I'm never buying Panasonic again... How about LG?
 

I have a Panasonic DVD-CV52 5-disc changer that I've been reasonably happy with (until now, but I'll get to that in a minute). It plays some KVCDs within a specific bitrate range, which is the reason I bought it, and has only ever barfed on a couple of pressed DVDs, both of which I successfully replaced with new copies. On the other hand, it's very slow at changing discs (the process is kinda clumsy, too) and doing the first read. But I was willing to live with that for the convenience of being able to stick both my KVCDs in at the same time and play the whole movie without having to get off my sweet, sweet ass.

However, things are not so merry on the old recordable DVD front. Before I bought my burner I checked that my standalone could play recordable DVDs, and in the front of the manual it says it plays DVD-R and DVD-RW. This was before DVD+R(W) came out, so I assumed it wouldn't play those (and it doesn't). However, having forked out for a batch of 10 DVD-Rs and making good progress towards perfecting a decent DVD9-to-DVD5 process, I now discover this player is very picky when it comes to DVD-R discs:

The first one I did (Elephant, R1) was with DVD Shrink (slight main movie compression necessary after ripping extra audio etc.) on Fujifilm media. It plays just fine, and I assumed this meant my player would play DVD-Rs. Ha.

The second (Max Keeble's Big Move, R1) was also with DVD Shrink. Main movie did not need compression, and again I used Fujifilm. Also plays fine. Hooray, I thought.

The third (City of God, R1) was also with DVD Shink, and this time the movie had to be compressed. I used cheap-ass e-Works media. This one, I now discover, suffers dropouts every couple of minutes or so.

The fourth (The Shield Season 1 Volume 1, R1) was with DVD Rebuilder. Also on cheap-ass media, suffers dropouts every 45 seconds or so.

The fifth (The Station Agent, R1) was also with DVD-RB, and also on cheap-ass media. It suffers dropouts every 5-10 seconds, including about 2 seconds into the root menu video.

It seems my Panasonic doesn't like cheap-ass media, which is a shame because cheap-ass media is... cheap, and that's kinda the point. Problem solved, I'll just fork out CDN$3/disc for Fujifilm at Rat Shack, I thought.

But then, just out of curiosity, I opened up the manual for the standalone and read a little deeper. Turns out there's some fine-print in the specifications section that says it'll play DVD-R and DVD-RW only if it's Panasonic media burned with a Panasonic drive.

While this is probably partly a ploy to persuade me to purchase more Panasonic paraphernalia, there does seem to be an element of truth in it, since it has big problems with the cheap-ass media that plays perfectly on my neighbour's JVC DVD/VCR combo unit.

So I'm not very happy with this unit, nor with Panasonic. This is the second Panasonic DVD player I've owned that has turned out to suck, the first being totally unable to play any kind of recordable CD (-R or -RW) despite being released several years after the CD-R spec. I bought my current unit as a replacement for that one.

No more Panasonic for me. No more Panasonic DVD players, at least. I'm now looking at the LG DV7732NSC. It's $99 at Future Shop and can apparently play VCD, SVCD, CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, MP3, WMV, JPEG, Kodak... the list goes on. The one format I see it doesn't support is DVD-RAM, but I don't really care about that. I'm extremely impressed with my LG burner and figure that DVD-Rs burned with an LG burner should surely play in an LG player... (All the discs play flawlessly in my burner.)

Anyone have any experience with this model, or with LG players in general? I'd be interested to hear comments before shelling out a hundred bucks on it.

Hi SansGrip,

I don't know much about LGs, but have you looked into JVCs :?:
I have the JVC XV-F80BK 7 disk changer, and it plays just about everything.
This is the model I have: http://www.audioreview.com/Multiple,...x.aspx#reviews

It's down to ~$100.00, because it's an old model, but it's still better than many new models that are now out in the street.
It plays all my KVCDs, SVCDs, KSVCD, DVDs, and MP3s.
I have tried several DVD-R brands, like the cheap CompUSA, etc., and it plays them all.

-kwag

Hi SansGrip,

I also don't know anything about LG but why not just get a cyberhome 300 at Walmart for 49 bucks,i know its not the best player out there but for that price why not,unless of course you are only lookin for a player that holdws more then 1 dvd

@Kwag

That JVC looks like a very nice unit but my budget is extremely limited (I have about CDN$150 with which to buy a player and more blanks :mrgreen:). Also my wife is confused enough by our 5-disc changer, God knows what she'd do with a 7-disc player... ;)

I think, for the price, that LG looks (on paper) like a very good buy, so I'm gonna take one of my backups with me to test it. I don't really need a changer now that I have a DVD burner.

@bigggt

I just did a quick Google search on Cyberhome 300 and found a number of posts complaining about it :?. I think I'm gonna pick up the LG (assuming it can play the backup that causes the most problems with my current player) and if I'm not satisfied with it I'll take it back and save up for a more expensive unit.

Thanks for the tip though :).

Well, I've been playing with my new DVD player for about 30 mins and can report..... it plays everything just fine 8). I've tested DVD-Rs and my DVD-RW, and they all work without a skip. The LG web site (linked in my first post) claims it plays DVD+Rs but the manual doesn't agree. I have some +Rs and will give it a try sometime...

This unit is progressive while my old one wasn't. It makes a big difference with regard to combing -- one of the discs I tried had a fast panning/people running scene which looked pretty bad on my old unit, combing all over the place. But on this one it looks perfect :!:.

I haven't tried any of the other features like WMV/MP3, JPEG, VCD or SVCD, and haven't tried any non-standard discs at all. Will have to dig out my old KVCDs 8O.

Now I can go ahead and burn some more discs :mrgreen:.

Its probably too late now, since you've already gone and bought an LG, but I just wanted to say that I own an LG5063 (bought last year here in Scotland for £70 and (after applying an internet unlock to it :wink: ) it now happily plays anything n everything.

Hmm. Where did you find this unlock?

For future reference, I just found this page of hacks for the Toshiba SD3900, which apparently uses the same firmware as my LG 7732NSC.

There's a region code hack (burn folder to CD), a hack to play SVCDs (I think the 7732NSC does already, but I applied it anyway because "FD" sounds more all-encompassing than "74" ;)) and a hack to resume playback at the last position after the player was switched off, instead of starting the disc from the beginning.

Nifty. Now all I need is a non-R1 disc so I can test it... :mrgreen:

When burning DVD+R's, try to apply bitsetting to DVD-ROM if your writer supports that. The disc will be more compatible and should also work better in PS2 and XBOX as well.

And yes, I wouldn't go for Panasonic either :lol: To my surprise LG has been a very good brand, so this time 1+1 was more than 2.

I've read about bitsetting and am sure it would improve compatibility. Not sure my writer supports it, though. Will investigate...

Well I wasn't entirely sure if it was acceptable to post the link of a site that explains how to hack your DVD, since technically its as bad as posting a link to a movie AVI.

But anyway, since others are doing it...my LG is unlocked using instructions from http://www.area450.com/hacks.htm

Hardware discussions are fine :)
We just inform people that they are "for educational purposes" ;)

-kwag

Ahem, so documentary movies are fine too then? :lol:

If you're being pedantic, you could also argue that you can learn stuff from movies - thus making them educational. For example, Farenheit 9/11 'educated' me...

Seriously though, I understand your point. :wink:

A movie AVI is a breach of copyright law. A DVD hack is not illegal in any way, at least in Canada. There is no law preventing me from modifying a piece of equipment I own, and even if there was I'd do it anyway.

Thanks for the link :).

Me too :mrgreen:

I must be missing something, because I don't see any LG hacks on this site...

apologies for sending a wrong link

this one should be better (it relates to my DVD player but you can search on others)

http://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers....Search=Search&

EDIT this link has helpful info on LG DVD players also http://members.lycos.co.uk/ittroll/vcd.htm

EDIT END

Oh, ok. Yep, that's where I found the hack for mine. Thanks :).