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DR DVD
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FUND RAISER?
I am currently
considering buying a budget DVD player, either the Alba DVD-103 or the Mico
DVD-A980. I missed the review for the latter and was wondering which was the
better buy? My primary concerns are to get a player that has – apart from
playing Region 1 discs – good picture and sound quality, I’m pretty skint, so I
can’t afford to pay much at the minute, so it has to be a player in this price
range. I’ve seen both machines reviewed in other magazines (though only on newsagents shelves I might
add) and both models receive equally praising and damming write-ups/off… I’m
totally flummoxed so please can you help me with this most important of decisions?
Toby M., via
email (monkbat@aol.com)
You made the
right decision coming to us and not one of those Johnny-come-lately mags, we
actually take players out of their boxes and test them… In fact our expertise
in reviewing AV equipment goes back to long before DVD was even thought of, and
we have seen just about every player there is, since day one. So, having
established our impeccable credentials and deep insight into the technology, I
have to say that the answer to your question, about which player to buy, is
neither, probably.
We gave both
players a guarded thumbs up, AV performance in both cases was satisfactory but
they each had their fair share of foibles and limitations but not enough to put
anyone on a budget buying one. However things have moved on since then and they
no longer the cheapest players on the market. At the time of writing that
honour goes to the Cyber Home AD-N212, which you can get from WHSmiths and
online from www.jungle.com for only £130. It is quite basic but it fulfils your
price, multi-region and performance criteria. If you were still keen on the
other two models then I would probably plump for the Mico player on the basis
that you get a few more bangs for your bucks, including a Dolby Digital
decoder.
QUERIES
TRICKY TOSH
I have found an
outlet selling the Toshiba SD100 for £165, which appears good value. Do you
know how to convert it to play American discs? I have a Philips TV with basic
surround sound, a Philips NICAM VCR and a Sky digi box. All of them have 2
SCART sockets and the TV also has an S-Video input. I’m really confused as to
how to connect it all up and whether or not I would get the benefit of Dolby
5.1 or dts sound?
John Foot, via
email
If Region 1
playback is important to you get a model with a ‘loose’ or disabled region
lock; modding the Tosh player will void the maker’s warranty, and you’ve no
comebacks if it goes belly-up!
Connect the DVD
player directly to the TV using a SCART cable or S-Video and stereo audio
leads. The sound you get depends on the type of decoder in the TV; it’s likely
to be either analogue Dolby Surround or a pseudo spatial or 3D effect. The
SD100 doesn’t have any built-in Dolby Digital or dts decoders, so you will need
to buy a suitably equipped AV amp and speakers or package system. Connect the
satellite receiver by SCART cable to the VCR, and the VCR by SCART to the TV.
IT’S A KING
THING
I just
purchased Three Kings on the day of its release, when I got it home I put it in
my LG 2330 and found it would not play any special features, scene access or
languages, it just freezes up. It will however play the film but it has spoilt
what looks to be a packed DVD. I haven’t experienced any other problems with
the machine, I have The Matrix, The Mummy and Austin Powers 2 and they all play
without any problems at all. The DVD also plays well on my PC, I can access
everything with no problems at all, Can you shed some light on the matter?
Alan Foster,
via email
And, by
coincidence…
Just bought
Three Kings, great disc, however, during chapter 12 (the gas attack) the
picture suddenly becomes juddery; I watched the movie to the end then skipped
back to chapter 12 when it played okay. I then went to chapter 12 through Scene
Select and found that it juddered again, but if I hit rewind and then play
again it sometimes plays properly. My player is an LG 3200, it this a known
fault with the LG deck or might it be a disc problem?
Ken Arber,via
email
See, what great
value DVD is, hours of fun, even when you’re not watching movies, there’s all
the little quirks on the players and discs to play around with. There does indeed seem to be some issues
between Three Kings and LG players and we’ve seen several similar complaints on
DVD newsgroups. A couple of respondents said the player doesn’t freeze; it just
takes a long time to access the menus.
We spoke to LG
about this and …
(Still waiting
for reply/comment from LG, to come)
REMOTE
POSSIBILITY?
I have a PC
located in the middle of the house and I use it to watch DVDs, I would like to
be able to watch them on the TV, in an adjacent room, but without any wires. I
have a Logitech cordless keyboard and mouse and I have seen ‘black boxes’
advertised, which transmit video from a VCR or satellite box to other TVs in
the house, so the technology exists. It shouldn’t be a problem but nobody so far
seems to be able to help.
Anton James,
North London
Technically
there’s no reason why it cannot be done but the necessary hardware and software
would cost significantly more than a top of the line DVD player, which would do
the job better and be a lot more convenient when it comes to loading/changing
discs. There’s no problem transmitting video and sound from an AV source over a
distance of several metres. Video senders have been around for years, though
most of them fall down on audio quality. I know of no commercial system that
will preserve analogue sound, let alone transmit digital audio data. However, the biggest problem is going to be
remotely controlling the PC. It’s easy with a VCR or sat box and again there
are plenty of ‘remote senders’ on the market that pick up infra red commands
from a remote handset, convert them to radio signals and change them back to IR
at the receiver, but a PC is a lot more complicated and you would need a second
video path for the PC monitor, so you could see your mouse and DVD control
screen.
ON A ROLL
I have a
Pioneer multi-region player. When I play Region 1 discs the picture rolls on my
7-year old JVC TV. However, on a 3-year old portable TV the same discs play
fine. I’ve tried numerous things, such as adjusting the V-hold (I think), but
to no avail. Can certain televisions be incompatible with Region 1 discs, and
if so what TVs are not and is there any way I can rectify the situation?
Chris Dawson,
via email
The age of your
television is almost certainly the problem. A TV of that vintage is unlikely to
be able to display NTSC signals and I assume the Pioneer player is putting out
a ‘PAL 60’ video signal. That basically means the player converts colour
information on the disc from the American NTSC standard to PAL – the system we
use in the UK – but relies on the TV to cope with the difference in the
picture’s line and frame structure. (NTSC pictures have 525-line and a 60Hz
frame rate, compared with 625-line/50Hz
for PAL). Most recent TVs can do this due to the fact that a lot of televisions
are made for a world market and it makes sense for manufacturers to use video
processing and display microchips that will operate on both systems. I’m afraid
that the only simple solution is to buy a new TV, preferably a biggish
widescreen model, to get the full benefit from DVD.
BOLLY GOOD
IDEA?
I’m a Bollywood
fanatic and while VHS releases rarely feature subtitles, almost all DVD movies
so. It’s for this reason that I’m on the cusp of investing in DVD. One thing is
holding me back though and shop assistants don’t appear to know the answer. I
would like to be able to record a video compilation of the musical segments to
save swapping discs all the time. Given that most Bollywood movies are
region-free and NTSC, will I be able to record video clips to form my own
compilation? Is the picture converted to PAL by the DVD player for displaying
on a PAL TV? I realise this doesn’t take full advantage of DVD quality but the
convenience of not having to swap discs all the time is my main concern.
Pino Agnello,
London N13
Short answer
no, long answer… As you know it is illegal to make copies of copyright material
without permission, and the DVD industry is very keen to stop piracy since the
picture quality of DVD makes them ideal for ‘mastering’. Judging by the fact
that you say the discs are NTSC I’m guessing they are produced in the US (the
Indian subcontinent is a Region 5 locale and uses the PAL TV system), in which
case there’s a fair chance they be encoded with the Macrovision spoiler
signals, that make VCR copying almost impossible. In any case, when playing an
NTSC disc most DVDs output a raw NTSC signal, which can only be recorded on a
NTSC or multi-standard VCR, or a PAL 60 signal, which cannot be recorded on PAL
VCRs, even ones with ‘NTSC playback’ facility. Since you seem to be mostly
troubled by the notion of disc-swapping, why not invest in a DVD multichanger?
There are several to choose from, from 2 and 3-disc models up to the Sony
DVP-CX850 with a 100-disc (expandable) capacity.
CODED RESPONSE
I bought a
Hitachi 505 DVD player and it plays Region 1 and 2 discs, but how do I know if
at some point in the future it is going to lock to one region only? It all
seems a bit hit and miss, I’ve heard of models that will let you change the
code only 20 or 30 times.
Anthony Gates,
via email
There are
basically three varieties of multi-region playback. Players made by top name
manufacturers who are members of the DVD Forum generally have fixed or ‘hard’
coded processors that have to be physically modified by replacing chips or
making changes to printed circuit boards. A couple of Forum members, like
Philips, make Players that allow the region coding to be switched a limited
number of times in ‘software’ by tapping a code into the handset. This is for
the benefit of people who move from one country to another, to a different DVD
Region or ‘Locale’. The third group include players either have multi-region
playback with no restrictions or limitations straight out of the box, or can be
easily disable with a simple code; in general these models are made by
companies that are not members of the DVD Forum…
BOX COPY
Every now and
again the question of how long DVDs will last pops up and scare stories
circulate about laser ‘rot’ and ‘burn’, one such tale was doing the rounds on
the Internet a few months ago. The fact is nothing lasts forever, DVDs and CDs
are not indestructible, nevertheless, stored properly – i.e. in the same type
of ‘living room conditions of temperature and humidity – that we prefer,
upright in their protective cases, away from direct sunlight, a DVD or CD
should last at least 50 or more years. However, the real point is that even if
they did last forever what would you play them on? Home entertainment
technologies have an average lifespan of around 25 years. The chances are that
in less than a generation there will be no hardware around – outside of a
museum -- on which to play your treasured discs. How many people still have
turntables, let alone record players capable of playing 78rpm records or
cylinder recordings?
Laser rot is an
old story. It concerned a faulty manufacturing process that allowed the
reflective layer inside CDs to oxidise, it was a brief problem affecting only
couple of specialist manufacturers about ten years ago, that was quickly put
right, and has no relevance to DVD. Laser ‘burn’ is another non-story as far as
DVD is concerned and it is to do with potential problems with some makes and
type of disc used in CD recorders and CD-R/RW recorders in PCs. Look at it this
way, you probably will be able to pass on your collection of DVD to your
grandchildren, they probably won’t be able to watch them but they won’t be too
worried since they’ll be able to download anything they like, in high
definition quality, through a SKY TV neural implant for 19.99 Euros a month…
---end---
Ó R. Maybury 2000, 2310
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