system by projecting sounds to the wall behind the user, but it sounds good.
* The remote control power button is in fact only an 'off' button. Once the unit is in 'standby', it can only be 'waken up' by using the play button of the remote control. Strange but it works.

Dont listen to the recent reviews its a great system!!

Have had this system for a week now. The sound quality is amazing and the DVD does a great job of upscaling to 1080i!

The sub is too strong at times, really it is like nothing you would ever heard of before!

I have read a lot of bad reviews about this product but I think that the complexity of it is somewhat too high for some people, which is maybe why they are encountering problems. Philips do not released products as bad as some people say this one is!

It is very difficult to put together so if you're not very knowledgeable about these types of things get someone to help or get a professional in.

The rear speakers work fine and do a great job in presenting them sounds that you would have probably never heard without a system like this one.

There is only one real problem I have with this system and that is that the DVD system itself is very slow to operate at times and changing source can take some time.
Come on Philips bring out a hardware update!!!!

To summarize you can't expect perfection for a surround sound system that comes in at £500 but this is the closest you can get to it for this type of money!

Fantastic picture but...

Getting set-up is a nightmare. Well, we knew it would be, as we struggled
for hours to understand the handbook of our previous Philips purchase, the digi-box!! So, after making a vow to stay cool, we embarked on the setting-up of the recorder. Six hours later, our resolution blown out of the water, we finally did it!! During the six hours, I contacted the helpline ...what a joke!!!!....and the on-line FAQ (better)...Anyhow, we finally got there...marriage just about intact!! Now the positive side. The recorded picture is superb which is basically the bottom line. If you are used to PC's or digital cameras, it behaves in a similar manner. But again, some negatives, the software is primitive compared to my Fuji camera, for example. I would also endorse the comment made by another post about the remote-control. The buttons are too small and not easy to read. But the worst feature of the remote is the time-lag between pressing the button and getting action on the screen. Especially the record button!!! This seems to take ages!! In fact, at first until you are used to this delay and allow, say 5 seconds, you can panic a bit!! So, in conclusion, love the electronics....not impressed by the software...but HATE the handbook!!!

Awesome

This is a really beautiful little player and the hack is really easy to use and effective. Playback is good quality with great sound and picture. Its small but very easy to travel with for this reason. Perfect if you are looking for a multi-region travel player.