great value dvd player

quality control....a lot of defective units going around....got a couple of friends with the same problem

This is my 5th installment review of the Toshiba 5700. After returning the unit and getting a replacement. I waited for a couple of weeks to make this review. I wanted to be sure that I can rate this unit well amidst all the problems I had with the previous unit. I played the replacement unit extensively and so far I have had no problems... no audio drop outs, no picture freezing. I guess what I got was a defective unit. My suggestion to Toshiba is to do a quality check/inspection more thoroughly. My suggestions to owners of the unit if you experienced any problems get a replacement. I will still give Toshiba a 5 stars rating for value (hard to beat for the features and price)and a 4 stars for overall rating because of poor quality control on the units.

remote is easy to use, all the video/ audio inputs you will ever need. better piture and sound quality over vhs.

price. $520 Canadian/ $350 U.S.

I have put this unit on top of my cerwin vega 10" speaker. I turn the volume up high and watched a full movie. The player did not skip once. What else can I say about the sd5700 it RoXorz.

Similar Products Used:

Technics sa-ga330

For the price, get real. First of all, the 4700/5700 uses Analogue Devices DA chips. These are the same guys who make the ubiquitious SHARC chip(Lexicon MC-10, Mclaren, Denon ,5800...,etc,. This is as good or better than most Burr Browns.(Texas Instruments)Simply amazong price/preformance ratio. ,,also wholeheartedly agree that most who complain lack either the six channel pass through or a set capable ofa progressive display.

Similar Products Used:

Sony DVP-700...etc

Digital Video,Digital Audio,DVD-audio,HDCD,amazing remote,its silver =)

none

this DVD player is damn sweet. It plays all the music formats that are availible today. install took me less than 1 minute. Remote is damn sweet to. I had no problems figuring out the remote."so easy" This is my first DVD player and I dont regreat spending the extra $100.00 going from the SD3750 to SD5700 it was worth it. Get the SD5700 Trust Me. ;)

Great picture and sound

Manual switching between dvd audio and video. Lacks complete front panel readout.

An excellent player. No problems. I believe some of the problems listed by others could possibly be caused by setup/adjustment of the player itself or associated equiptment. One example is the poster who noted the "uneven black bars". The player has an adjustment. I have had a total of 9 dvd players since day one so i''m not a novice. Yes there are some bad ones put out occassionaly but htis is not one of them. For the money this is a very good player. The JVC xv723 (which i also own) is another top player.

Similar Products Used:

Panasonic-JVC

Great machine. Great color. great sound. Great BARGAIN.

audio dropouts!

Great machine. Great color. great sound. Great BARGAIN. However, as Anthony of Cali said, the damn machine has audio dropouts!!!!! So annoying when you have company over and a name is mentioned, critical to the movie, and its lost. Had to go back and listen again for the name- Pain! This is the 5th or 6th time, too. Back it goes on Monday-Damn. I tried pulling out plug for 15 minutes- no good. It plays so well, i just want a replacement.

Similar Products Used:

Sony DVP360

Excellent progressive scan video & DVD-Audio User grahic menus Simple but well-laid-out remote Multiple interconnect options

No automatic DVD analog/bitstream switch (manual)

I''ve always been a fan of Toshiba and was still pleasantly surprised with this model''s performance. The switch from interlaced to progressive scanning is astounding - absolutely film-like in widescreen! While the colors may be more subtle in progressive, Toshiba provides 3 custom video adjustment settings for a variety of media. Being new to DVD-Audio, I have not listened to other comparable units, but the 5.1 channel fidelity is obviously leaps ahead of CD''s in soundstage and clarity. I don''t see how anyone could have complaints considering Toshiba''s obvious dedication to the DVD medium and the shear monetary value of this machine!

Similar Products Used:

Toshiba SD-2109

many functions,sound and picture quality,price,looks

non

very nice player...it can play six channel music direct, very crisp progressive scan play back, many extra functions ie,zoom, multiple fast ff,HDCD looks very nice...metal footing and the way the lights turns on and off on the front panel(cinema series/silver) and also, the price! (canadian dollars/may be alittle more in the USA?)

Similar Products Used:

jvc xv-s60bk,sony dvp-ns700p,Toshiba sd4700, Toshiba 3750

Great picture and sound

sound drops on some dvd's

Just got this DVD in early December and have encountered sound drops (split second missing segments of sound) during the play of certain dvd's on a sporatic basis. I spoke to Toshiba who was unaware of any problems, but this is simlar to a problem they had with my previous Toshiba dvd player. For that one, I had to send it to a repair center for a "chip update". However, I cannot understand why this brand new model would need any updates to play certain dvds. My suspicion is that Toshiba rushed to get this model out before the holidays and it still has some bugs. Has anyone else had the same problem with this model or other Toshiba models?
The picture is great (but I don't see a vast improvement with the progressive scan vs. my old model that lacked progressive scan. I have a Toshiba 65" HDTV).
I will likely bring this dvd player back this week and get a Sony or Panasonic. Too bad, I liked it except for this one very annoying problem.

Flexible solution which includes DVD-Audio, HDCD, MP3, VCD, CD-RW, and CD-R. Fine performance.

Does not support SVCD. MP3 on CD-RW not recommended. Limited bass management. No DTS decoder.

The SD5700 is an upgrade to my SD-5109, which I have been very happy with but lacks support for DVD-Audio, MP3, VCD, CD-RW, and CD-R. I have tested all these modes as well as DVD-Video and HDCD and they all seem to work well. I was in particular looking for a unit that could handle both DVD-Audio and HDCD at a reasonable price and this filled the bill.

One possible caution, users that want or need to use the 6 channel output that lack large left and right speakers may want to look elsewhere. As best as I can tell, only the center and surrounds (all or nothing) can be set to "small" (according to the manual, a small speaker is one that doesn’t output bass lower than 120Hz). I have Boston A150-II speakers left and right which have 10 inch woofers so I seem to be OK. Also, the bass crossover can't be set and the manual doesn't indicate where the crossover is. Personally, I'd prefer to set my front left and right to "small" as well and let my Polk subwoofer handle the deep bass, but (unlike my Onkyo receiver) that option does not seem to be a possibility.

My 480p TV only has one input for progressive component (Y,Pb,Pr) and my receiver has none. So, I have to transfer the cables between my HDTV cable box and DVD player. I really don't need to use my component output when looking at the video material on a DVD-Audio disk and composite video is fine. However, for there to be composite video one either has to set the switch on the back to "interlaced" and turn the power off and on or press the "color stream selector" on the remote control. In comparison the composite video on my SD-5109 is always active.

The priority is set to DVD-Audio which means that going into the setup and changing the "priority" setting is needed followed by either on/off or eject and reload of the disk to gain access to the DVD-Video part of the disk which sometimes contains material not on the DVD-Audio part of the disk. The same is true when switching between bitstream and 6-channel output, something necessary when switching between DVD-Audio (6 channel) and DTS or an external DD decoder (via bitstream digital output).

Occasionally, the setup menu logic becomes confused and the setup program freezes. Powering off and on clears the problem.

Although the $300 price tag is very attractive, don't forget to budget for the (six) cables if you want to use the DVD-Audio in 6-channel mode. My cables ran about $200 total (I opted for Monster M550i cables at $63.00 a pair). Given the fact that 24bit/96kHz output is possible in 6-channel mode (and as high as 192kHz in 2-channel), I didn't want to skimp on cables. Of course, the much more ideal solution would have been for the DVD and receiver to have a IEEE-1394 (firewire) connection, but neither this DVD player nor my Onkyo receiver have one -- too bad.

I listened to "Sing Sang Sung" (which is up for a Grammy Award) in DVD-Audio (Silverline, Big Phat Band, "Swinging for the Fences"). I had previously listened to this in DD, DTS, and 2-channel CD. DVD-Audio is a noticable improvement over these formats. The sound quality was simply stunning.

Peformance in all other modes seemed very good, even mp3. btw mp3 titles are truncated to the first eight characters. I didn't notice any decrease in quality between the 5700 and my 5109 which had a $1000 list price. Video and audio peformance seems to be at least as good as my 5109.

Overall, although not without its limitations (for example I wished that SVCD playback worked) and quirks, this is a keeper.

Similar Products Used:

Toshiba SD5109, SD2109