Philips DVP5960 DVD Player with HDMI, 1080i Upscaling, DivX Ultra, USB direct Reviews

• Great HDTV picture

  
  By A27PWW8LA5RY8Z on 2006-07-11
  The rumor that the new Philips DVP5960 has corrected the bugs that plagued the Philips DVP5900 upscaling DVD player appears to be true! Also, the DVP5960 produces a much better picture than the DVP5900. The DVP5960 is "DivX Ultra" certified. I've tried upscaling DVD players from Sony, Samsung, and Toshiba. Only the more expensive Sony could match the DVP5960 picture quality. However, Sony DVD players are notoriously finicky about which discs they will play, while Philips is known for its "plays it all" DVD players.
  
  The DVP5960 uses a 12 bit/108 MHz video system instead of the 10 bit/54 MHz system used in the DVP5900. The 12 bit/108 MHz video system produces visibly sharper images and natural colors. The quality of the picture on my 42 inch Plasma HDTV is very impressive.
  
  When using the HDMI digital interface, I have found 480p to be the best selection. Anything other than 480p causes distortion of the picture for a disc with non-widescreen content. Selecting 480p turns off the DVD players upscaling feature and allows my HDTV scalers to format the picture correctly for my display. Also, selecting 480p restores functionality to the "format" button on my HDTV remote control, thus allowing me to select a format that produces the best picture.
  
  Use of the HDMI digital interface as opposed to the Component Video connection produces no visible difference in image quality on my 42 inch Plasma HDTV. The HDMI interface (cable must be purchased separately) can carry both video and audio, which cuts down on cables. HDMI transmits video and audio digitally; therefore, any cable that meets the minimum standard will work correctly.
  
  The DVP5960 has a USB port on the front panel that can accommodate a USB device or a flash card reader for playback of JPEG, MP3 or WMA files. You can display JPEG files with SD or HD resolution. The SD JPEG image quality is very good. The HD JPEG image quality is excellent but image display is very slow.
  
  One major complaint with DVD players concerns their inability to play damaged discs. The DVP5960 has successfully played imperfect discs that other players couldn't handle.
  
  Using the "display" button on the remote, you can view the bit rate and other interesting information about the disc being played.
  
  If the selected soundtrack on the disc you are playing is DTS (Digital Theater Sound), the analog audio output will be muted; consequently, you may need to use the "audio" button on the remote control to select a different soundtrack. DTS soundtracks are not very common in DVDs.
  
  The DVP5960 shows a noticeable pause at the layer change point when playing dual layer DVDs; however, this is not unusual for DVD players.
  
  The DVP5960 does not have an optical digital audio out or S-Video out connector.
  
  The DVP5960 seems to have replaced the DVP5900 which is no longer listed on the official Philips website. The DVP5960 chipset is MediaTek MT1389. The DVP5900 chipset is Zoran Vaddis 778.
  
  The DVP5960 provides video scaling up to 1080i. The resulting video output signal can be fed to an HD display through the HDMI digital interface. The objective in scaling is to make something out of nothing. Nearly all projectors, flat screen LCDs, plasmas and projection TVs have upscaling video processors. The issue here is quality. Scalers built into HDTVs should perform better than or equal to those in most upscaling DVD players. Scalers built into HDTVs are designed to work with that equipment's native display resolution.
  
  HDMI is about DRM (digital rights management), a euphemism for copy protection. HDMI = DVI + HDCP. HDCP is the copy protection component of the HDMI standard. HDCP encrypts the outputed DVD content to prevent unauthorized copies from being made. It is possible that with certain copy protected PCM audio qualities, the digital audio output (coaxial and optical) from HDMI compliant devices is muted. Furthermore, HD video signals may be downsampled to non-HD for non-HDCP DVI connections. HDCP compliant products are prohibited from sending HDCP protected content to analog outputs at HD resolution.
  
  The other component of HDMI is the digital interface. Although manufacturers claim otherwise, many experts say there's very little difference in image quality using a digital interface as opposed to an analog connection.
  
  For nearly a decade, manufacturers have been selling televisions advertised as HDTV, HD-Ready, HD-Capable, HD-Compatible, etc. Most of those televisions do not have DVI or HDMI digital interfaces. The FCC approved HDCP as a "Digital Output Protection Technology" on August 4th, 2004. Consequently, most HDTVs manufactured before 2004, and many manufactured before 2005 may become useless for watching true HDTV.
  
  Both the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD organizations have stated that the first movies to be released will not implement the HDCP protection flag. These may be the only DVDs that many HDTV owners will be able to view at HD resolution.
  
  Proper working with HDMI is only guaranteed with HDMI/HDCP compliant consumer products. Digital devices from different manufacturers have the possibility of differing standards which may cause problems. Vagueness in the HDMI/HDCP specification or inadequate testing may cause further problems.
  
  *** Addendum
  
  DTS (Digital Theater Sound) soundtracks are most often found in Superbit DVDs. Superbit and DTS technologies are especially beneficial with high end audio equipment and large screen high definition displays.
  
  The availability of DTS encoded DVD movies is limited. DTS encoded DVDs often cost more than their Dolby Digital (AC-3) counterpart. Discernible differences in audio quality between DTS and Dolby Digital (AC-3) are highly dependent on the encoding technique and equipment as well as your decoding equipment.
  
  The soundtrack for a DVD movie can contain Dolby Digital (AC-3), DTS, MP2, or PCM audio data. NTSC DVD players must support Dolby Digital (AC-3) and PCM soundtracks; consequently, all 525/60 (NTSC) discs must contain, at a minimum, Dolby Digital (AC-3) or PCM audio data. All other formats are optional.
  
  A DTS soundtrack is almost 4 times as large as a comparable Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack. This is because DTS audio is not compressed to the same degree as Dolby Digital (AC-3) audio. Both DTS and PCM together don't usually leave enough room for quality video encoding of a full length movie. Consequently, a disc with a DTS soundtrack will usually carry a Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack. This means that all DTS discs will work in all DVD players, but a DTS compatible player and a DTS decoder are required to play the DTS soundtrack.
  
  Most DVDs are encoded to optimize space for the feature plus added value and audio streams. Superbit utilizes the physical space devoted to added value to produce a disc with a higher bit rate video and both DTS and Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtracks. Superbit titles have a Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack (at the highest rate of 448 Kbps) and a DTS soundtrack (at the half rate of 768 Kbps). Superbit titles are recorded on dual layer discs (8.5GB storage capacity). There is usually a noticeable pause during the layer change as the player's laser adjusts to read the second layer. The length of the pause varies from disc to disc and player to player.
  
  

• Great for playing all formats.

  
  By A6VPK7X53QNAQ on 2006-07-09
  I bought this DVD player in mid May and 3 weeks later with very nominal usage my player just died in the middle of a movie. I had it connected to a top of the line surge protector so the problem was not a power surge. I could not even get the disc out. When I took it back to Circuit City they assured me it was probably just a bad one and gave me a new one. I could have got another brand but for the features and price I could not find one I liked in the store. The new player has worked ok for the last month but it shows some jitters while switching from one HDMI set up mode to another and causes a 'green' screen to display on my plasma. Once I switch it off and then on again it has worked fine but I am prepared to have it die on me in just a few months. I did not notice any substantial improvement in picture using the HDMI cable over the component connection. In fact, if you have a progressive DVD player I doubt that you would notice too much difference in the image quality using this upconverting DVD player. I had it set to the 1080i resolution and also to the 720p and 570p. On some DVDs the 1080i performed better than the other resoulutions but on some others it did not seem to make much of a difference which makes me think that the image quality is very DVD dependent.
  
  The good:
  Plays all discs - VCDs, CD-RWs, CDs, DVDs, MP3s, Div-X and just about anything that won't play on other DVD players.
  It even has a USB connection in the front which you can use to directly plug in a zip drive or another device like a hard drive, although I have not used this feature yet.
  The bad:
  Remote is not at all user friendly. It is of cheap construction and buttons are not intuitive. I liked my Sony remote much better. Worse, the DVD player is VERY slow to respond to your pressing remote buttons. At times, I have to struggle to get it to respond.
  While changing resolutions through DVD player set up it is better not to have a disk playing in the DVD player as that causes errors.
  
  Finally, for the features and price this is a good buy if you have a lot of Div-X, VCD, DVD-RW discs and copies of original DVDs as this player plays them all. However, don't expect this player to be a life-long purchase and cross your fingers and hope you get a good piece when you buy one. In fact, I recommend buying it from a store close to you so that the return is easier.
  
  11/06/06 Update: The player has worked just fine up till now but I hardly use it more than once a week.
  11/16/08: This player is still working fine and plays all DVDs and home made movies without any problem. You can also make it region free if you like - just Google it. So I stand by my rating.
  
  

• Great HDTV picture

  
  By A27PWW8LA5RY8Z on 2006-06-14
  The rumor that the new Philips DVP5960 has corrected the bugs that plagued the Philips DVP5900 upscaling DVD player appears to be true! Also, the DVP5960 produces a much better picture than the DVP5900. The DVP5960 is "DivX Ultra" certified. I've tried upscaling DVD players from Sony, Samsung, and Toshiba. Only the more expensive Sony could match the DVP5960 picture quality. However, Sony DVD players are notoriously finicky about which discs they will play, while Philips is known for its "plays it all" DVD players.
  
  The DVP5960 uses a 12 bit/108 MHz video system instead of the 10 bit/54 MHz system used in the DVP5900. The 12 bit/108 MHz video system produces visibly sharper images and natural colors. The quality of the picture on my 42 inch Plasma HDTV is very impressive.
  
  When using the HDMI digital interface, I have found 480p to be the best selection. Anything other than 480p causes distortion of the picture for a disc with non-widescreen content. Selecting 480p turns off the DVD players upscaling feature and allows my HDTV scalers to format the picture correctly for my display. Also, selecting 480p restores functionality to the "format" button on my HDTV remote control, thus allowing me to select a format that produces the best picture.
  
  Use of the HDMI digital interface as opposed to the Component Video connection produces no visible difference in image quality on my 42 inch Plasma HDTV. The HDMI interface (cable must be purchased separately) can carry both video and audio, which cuts down on cables. HDMI transmits video and audio digitally; therefore, any cable that meets the minimum standard will work correctly.
  
  The DVP5960 has a USB port on the front panel that can accommodate a USB device or a flash card reader for playback of JPEG, MP3 or WMA files. You can display JPEG files with SD or HD resolution. The SD JPEG image quality is very good. The HD JPEG image quality is excellent but image display is very slow.
  
  One major complaint with DVD players concerns their inability to play damaged discs. The DVP5960 has successfully played imperfect discs that other players couldn't handle.
  
  Using the "display" button on the remote, you can view the bit rate and other interesting information about the disc being played.
  
  If the selected soundtrack on the disc you are playing is DTS (Digital Theater Sound), the analog audio output will be muted; consequently, you may need to use the "audio" button on the remote control to select a different soundtrack. DTS soundtracks are not very common in DVDs.
  
  The DVP5960 shows a noticeable pause at the layer change point when playing dual layer DVDs; however, this is not unusual for DVD players.
  
  The DVP5960 does not have an optical digital audio out or S-Video out connector.
  
  The DVP5960 seems to have replaced the DVP5900 which is no longer listed on the official Philips website. The DVP5960 chipset is MediaTek MT1389. The DVP5900 chipset is Zoran Vaddis 778.
  
  The DVP5960 provides video scaling up to 1080i. The resulting video output signal can be fed to an HD display through the HDMI digital interface. The objective in scaling is to make something out of nothing. Nearly all projectors, flat screen LCDs, plasmas and projection TVs have upscaling video processors. The issue here is quality. Scalers built into HDTVs should perform better than or equal to those in most upscaling DVD players. Scalers built into HDTVs are designed to work with that equipment's native display resolution.
  
  HDMI is about DRM (digital rights management), a euphemism for copy protection. HDMI = DVI + HDCP. HDCP is the copy protection component of the HDMI standard. HDCP encrypts the outputed DVD content to prevent unauthorized copies from being made. It is possible that with certain copy protected PCM audio qualities, the digital audio output (coaxial and optical) from HDMI compliant devices is muted. Furthermore, HD video signals may be downsampled to non-HD for non-HDCP DVI connections. HDCP compliant products are prohibited from sending HDCP protected content to analog outputs at HD resolution.
  
  The other component of HDMI is the digital interface. Although manufacturers claim otherwise, many experts say there's very little difference in image quality using a digital interface as opposed to an analog connection.
  
  For nearly a decade, manufacturers have been selling televisions advertised as HDTV, HD-Ready, HD-Capable, HD-Compatible, etc. Most of those televisions do not have DVI or HDMI digital interfaces. The FCC approved HDCP as a "Digital Output Protection Technology" on August 4th, 2004. Consequently, most HDTVs manufactured before 2004, and many manufactured before 2005 may become useless for watching true HDTV.
  
  Both the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD organizations have stated that the first movies to be released will not implement the HDCP protection flag. These may be the only DVDs that many HDTV owners will be able to view at HD resolution.
  
  Proper working with HDMI is only guaranteed with HDMI/HDCP compliant consumer products. Digital devices from different manufacturers have the possibility of differing standards which may cause problems. Vagueness in the HDMI/HDCP specification or inadequate testing may cause further problems.
  
  *** Addendum
  
  DTS (Digital Theater Sound) soundtracks are most often found in Superbit DVDs. Superbit and DTS technologies are especially beneficial with high end audio equipment and large screen high definition displays.
  
  The availability of DTS encoded DVD movies is limited. DTS encoded DVDs often cost more than their Dolby Digital (AC-3) counterpart. Discernible differences in audio quality between DTS and Dolby Digital (AC-3) are highly dependent on the encoding technique and equipment as well as your decoding equipment.
  
  The soundtrack for a DVD movie can contain Dolby Digital (AC-3), DTS, MP2, or PCM audio data. NTSC DVD players must support Dolby Digital (AC-3) and PCM soundtracks; consequently, all 525/60 (NTSC) discs must contain, at a minimum, Dolby Digital (AC-3) or PCM audio data. All other formats are optional.
  
  A DTS soundtrack is almost 4 times as large as a comparable Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack. This is because DTS audio is not compressed to the same degree as Dolby Digital (AC-3) audio. Both DTS and PCM together don't usually leave enough room for quality video encoding of a full length movie. Consequently, a disc with a DTS soundtrack will usually carry a Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack. This means that all DTS discs will work in all DVD players, but a DTS compatible player and a DTS decoder are required to play the DTS soundtrack.
  
  Most DVDs are encoded to optimize space for the feature plus added value and audio streams. Superbit utilizes the physical space devoted to added value to produce a disc with a higher bit rate video and both DTS and Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtracks. Superbit titles have a Dolby Digital (AC-3) soundtrack (at the highest rate of 448 Kbps) and a DTS soundtrack (at the half rate of 768 Kbps). Superbit titles are recorded on dual layer discs (8.5GB storage capacity). There is usually a noticeable pause during the layer change as the player's laser adjusts to read the second layer. The length of the pause varies from disc to disc and player to player.
  
  

• In plain English

  
  By A16YJ9X6585G0D on 2006-06-23
  I was thoroughly impressed with this unit and about to buy it, until I saw it in person.
  
  The other reviewer pointed out that this DVD player had an HDMI output and talks about HDCP. He also mentions that there are problems with digital sound.
  
  Perhaps the upshot of this is that this unit doesn't have an optical audio output in favour of the HDMI's sound carrying capability.
  
  Great if you don't mind using your TVs speakers, but a bit of a headache if you use a home theatre receiver and/or have a TV set with DVI input (DVI and HDMI are compatable).
  
  There is a coax output for the audio signal if you don't mind using that feed to the receiver for your audio signal.
  
  So, you are set with this unit if your TV has the HDMI input or you don't mind using the coax feed for the audio signal.
  
  Actually, I own a Philips DVP5140 and an OppoOPDV971H. In some ways, I think this unit compares to the Oppo from my experience with both the 5140 and the Oppo.
  
  You won't go wrong at this price, especially as people are discussing the new generation of HD (blu ray and HDDVD).
  
  

• Fantastic Value w/ USB and Broad Media Compatibility

  
  By A34J2RNOPGZQDS on 2007-08-12
  I bought this after being incredibly satisfied with its pseudo-predecessor, the Philips DVP642 DVD Player. The reasons I loved that player was that it played just about anything I threw at it. I could take DVD's I bought and convert them to DIVX or XVID and play 6 movies, or twenty TV shows on a single disc. It would also happily play all of my mp3's and jpgs I burned to data DVD's and CD's. I don't use the picture functionality much, but it makes for a great slideshow/screensaver.
  
  Anyway, the DVP5960 has all of that functionality and more. Here are the top three reasons I recommend this DVD player and the reason I gave it 5 out of 5 stars:
  
  #1: like it's predecessor, the DVP5960 is cheap. It makes a great birthday, Christmas or wedding present. I've probably bought 6 or 7 of the DVP642's to give away, and will likely do the same for the DVP5960 over the next couple of years.
  
  #2: this sucker plays just about anything you throw at it. The DVP5960 will happily trudge through scratched or non-standard DVD's that other DVD players would scoff at. (Especially the DRM-happy Sony players)
  
  It plays NTSC, PAL, Burned DVD's and CD's, and even burned *DATA* DVD's and CD's which can hold thousands of pictures, hundreds of mp3s, 15-25 television shows or 4-8 movies per DVD (compressed, like in divx or xvid formats.) There is a slew of software which will convert your legally-bought DVD's to these compressed DIVX formats, as well as all kinds of free content you can download off the internet.
  
  I'ts pretty cool to throw in a DVD and watch an entire season of your favorite show without changing the disc. Also, I found that the DVP642 occasionally had problems rendering certain .avi's. The DVP5960 seems to have improved it's codecs and consequently, every video I used to have a problem with plays beautifully on the DVP5960.
  
  #3: This is the coolest feature to me: The USB port. The product literature suggests the USB port is there to hook up mp3 players and cameras, and play mp3's or display pictures from them. As a test, I threw a few .avi video files on a 2 gig USB stick and plugged it in. I was delighted to see the DVP5960 pick up the videos on the stick with absolutely no problems. In fact, it loaded and played them much faster than it read my DVD's.
  
  Next, I took a little external 80 gigabyte hard drive I had, loaded it up with mp3's, jpg's, mpg's and avi files (divx, xvid, etc) and enthusiastically plugged it in. After a few seconds trying to recognize the drive, it displayed "Disk Type Unsupported" on the screen. Doh!
  
  Demoralized, I wondered why the USB stick worked and the external drive did not. The next day I realized the main difference between my external drive and the USB memory stick was the file structure. USB sticks generally default to either the FAT or FAT32 file system. However, Windows XP likes to format drives to NTFS, a proprietary Microsoft file system. In fact, XP will not allow you to format a drive to FAT or FAT32 through it's GUI. It does provide instructions to do so via the command line (start-->run-->'cmd'), but after four hours of formatting my drive to FAT32, it failed. I did some research and found out that although a common misconception is that FAT32 can only format a disk up to 32 gigabytes or so, it can actually support drives up to 2 terrabytes. (2000 gigabytes.)
  
  Do a search for a free program called "fat32format.exe" and run it from the command line on your external USB hard drive. It formatted my 80 gig drive it in about 30 seconds.
  
  After doing this, I loaded up the drive again with mp3's, jpg's and several dozen movies and television shows, crossed my fingers and plugged it into the DVP5960.
  
  I clicked the USB button, waited a few seconds while it tried to recognize the drive, and much to my delight, displayed the full contents of my 80 gig external drive! As I type this, my DVP5960 has been reading videos off that external drive for about 12 hours now. This alone makes this DVD player worth it to me.
  
  As others have said, these drives do seem to break down after a period of heavy use. With the DVP642, I think I heard of two burning out, each running for about two years before they gave out. If you make sure they don't get to hot (provide ventilation) I think you can limit this. But frankly, I am more than willing to pay $70.00 every two years for the broad compatibility and USB functionality this drive provides. And who knows, maybe this new model will have a longer shelf life. Time will tell.
  
  If you're looking for a drive that will run just about anything you throw at it, this is the drive for you. I have messed with many, many DVD drives, and I simply cannot recommend this drive enough.
  
  
• More technical specifications
  By A2Q89DEW2Y91A7 on 2007-03-05
  When shopping for a new DVD player I felt this Amazon page was lacking some vital information. Here is more information from the Phillips brochure.:
  
  DVD Player with Video Upscaling up to 1080i
  HDMI DivX
  Picture/Display
  *Aspect ratio: 4:3, 16:9
  *D/A converter: 12 bit, 108 MHz
  *Picture enhancement: High Def (720p, 1080i), Progressive Scan, Smart Picture, Video upsampling, Video upscaling
  Sound
  *D/A converter: 24 bit, 192 kHz
  *Signal to noise ratio: 90
  *Distortion and Noise (1kHz): 65 dB
  *Crosstalk (1kHz): 70 dB
  *Dynamic Range (1kHz): 80 dB
  *Sound System: Dolby Digital
  *Frequency response: 30-20000 Hz
  Video Playback
  *Playback Media: CD, CD-R/CD-RW, Video CD/SVCD, DVD, DivX, DVD+R/+RW, DVD-R/-RW
  *Compression formats: MPEG1, MPEG2, DivX 3.11, DivX 4.x, DivX 5.x, DivX 6.0, DivX Ultra
  *Video disc playback system: NTSC, PAL
  Audio Playback
  *Playback Media: CD, MP3-CD, MP3-DVD, CD-R/RW, WMA-CD
  *Compression format: Dolby Digital, MP3, PCM, WMA
  *MP3 bit rates: 32 - 256 kbps
  Still Picture Playback
  *Playback Media: DVD+R/+RW, DVD-R/-RW, CD-R/RW, Picture CD, Kodak Picture CD
  *Picture compression format: JPEG
  *Picture enhancement: Flip photos, Rotate, Zoom, Slideshow with MP3 playback, High Definition Resolution
  Multimedia Applications
  *Multimedia connections: USB memory class device
  *Playback Formats: DivX, MP3, JPEG Still pictures
  Connectivity
  *Rear Connections: Analog audio Left/Right out, Composite video (CVBS) output, HDMI output, Digital coaxial out, ComponentVideo out Progressive
  Convenience
  *Child Protection: Parental Control, Child Lock
  *On-Screen Display languages: English, Mexican Spanish, Canadian French
  Accessories
  *Included Accessories: 2 x AAA Batteries, Audio/Video cable, Quick start guide, Remote Control, World Wide Warranty leaflet, User Manual, Product Registration Card
  Dimensions
  *Set dimensions (W x H x D): 435 x 37 x 235 mm
  *Packaging dimensions (W x H x D): 490 x 82 x 320 mm
  Power
  *Power supply: 120V, 60Hz
  *Power consumption: < 10 W
  *Standby power consumption: < 0.8 W
  *
  HDMI for simple AV connection
  HDMI stands for High Definition Multimedia Interface. It is a direct digital connection that can carry digital HD video as well as digital multichannel audio. By eliminating the conversion to analog signals it delivers perfect picture and sound quality, completely free from noise. HDMI is fully backward-compatible with (Digital Video Interface) DVI.
  Video Upscaling up to 1080i
  With Video Upscaling you can increase the resolution of SD (Standard Definition) video signals that DVD uses to HD (High Definition) so you'll be able to see more details thanks to a sharper, more true-to-life picture.The resulting HD video output signal can be fed to an HD display through HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface).
  High definition JPEG playback
  With High Resolution JPEG playback, you can show up to 2 Megapixel resolution on your Flat TV (FTV). Now you can view your digital pictures in their true resolution, without loss of quality or details.
  Progressive Scan
  Progressive Scan doubles the vertical resolution of the image resulting in a noticeably sharper picture. Instead of sending a field comprising the odd lines to the screen first, followed by the field with the even lines, both fields are written at one time. A full image is created instantaneously, using the maximum resolution. At such a speed, your eye perceives a sharper picture with no line structure.
  Multi-format Movies with DivX
  Multi-format playability allows you to play most disc formats for maximum disc compatibility and viewing pleasure.
  DivX Ultra certified
  DivX Ultra combines DivX playback with great features like integrated subtitles, multiple audio languages, multiple tracks and menus into one convenient file format.
  Music: Windows Media(tm) Audio
  Multi-format playability allows you to play most disc formats for maximum disc compatibility and listening pleasure.
  Picture CD with MP3 Playback
  Picture CD is a CD-R or CD-RW disc on which you can store your MP3 and digital pictures. When inserting a Picture CD in the DVD player, a screen menu will pop up, showing your JPEG's and/or MP3 files on the disc. Just select the music and pictures files you wish to enjoy and press play or OK. You can watch your pictures on TV with your music playing simultaneously.
  
  
• USB makes this player a steal
  By A2ZI9VAUN7YVYN on 2006-08-22
  USB:
  The primary reason I bought this DVD player was because of its ability to play off USB devices. The specs indicate it will read jpegs, MP3s, and WMAs off a USB flash drive. It will also read off a FAT32-formatted external hard drive as long as it is externally powered and it will also play divx/xvid from USB. I'm using a 250GB Seagate HDD inside a (warranty-voided) Maxtor enclosure. The divx/xvid playback works perfectly and no stuttering. The interface for the USB is pretty bad though. It will only give you 8 characters of the filename and only 4 filenames at a time.
  
  DVD Playback:
  No issues, but I wouldn't recommend this player if your only using this for DVD Playback. One should take advantage of the divx/xvid and USB capabilities, otherwise, why buy this? Some people have complained about lack of DTS decoding, but the vast majority of the public are fine w/Dolby Digital. It's a $80 machine after all. Like many DVD players, there's a region free hack (google it!) I don't have a very good TV and can only use composite, so I can't comment on the upscaling.
  
  Remote Control:
  I need to point the remote directly at the player to get it to work. The buttons you use the most (up,down,left,right,enter) are near the top where your thumb should land. Left/Right double as RW/FF when applicable and run at 2/4/8/16/32x which works on divx/xvid as well as dvd. The "enter" button is a huge 0.5inch diameter circle. Play/Pause/Stop/Next/Back are right underneath and also "thumb accessible". Would have liked a backlight though. There is no volume amplifier, so you will need at least 2-3 remotes (TV/DVD Player/Sound System). Overall, I'm happy with it.
  
  Overall Impressions:
  You get alot for $80. It is a steal if you're using the USB to play divx/xvid, something that only a fraction of DVD players can do. And those that do are generally international players. Bad USB interface though. No complaints w/DVD player. Not much to say about it other than you can do a region-free hack. Even though the remote has bad response, I like the fact that all the commonly used buttons are all around the thumb area and the buttons I use the most are bigger.
  
  
• Nice picture but no resume function
  By A210PRFGUD4EKD on 2007-01-22
  I bought this to go with my nice new 1080p TV and I wanted it for it's upscaling capabilities. Annoyingly, it only upscales to 1080i so doesn't make the full use of the TV. However the picture still looks very good like that so the whole upconvert DVD player is definitely the way to go.
  
  The reason I hate this player is that it has no resume function - if you are partway through a disk (often happens to us as we watch TV shows on DVD where there are many episodes to a disk and we watch one or two per evening) it will forget where you are when you power the thing off. Our last player ( a progressive-scan Sony) would remember your spot on the five last disks you watched and just automatically return you there when you put the disk in, or power it back up. It's a feature we realize (now that we don't have it) that we cannot live without so this thing is going on Craigslist and we are buying a 1080p upscaling model (making full use of the TV) that *does* have the resume function.
  
  Also, the remote is also not intuitive, it doesn't come with an HDMI cable and it's slow and unresponsive. I hate it.
  
  
• A COLLECTION OF GOOD AND BAD POINTS
  By A2DJD3C6ANHKFP on 2006-08-15
  I love my Philips 642 (which I use with the bedroom TV) and since my Zenith player in the living room was giving me trouble I thought I'd try this model. Sadly, it's gonna go back -
  
  GOOD POINTS
  
  Great picture quality. I haven't tried the upscale feature. My HD set only has DVI and I don't feel like buying an adapter, especially since (supposedly) the HDMI output on the player cuts off the coax digital audio output if you use it. Groovy if you've got a HDMI amp you can snake it to, I don't.
  
  Hackable. Simple to turn off the region code and play PAL discs, and the PAL conversion is the best I've seen, even better than the 642. Very nice if you have import discs.
  
  MP3 playback supports DVD mp3 discs, and sounds GREAT. The menu is a bit crude (like almost every DVD player is when it comes to mp3) but better than most. It at least displays the bitrate and total files in folder. It also allows you (via the "display" button) to select single, shuffle, folder and repeat folder options. That is an EXTREMELY nice option, since most of the time I only want to hear one folder (album) and damn near no other player I've come across features this.
  
  I haven't messed much with the DivX playback, but the little I did worked fine.
  
  CONS
  
  Audio occasionally mutes on my burned DVD-Rs and RWs. BIG drag. This may just be a defect with this particular machine, and I'll try another before giving up on this model. Otherwise it doesn't seem to have any problems reading them.
  
  Biggest complaint - NO DTS OUTPUT. WTF?? Even the cheapest chinese throwaway players offer this. I don't have a HUGE collection of discs with DTS, but enough to make this a BIG drawback (since I happen to prefer DTS when available). Don't know what they were thinking with that one.
  
  Oh, and the remote is pretty lame . . . . not as bad as the 642 but still cheap and awkward.
  
  If the above drawbacks aren't dealbreakers I'd say go for it. For an under $100 player it's got a lot of nice qualities.
  
  
• A big step forward from DVP642
  By A3TU2PWKE8GBAK on 2006-10-21
  Philips DVD players are my most favorite for two reasons, 1. they are cheap and 2. they can play DIVX and can be made region free gracefully. I am user of DVP642 for last one year and even though I enjoyed the flexibility of playing all sort of DVD/DivX files thru it, I never liked the picture quality/menu browsing much. Now, with this new model, menu browsing is much faster, discs loads way faster and not too mention picture quality also improved greatly.
  To add to my pleasure, there is a nice little USB port in front of the player, so for me, no more burning huge divx movies in CD's/DVD's. I just copy them in a USB thumbdrive and plug them in to my DVD player..voila!
  On a not so brighter side, the player does nto support DTS out of the box. But a quick upgrade of firmware fix that problem. Also, lack of S-Video out/Optical out can tick off some users.
  Overal, an excellent purchase for the price.
  
  
• Would have been 5 stars if the USB interface worked reliably...
  By A1W8V6YOOYEXC8 on 2007-01-07
  I receieved a DVP-5960/32 as a Christmas gift. In order to avoid having to burn DVDs or CDs, I purchased a high speed 2GB USB storage solution which consists of a Kingston 120X Ultimate SD Card and a Crucial Hi-Speed USB SD/MMC Card Reader from Amazon (tested read peformance is 16MB/second). The USB device must be formatted as FAT32 for the DVD player to read it (NTFS not supported).
  
  I was experimenting and used AutoGK 2.40 to encode/compress a George Michael Video from a DVD. I encoded it into 4 ea. 700MB Xvid files and included the native AC3 5.1 and stereo MP3 audio streams. That, I figured would put it to the test as the video rate will be higher than typical. One of the videos that has rain falling skips terribly (audio and video) when the rain is present (i.e., the rain aggrevates the compression algrorithm resulting in a lot of video updates). Once it flips to a scene without rain, its plays fine until the rain reappears. Next, I burned the avi file onto a DVD. The DVD plays the same AVI file fine... skip free during the rain. I suspect this problem is due to insufficient read-ahead and caching of USB data (likely a software design flaw). I'm curious, has anyone else experienced problems playing videos via USB when they work fine on DVD? I disappointed as this seems like software development 101 to me and the engineers at Philips should have addressed this long ago. Then again, this might be due to a poor h/w interface design.
  
  Also, the player doesn't support long file names. There is aftermarket firmware which supports this. That makes me wonder how hard it would have been for Philips to implement. Can you say Lazy?
  
  I wanted this player for the USB interface. I've read other comments around the net about mixed results with various USB devices. This should have been tested more thouroughly by the Philips before releasing this player. USB is a mature well understood interface. Hence, there is no excuse for interoperability issues. I would have given it 5 stars had the USB been more reliable. This player is a GREAT value for the price. It's unfortunate it has the USB design flaws.
  
  FYI: I'm running the Philips stock 37.06.42.29 firmware.
  
  
• This device is slow...
  By A1PMPB3NV8SJ0V on 2007-06-08
  I purchased the Philips DVP5960 player based on reading the reviews and I had high expectations for this product. When I received it, the device was SLOW. It took a good 45 seconds for this player to load a DVD with divx files. Once I started playing the divx files, I noticed the player wasn't able to handle divx files with high bitrates. The player would drop frames to compensate to keep the audio in sync with the video; which wasn't always successful, the audio would sometimes lose sync with the video.
  
  The second problem I experienced with this player, was playing normal DVD movies. After awhile, when a movie has been playing for 45+ minutes, the video would start to pixelate and the audio would drop in and out as if there was a scratch on the DVD (which wasn't the case). To be sure there was nothing wrong the movie, I put that same disc in another player and played the movie from start to the same point where it dropped out, and my other DVD player didn't give me any problems.
  
  The last and final gripe I had with this product was the USB (one of the primary reasons I bought this player). For starters, the USB speed is 1.1, it's not 2.0 so this was problematic as the video/audio would sometimes skip when playing a divx file, as it can only transfer the data from the USB device to the player so fast. The other problem I had was with the interface. When you browse for a file on the USB device, the UI would only display the first 5-6 characters of a file name, and this makes it extremely difficult to navigate around and figure out what is what unless you go through each file individually.
  
  Overall, needless to say, I wasn't all that impressed with this player, and I ended up sending it back to Amazon and bought an Oppo DV-981HD Universal DVD Player with HDMI, 1080p Up-Converting, with DivX.
  
  
• Poor HD JPEG Viewer.
  By A1CGTOUKHJ9EBU on 2006-08-25
  I was primarily and desperately searching for an HD JPEG viewer, and so the following review was written based soley on that alleged feature of this player:
  
  PROBLEMS:
  
  Paging down (or up) through the list of JPEG files doesn't support holding down the key for a repeated page-down. You have to hit the button once for each page-down.
  
  Sometimes paging up and down through the list of files just hangs the system, necessitating an eject-disk to solve the problem.
  
  Painting JPEGs on the screen is really slow -- like 4 to 8 seconds (or more!) for my "average" size jpegs (like 1280x1024), painting from top to bottom in slow motion. To make matters worse, there's no way to control for how long each picture is displayed. Default picture display before moving onto next picture is apparently hardcoded at 4 seconds (after picture is finally finished painting). What this means, for all practical purposes, is that you're sitting around watching the PAINTING more than the VIEWING of the whole picture!!!! This is pretty much the deal-killer for me. Why they can't paint each JPEG into a buffer in the background, and then just whip it up onto the screen, is beyond me. Lame lame lame lame lame! If it's going to do HD JPEG, it MUST do it faster than this!!!!
  
  Only 648 pictures per folder supported, ignores everything after that. This limitation is not listed in the manual.
  
  Apparently, non-JPEG files in the folder result in a four-second blanking out of the screen when they come up for playback. I'm talking files that don't even have a JPG extension.
  
  Long filenames are not handled gracefully. On a burnt CD, the long filenames are cut off after 14 characters or so. From a USB device thumb drive, the long filenames are mangled back to 8.3-with-a-tilde hell. Again, these limitations are not listed in the manual, in fact the manual clearly states that 30 character filenames are supported.
  
  When in shuffle mode, cannot backtrack to the previous picture or pictures once you've gone beyond it.
  
  Pressing prev/next in JPEG Preview mode works only sometimes. According to the manual, it should page through thumbnail images, 12 at a time. I only got this to work about half the time. Can you say, "buggy firmware"?
  
  No way to get any picture info in the middle of the slideshow, you have to stop the slideshow!
  
  Shuffle mode works, but apparently no way to select "shuffle" and "repeat folder" at the same time. When in shuffle mode, slideshow stops when all files have been displayed.
  
  There doesn't seem to be any way to manually flip from picture to picture. The slideshow starts automatically. You can press Pause, then Next Picture, but at that point Pause is undone, and automatic playback resumes.
  
  The included remote control was lame. For instance, the button marked "Display" did two distinctly different functions, depending on where I was at the time, and neither function was what I was intuitively expecting (like maybe "display" some info about the JPEG file while in a slideshow? Nah, forget it! That feature's not available at all, much less assigned to the "Display" button!) Also, at a normal distance and angle from the DVD player, the remote seemed to frequently not function, and I had to repeated press keys to get them to work. Maybe it shipped with weak batteries, I neither know nor care at this point. And, of course there is no indicator light on the remote to let you know whether a signal is being sent or not.
  
  The manual is truly godawful. Not the least of its problems is that it was neither written nor proofread by an English-language speaker.
  
  When pausing a picture, the "pause" symbol hangs in the upper-right of the screen forever. So if you thought you could bypass all the limitations mentioned above, and just pause on a single picture and show it for a while, like a work of art, too bad -- you have to deal with lameness here too. No nice clean still pictures for YOU! Oh, and to add insult to injury, if you pause a picture too long, the "screen saver" comes on, and disrupts your entire slideshow.
  
  And now for the good news:
  
  The picture browser does show "x of y" information when browsing the file list. Whoopee.
  
  An 800 pixel-tall image showed up full height on a 720p display (unlike on the Samsung HD860). Interestingly, an image that is only 480p tall, also displayed full-height on my 720p set! This "upscaling" actually looks pretty good and is not too pixelated at all. At least they did one thing right.
  
  Dang, but the JPEGs look great! Truly stunning -- Picture quality is excellent. If you're trying to display a limited number of pictures, and don't want/expect/need any additional features at all, this would be a nice JPEG viewer. OK, two things right.
  
  No need to manually switch from SD to HD, like with the Samsung HD860.
  
  
• Amazing for the price - reliability TBD...
  By A1UJZATGEV6U1Z on 2007-04-23
  There is no longer any doubt after using this unit for a few days that (within this price range) it is THE DVD player to have if you are a geek who loves movies and don't want technology and movie companies telling you what you can and cannot play on equipment you buy.
  
  Everything others have said so well in other reviews is true: it plays virtually everything you throw at it, especially after the region-free hacks and firmware upgrades (if necessary).
  
  It's so insanely open to what it will play that now with the USB input it doesn't even have to be on disc-based media anymore!
  
  There are only a few points that might reduce my review from 5 stars and might or might not apply to you:
  
  1) whether the lack of USB 2.0 (the player's input) and lack of long filename compatibility will end up being a long-term annoyance. Most videos, especially taken from pen/thumb drives will play without an issue (all is well with mine so far). If you're looking to use USB hard drives, you will have to make some adjustments with no guarantee of success to get things to play well because the port hardly supplies any power (you must supply external power for USB drives), is only compatible with FAT32, and is USB 1.1 which may choke or stutter on some drives or complex, high-bandwidth files. In future players, as the tech gets even less expensive, maybe USB 2.0 and long filenames might be implemented.
  
  2) High-end equipment. For us poor slobs who only still have 4:3 TVs and no high-end home theater setups, we're not going to notice or care if the picture/sound hookups are marginally less good or exact than some high-end Oppo or other "specially modded" region/format free player. Based on how much of an audio/videophile you are, your mileage may vary although many are very happy with it even in a higher-end system.
  
  3) The big reliability question, which is probably a lot of the reason this product doesn't have a higher overall rating. No way to answer this (yet). Be aware that Philips' warranty is only 90 days. If you purchase on certain credit cards, this may be extended automatically. If you are willing to shell out more for some sort of protection plan (caveat emptor on those) this may be an option. Or, if you're not too mad that this inexpensive player doesn't last as long as it should, you can replace it. But it may be destined to live long and give you enjoyment for years. It's a risk.
  
  (EDIT TO ADD: Good news? I just registered the DVD player through Philips' website and when I got my "receipt" it claimed the player was warrantied for 1 YEAR parts and labor. Is this a mistake or true? Not sure when the warranty documentation in the manual says 90 days (perhaps the manual is the one in error?). Legally I wonder if I could hold Philips to this...hopefully never will have to find out.)
  
  I think it's incredible that my first DVD player (still with me!) cost nearly $200 in 1999 and this one, which makes the old one look like a joke in terms of what it can do, ended up being far less than half that amount!
  
  Now, I don't know how I got along without it.
  
  If it lasts, it's one of the best electronics purchases I've ever made.
  
  EDIT: Over a year later, and it's still going strong. Hope I don't jinx it by editing this though (heh heh). Also, it seems to have been eclipsed by the Philips DVP5982 1080p Upscaling DVD Player, and might actually be cheaper.
  
  
• Don't waste your time and money
  By AUFYOGIUBRTX on 2007-05-18
  No resume function; slow start-up (sometimes Windows is faster!); shoddily made... I'm about to return my second unit, with little confidence that it'll last for long. I bought it in September; by December it was malfunctioning; I received the replacement in January; the replacement started malfunctioning last week.
  
  Philips' return process would strain anyone's patience. First -- after an endless voice-recognition phone menu finally gets you to a real person -- you're asked to describe the problem, you're given a return authorization number, and told that someone will call back in 24-48 hours. Unless you happen to be there to answer the phone, it's another visit to their endless voice-recognition system. If you're lucky, the first person you call will be able to find your record; more likely, you'll have to hang up and try again. Finally, you get issued a second return authorization number and treated to another 24-48 hour wait for the mailing label to be emailed to you. Then a 3 week wait for the replacement unit.
  
  Philips acts like a company that has no competition. Bring on the competition!
  
  
• Love it and hate it
  By A2DH73EIY6ZU2E on 2007-05-23
  Rarely has there been a product I so loved and hated at the same time. This device has one MAJOR pro and several MAJOR cons.
  
  Pro: USB port! You can stick a flash memory device or even a hard drive into it and access all the files on that device -- including playing DivX movies off it. This is a HUGE positive and the reason for my purchase. But...
  
  Cons: 1. Long filenames are NOT supported for that flash/hard drive. 2. No S-Video out for those of us who don't yet have a hi-def TV. 3. Horrible little remote -- few buttons, weak signal, just awful. 4. Flimsy-feeling player.
  
  How to rate such a product, with one GREAT feature, several big weaknesses, and a good price? I'll compromise and give it a "3". It may just be the cheapest way to get a hard drive's worth of DivX movies over to your TV. But it could have been so much better.
  
  
  
• Unbelievable Picture!
  By AJWA66M37EI1C on 2006-11-15
  I bought this to pair with a new Sony SXRD-KDS60XBR2 (full 1080P) television. I'd read good reviews on upscaling, but after seeing so many poorly connected HD TVs in the stores, I wasn't expecting much, even from this. But I wanted to move my current DVD player along with the old TV and decided to give this one a shot. Oh Man! Not only does the upscaling produce a fantastic picture from the DVDs, but it does a pretty good job on DiVX and even VCD (for what's it's worth). As with everything, the quality of the source material has a great effect on the resultant image - DiVX and VCD don't shine like DVD. One note for you - make sure you go through all the options with you first start up the device. It does not default to 1080i upscaling. Also, for the absolute best quality, go with "super-bit" DVDs. An overcompressed movie will still look over compressed, even when on this marvelous peice of hardware. Highly recommended!
  
  
• Amazing Player -- Best Feature USB Support !
  By A3O06HPRMR5BOO on 2006-11-28
  This player is amazing.. Plays almost everything you can download from the internet. DIVX Quality was near perfect with Dolby Surround n Stereo. Best feature i liked was the USB Support.. So if you buy something online and download it as MPEG4 or any format as a matter of fact (not Real etc of course).. Don't need to burn a DVD.. Just move it to a USB drive and hook it on.. Browse the movie via the remote and here you go.. No frame refreh problems.. no flaky picture.. almost perfect.. If you buy it now.. you will get the latest firmware.. if you don't have the latest download it off Philips USA support website.. Even an IPOD hooked with the USB dongle works.. just browse to the iTunes Music folder and there you have it.. all the MP3 with ID3 tags.. i definitely recommed it for the proce.. even though i got a decent deal at Circuit City during Black Friday shooping...
  
  
• Best upconverting DVD player with Divx/Xvid and USB drive support
  By A3L9CDI9JOLC2B on 2006-12-21
  I think this is the best and may be the only DVD player at this price and with features like
  
  1. Plays most file formats(Divx, xvid, avi, DAT) common on internet.
  
  2. USB port rocks. Just copy the Divx file on a flash drive and play it. No need to burn DVDs. It works with external powered USB drives too. I've tested it with my 400Gb drive with tons of video on it. Make sure the drive is formatted FAT32 as primary partition and powered on before connecting. I used swissknife utility to format the drive.
  
  3. Up converts the DVDs to 720p and 1080i HDTV resolutions.
  
  The first two features were most important to me and I'm very happy with it so far.
  
  
  
  
• So far so good
  By AAV3HU72C3R3G on 2007-03-29
  I bought this because the previous Philips DivX player (the entry level one) died after a year or so. It played most movies I tried. This one plays everything, though, and I have tried multiple formats of mpeg4 compression: divx, xvid, etc. I have never seen anything that didn't work. Further, I've not tried a DVD disk, be it +RW, +R, or -R that did not work.
  
  I've never used the HDMI output.
  
  I have used the USB port and regularly watch movies streamed off an external hard drive.
  
  For some people the ability to play beyond standard DVD format will be useless but to me it's critical. I've had this player for about 6 months and if it died tomorrow I'd probably end up buying it again--even though it would only have lasted six months!
  
  
• Does NOT support any HD quality videos
  By A3SYH64A7ORXZ0 on 2006-10-07
  it's great if you only want a DVD player that can play DVD quality videos (480p/30 or up to 4Mbps) and comes with HDMI, upconverting, and USB 1.1.
  
  it can't play any HD quality (720p or 1080i), more than 4Mbps, or more than 480p/30 videos on CD/DVD or via USB.
  
  you can buy it now to enjoy DVD quality videos, and use it until a Blu-ray or HD DVD player (hopefully with DivX and USB support) becomes available and/or more affordable.
  
  or don't even bother if you can't live with the facts that:
  
  1. it can't play more than 4Mbps videos on CD/DVD or via USB. i assume its video processor isn't fast enough.
  2. it can't play 720p or 1080i videos on CD/DVD or via USB. it rejects these as "resolution not supported".
  3. it can't automatically or manually adjust the aspect ratio for some DVD contents (previews and bonus features).
  4. it's USB 1.1 (up to 12Mbps). but it probably doesn't matter since it can't play more than 4Mbps videos anyway...
  
  
• Good DVD Player
  By A3K9XUGLIU77N6 on 2007-01-08
  1. Its low cost DVD player with good features
  2. Pro: Play all formats, HDMI Upconvert to 1080i, USB input, region free
  Upconvert works great if you know which resolution to use. I have a Sharp 1080p LCD. I had some trouble at beginning that all movies are being stretched unless I use 480p, but after playing about 20 times with different movie with various settings, I found that the upconvert setting is depending on the the display size. Set to 480p for a 4:3 screen. 720p or 1080i for a wide screen depending on your TV. A proper setting can avoid the stretching problem. In fact, I find a wide screen movie to narrow when I set it to 480p.
  3. Con: machine too light, remote too cheap but I use all-in-one instead, USB is only 1.1, that means Dvix with 2 chennels audio. More than that, you'll have problems.
  4. The latest version works for Dolby 5.1 and TDS with HDMI. Set to all digital for coaxial output and PCM for HDMI output to TV.
  
  New information
  
  I hooked up both HDMI and component cable to my 1080p TV, I pause the movie, then switching among all settings and here are my assessment:
  There are differences among component at 480p, HDMI 480p, 720p and 1080i.
  1. Color looked better at HDMI 480p then the component cable (which is 480p) but picture quality are the same
  2. Picture quality is best at 1080i, then 720p, then 480p
  3. For a good DVD, use 1080i or 720p, but a poor quality video shows better with component cable
  4. A 4;3 video only shows correct aspect ratio only with 480p, but a wide screen video show correctly only with 720p or 1080i
  Hope these helps
  
  
• Good enough features and performance for the price
  By A1P0BR29UM4M8G on 2007-03-24
  I bought 3 of these players mainly so my parents, aunt, and grandmother can watch their weird format Chinese DVDs. I really don't know what kind of format those Chinese soap operas are in, but I know they're not standard MPEG2. All I know is that they're heavily condensed (like 10 hours of shows) and no ordinary DVD players will play them. The issue is NOT because of region code (China-produced movies are always region-0).
  
  Before buying the Philips DVD player, the only other DVD player that I knew for sure can be used to watch them are from the "GIEC" brand (I bought them from yesAsia before). But they're ridiculously expensive now (>$125). So I bought one DVP5960 from a local Bestbuy - it worked for those DVDs! And then I bought 2 more online. It really is true - you throw any piece of crap DVD/CD at the DVP5960 and it'll be played.
  
  The other two features that were useful for me are the Divx and USB. Divx is nice - even more downloaded Chinese movies my folks can watch. USB is used mainly for me. I record shows (with beyondTV) and save them as Divx files on a USB key. I find if you record at a bit rate of 800, the DVP5960's USB 1.1 speed is still fast enough to play the show without hickups. Speaking of USB 1.1, it is definitely a bit slow to display all the JPEGs from the 6+ megapixel cameras these days. It'll take a minimum of 10 seconds between each shot (assuming you're using a problem-free memory card and memory card reader). But it's still bearable.
  
  
• Versatile... And works with an iPod? Wow.
  By AKAYSVVJ63KIB on 2006-11-02
  I moved and left my Philips DVP642 back home and I thought that was great (and it had its share of problems).
  
  Missing movies, I decided to but the Philips DVP5960. Let me tell you: What an Improvement!
  
  The direct USB works great with my 2gb thumbdrive. There has been ONE movie where it had parts where it froze but I think the bitrate was too high for those moments. Other than that, all the other movies I played were great.
  
  What really surprised me, is that I loaned my DVD player out and he stored a movie on an iPod and plugged it into the DVD player via USB and it worked. This was a pleasant surpise since a lot of my friends had iPods and that they can make use of their extra space.
  
  It is a nice looking DVD player.
  
  Made region-free in less than a minute.
  
  I notice that upscaling works well with the Divx files and the movies look better than on my comp.
  
  Cons
  -Remote is different than typical remote. Cheapy
  -Don't know how to operate without remote (always keeping it in a safe place)
  
  Bottom line:
  Excellent Price. Two highlighted features: USB support and Divx.
  In the world of digital media, this DVD player is the way to go at this point in time. The less limitations of what to play, the better.
  
  
• Phillips DVP5960 DVD Player
  By A77Z8LXC0Z5ZQ on 2007-01-04
  An odd unit. First, I assumed it would have an S-Video output, and it does not (?). Out of the box, the unit turns completely off after some period of time (10 minutes, or something like that) so you can not re-start a DVD from the place you stopped or paused it. It's so dumb. I'll pour through the manual and maybe it's a power savings option I can de-select, I certainly hope so.
  
  For the first time I've bought two cheap DVD players in a row, this one and a Panasonic. I threw the Pansonic away when it totally failed (probably the power supply)after about 14 days, but it had an S-Video output! Now this Philips... hummm, I'm gonna be forced back to higher-end video equipment.
  
  One thing I noticed about both these players (compared to the $1600.00 Marantz unit that just got outdated before them, e.g., no HDMI up-sampling)... they do everything so slowly! You press the (drawer) "Open" button and there's this huge delay before anything happens... almost identical on both these units and a secondary Sony (cheap) unit I have at my computer station.
  
  Anyway, I would not recommend the Philips... too many short-cuts, too slow in operation, missing key features (no S-Video output), and that strange turning itself off feature. Not a good buy, even at these low, low prices.
  
  
• You get what you pay for
  By A34Y62MELDKGYO on 2007-01-23
  I guess they had to cut some corners in order to support all the formats they do at this price point. The big annoyance to me is the remote control apparently alternates between two codes each time you press the same button. This makes programming a learning remote to replace it almost impossible. What were they thinking by doing something whacky like that? A minor annoyance is that you have to press the play button at startup in order for the unit to return to the place in the dvd where you powered off.
  
  On the plus side, the picture looks good and it has hdmi output.
  
  
• Great DVD player
  By AWFHE5V3S5AAR on 2007-03-15
  Does what it says!. Stick your flash drive in the slot, the file list opens, select your file and it plays. No hitches. I give it 4 stars because it lacks a s-video and optical output. Component and coaxial out goes to a receiver with video upconversion to HDMI (Yamaha RXV-2700). What I cannot understand is why only Phillips thought of adding a USB port. The other DVD player manuf. must be napping! Get this player, and no more burning to DVD of divx files. Just get a large flash drive (2Gig and over) and you're good to go.
  
  
• Avoid this player!
  By A2JJLDHTBCH40G on 2007-05-03
  It all looks good for the price but beware! In addition to numerous other complaints about the unit which I can attest are true, I have had nothing but problems with this, my 2nd unit.
  
  The first unit played about 1 out of 10 dvds, and the others would just spin while the entire unit vibrated like there was an earthquake. After some very helpful tech support, like "try unplugging the unit and then plugging it in again" or, "are you sure the disc is clean?" I finally got them to replace the unit.
  
  The 2nd one arrived and worked for about a day. Then, during movie playback, the sound would drop out every 10 seconds or so until the length of the dropouts got longer and the gaps between the dropouts got smaller and finally -- no sound. Again, very helpful tech support such as "are you hitting the mute button on your tv by accident?" and "are you sure there is nothing wrong with the disc?" The problem eventually corrected itself and it worked for about 4 months as advertised.
  
  But, lo and behold, now the player will not recognize any disc. I'm going to take a sledgehammer to this thing and vow never to buy Philips products again.
  
  
• Don't toss the old DVDs
  By A1KZGAJISMN0M2 on 2007-09-01
  If you have purchased a high def TV and long for the same clarity from your vast DVD collection under the old standard format, THIS is the player for you.
  My standard format DVDs sparkle with the lift given them by this player. The lines of resolution are hiked up to nearly match the high-def the new formats brag.
  Philips has my vote for performance and PRICE!
  
  
• Good picture for the price
  By A24CV1I7IB8CVY on 2006-08-31
  I just got this and I think the player does a fairly good job in upconverting the DVD with good picture quality. I tried the Oppo OPDV971H preivously, this player is not a good as the Oppo but good enough for my eyes. And since it costs only $70 at Circuit City, I think it give a better value at pixel/$$ count. I particular like the HDMI out, makes connection simple. I have a 56" Panasonic DLP HDTV and it does a good job in video and sound. The drawback is it doesn't cover up the entire screen (i.e. cut outs at the top and bottom). The other drawback is no optical out, only coaxial out to connect to your receiver. It plays different DVD media, i.e. DVD+RW or DVD-RW. And since I have 2 Philips DVP624 for many years, I think this one will do just fine in a long run. I haven't test the HD JPEG yet but it is not critical for me since I can do it directly via my Set Top Box and PC via the network. Oh, make sure you adjust the HDMI Setup to do 1080i, that will increase the resolution big time.
  
  

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