Price, looks

Getting used to the remote, not much of a weakness

Got mine at Best Buy for $250, used a $100 gift certificate so you can't beat the price. Has been very reliable, only very slight pauses at some layer changes. The worst was with Heat, I finally accepted the fact that there were some lines I would have to miss in that scene. Overall I am very happy and have experienced no problems with the machine being picky or stopping.

The Phillips DVD825AT went back to Best Buy this afternoon.....replaced by a Sony DVP-S530D.
The 825 picture and audio are far inferior to the Sony and the 825's remote just sucked....had to bang it to get it to work....also if you stop the picture the picture starts at the beginning of the disk which sucks (pause starts the picture where it was paused at)....build quality was inferior to the Sony....however there may be future lip-sync problems with the Sony....which couldn't be any worse than the sudden "freezing" of the picture for 5-10 seconds then resuming somewhere in advance of where it stopped.....got a "bad disk" error on a brand new "Patch Adams" disk....went back then forward to that chapter and it went away....anyway I give it a "1" for being generally crappy....didn't buy the extended warranty for the 825.....got the 4 year one on the Sony....it could prove to be cheap for the $69.95...

Paid $249 for the Phillips @ Best Buy

Paid $299 for the Sony DVP-S530D @ Best Buy...so far can tell that I got my $50 worth in picture and audio..

Here's the story...Originally bought the Sony 530 and experienced lip-sync problems on the 2nd dvd I rented from BB. Got a vague response from sony about the problem and a vague explanation from onecall rep. I returned it for the Philips so that I could put an extra 100 bucks into getting tannoy M2's instead of M1's.

Tried the Philips with the same set-up and same dvd's and found that the lip-sync wasn't present but the picture quality sucked compared to the Sony. I'm new to the dvd market but I could definitely see a difference. The Philips had pixellation out the ying-yang. Artifacting, black was never black. I don't have a good tv (zenith no s-video) and I don't have a good receiver (sherwood). I'm starting my system with the source player and new speakers. But even with my low-fi stuff, the sony made it look 3 times as good. just that damn lip-sync problem.

The sound was a better (more bass, more open, less bright than the sony). I could now play my CDR's which is a real plus. The price is right (249 at Best Buy) the picture quality is subpar.

Now I need to go out and get another unit (panasonic?Toshiba?) The reviews have been helpful, but take note, I went off a review in Stereo Review magazine for the Philips and I didn't see anyone post an offensive remark about its picture quality.

Bottom line, if you can't tell that the picture looks like it's being played on a computer with a first generation DVD-rom and you like to listen to music a little more than watch movies but only want one component. And you can't shell out an extra 50 to 100 bucks for a decent looking player, buy the Philips. If you want excellent picture/decent sound and can wait til there's a permanent fix to the lip sync problem, go Sony.

4stars-sound
1 star-picture
2.5 star-overall value

I picked up the Philips DVD825 about a month ago. I, too, have had trouble with the player intermittently pausing for 1 sec, then playing for 2 sec on dvd's (as described below). I found this happens after playing an audio cd, then putting in a _particular_ dvd. If you power down/up (reboot), the problem goes away (until the next time you do the same sequence). Microsoft indeed. The audio sound is quite good but the video/dvd is only adequate, imho. CDR playback is perfect, which is great since I have a large collection of live cdrs. I've been told that this model is discontinued (even though they are still in many stores), and that may be why there is absolutely no sign of this model on the Philips web page.
BTW - Sears had these on sale for $250 about 1.5 weeks ago.

DTS, price, quality

Has problems with dirty dvd's

I've had this DVD player for more then a year now. I got it because one of my friends purchased this one and I was impressed for the quality for the price. I had looked into buying a Sony or a Toshiba, but at the time both of them were reported to have problems with certain dvd's. After having this player for more then a year, I've never had any problems. While skipping does occur with some rented dvd's, cleaning the dvd generally cures this problem. At some point I want to buy a Sony dvd player to match the rest of the components in my system. I will keep the Philips one as a back up in case something happens to that one though.

Good price

Problems after 1 year, small remote, lack of satisfaction.

I picked this DVD player because Phillips-Magnavox has always had a good reputation. It worked fine for the first year I had it, then just after the warranty was up, only about 5 of my 50 DVD movies play. I think this is outragous. I spend $179.00 (on sale) on a DVD player and I only get one year out of it. I wanted to complain to Phillips directly, but you have to register on their site to complain...that's BS. The player won't even accept a laser lens cleaning disc...I mean come on!!! I DO NOT RECOMMEND PHILLIPS TO ANYONE ANYMORE.

Similar Products Used:

RCA, Panisonic, DVD players, etc.

it does everything its supposed to do

huh? what weaknesses

i bought it used from a rental store 2 years ago and have never thought of replacing it
for the rest of you 825 users you must have done something wrong cause ive dropped mine and it still works

Similar Products Used:

the one in my computer

The pretty blue light

It only plays in b/w now

Don't take a chance and buy the DVD825. I played only 5 dvds on it and then it suddenly started playing everything in black and white. I tried switching it between PAL and NTSC and it didn't work.

Philips Customer Service was worthless. So now I'm going to have to buy a new dvd player to replace this piece of junk.

plays CD-Rs, VCD, XVCD, SVCD, audio CD, great sound and picture quality

Doesn't play PAL format VCD or SVCD, only NTSC ones. doesnt' play mp3 disks

I've had the 825 for over a year, and had very few problems. it doesn't play all vcds, because it is an NTSC only player. check your vcd. if it doesnt' play it's probably PAL format. It has played many brands of CD_R media with zero problems.
I've had a "glitch" only once or twice ever, and they always went away after turning the machine off and back on. we're talking 2 or three freezes on over year here.
No problems ever with audio CDS. never caused a problem, play perfectly, and actually this was what the first half-dozen things I played in this machine were. home-burned, commercial, plays 'em all.
It handles ff/rewind better on VCDS and SVCDS than on all of my friends' machines.

Similar Products Used:

APEX 500, and computer DVD drive

It's black.

It stinks.

This is my first DVD player, which I bought two years ago. At that point, I just wanted a basic "starter" model. It's had a problem since day one with gradually lightening and then darkening the picture, and the frequency and degree of both lightening and darkening seems to have increased with use, and there seems to be no resolution, though I've tried just about everything. Watching a movie and having the picture go from completely washed-out to darker-than-dark is irritating and distracting!

Given the comments I've seen here, I'm glad I didn't extend the warranty, because it sounds like it would have been a waste of money!! This is my first and last Philips-Magnavox product. I thought I'd give them a shot, but now realize I should have stuck with a better-quality product. At this point, I will either throw or give this one away and pick up a newer, snazzier one that works.