I knew two months ago that I wanted this unit but held off because of the reported adio sync problems, hoping that they would be resolved. I finally gave up and bought one from a retailer with a good return policy. Unfortunately I ran into a problem of a different sort almost immediately, namely audio dropouts. They occur frequently (a dozen times when watching Ronin) and both on DVDs and CDs (when played through a digital coaxial connection). Other than this problem, it is everything I expected that it would be: great video and sound and loaded with features. Too bad Sony's quality control is not better. A five-star design, but three-star quality.

I'm happy with it.
Haven't had any problems with it.

I've had the 550d for about 10 days now (serial number has a "/B" on it). The only problem was 2 audio dropouts
during a rental from Blockbuster... cleaning *might* have
fixed this. No lip sync problems, and I've been looking!
However, I have next to the worst set-up possible...
13" TV connected to RF Modulator and pro-logic stereo
sound using a STR-DE615. :(

Question: Has anyone had the lip sync issue WITHOUT using
the PLAYER'S AC-3 decoder? Would using the RECEIVER's
decoder rectify the situation?

I have owned the S550D for two months now and have experienced no problems at all. I have watched many, many movies in detail several times and have not noticed any lip synch. or audio drop out problems. All the DVDs I own are encoded with AC3, however, I just purchased Apollo 13 with the DTS soundtrack and its sounds phenomenal. There are various ways to connect the DVD player to your audio/video equipment and these may or may not be responsible for some problems other folks have posted here, so let me summarize my connections. The DVD player is connected to a 32" Sony XBR via the component video connectors and I connect the optical out of the DVD player to a Sony STR DE925 receiver.
A few gripes about the player that I can live with:
Doesn't play CDRs.
Doesn't output 96kHz signals via digital out (not that my receiver could decode it anyway).
Really could use a backlit remote.

Other than that I am completely satisfied with the player.

I've had this unit for about two months. I never encountered the lip sync problem until last week. I was about 1.5 hours into True Lies. Then it was like watching a Kung-Fu movie. The lips and voices were at least 1 second off, and increasing. Fortunately, I live very close to a Sony Factory Repair Center. I took it in this weekend, so i'll post again after I get it back to tell all of you if it is fixed or not. For now, i'll give it four stars.

Have been thrilled with the perfomance of my one-week-old Sony 550D player! A few days after receiving it, I discovered this Web site and found the discussion about a "lip sych" issue to be a bit disconcerting... It appeared last night for the first time while watching the "extras" on Blade. I pressed Stop and then Play, and it returned to the same spot in a couple of seconds, and was now working perfectly again. I think Sony may have a recall on these units.
Someone had suggested that it was a control issue, but my experience doesn't suggest that.

Still will give the player five stars for performance and features.

I just found about this web site and I am extremely happy I read your reviews.
I purchased the DVP-S550D from Best Buy on 6/12/99. Was I lucky I did not have the unit for more then 30 days. I also had lip synch problems.

The dept manager said I could exchange the unit, but Best Buy had no units in stock. They are back ordered for 30 days.

The only thing I can hope, is that Sony is aware of the problem and is fixing it.

PS: I have to say Best Buy let me keep my old unit until new units come in They have extended the return policy. I guess with their stock doing so well, they are starting to realize the customer is very important to their future growth.

well I thought I had a fixed machine, even though it does show a software update I still experienced a sync problem. I watched 12 movies(most were ones that had a sync problem on my previous 550) on my 13 th movie Scarface, about halfway through I noticed a sync problem.to get into service mode and see which revision you have, turn player off, then push Title, then Clear, then power. you should be in service mode, at the bottom of the service menu screen it should say Revision 1.500, my new one says 1.800. also pick option 5 and it will show you a few other stats....SYSCON ver was 1.5000 on old player, newer one shows 1.800.
I guess this software update didn't totally clear up the problem. I think it helped because on my old player I would see it quite frequently. Back to square one. If you find a diff revision than i have found please let me know.

O.k, here's the dilly yo....Last time I reviewed this player I gave it one speaker due to the audio sync problem. Well my retailer finally got a shipment in on 6/24/99. So I went back and exchanged my old S550D for a fresh one right off the truck and guess what, It does have few software revisions from the first batch, I know this cause I got into the service mode and took note of all the system versions and what not. I have watched 10 movies on it and no more lip sync OR audio dropout(old one had both). If you would like more info on what I found just e-mail me. Like i said before, this is an awesome player!! all the features, great picture, excellent remote and great menu system!!! It handles VCD's great too(just watched matrix) and plays a few cdr's but not many. gotta give this baby A 5 speaker rating!!

I got the DVP-S550D at GoodGuys. Before my family shipped the DVD player here to Japan, I did some reasearch on it and found my way here in Audio Review. I'm glad that I did, because I would have been stuck with this problematic machine. My family was able to return the un-opened box and told the GoodGuys sales people about the problem and this website....they checked it out, loaded Lost in Space and offered me a very good price for the DVP-7700. The top-of-line model has no problems whatsoever and the only lip-synch problems I have is when my girlfriend mimics my cheesy sci-fi flicks!
From what I've seen, heard and read I give the lone star for the DVP-550D.