I bought this DVD player due to the fact that I used to play all my DVDs on the PlayStation2 but recently the PS2 has been causing problems reading DVD-Rs that worked a while back. I was told that the lens for the PS2 need cleaning and that is why the problem is occurring but I needed a DVD player anyway so I went ahead just picked this one as it had received good reviews on other websites and supported DVD-RW but as a bonus it also supported DVD+RW without any problems.Media Supported: DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW.
Format Supported: DVD-Video, VCD, SVCD, XVCD, XSVCD, MP3CD (all bit rates), WMACD (all bit rates), Fuji film CD, Kodak PhotoCD, JPEGCD, CDDA.
This DVD player supports multi-region discs, I have tried all the different regions.
So far have not experienced any problems, seems to be working perfect especially by supporting the DVD+R format. Operation seems to be very quiet while playing any disc and the loading times are very fast. As soon as you insert the disc it will boot up straight away without any delays.
The DVD player has very nice and simple menu and the OSD (on screen display) is very detailed and can be fully customised to display what you want.
I have made DVDs using the following software: Roxio Easy CD & DVD Creator 6, Ulead DVD Movie Factory 2 and Nero Burning ROM 6.
The brands I have used are:
DVD-R:
JVC (written at 4xSpeed)
TDK (written at 6xSpeed)
Verbatim (written at 2xSpeed)
Unbranded (written at 1xSpeed)
DVD-RW:
TDK (written at 2xSpeed and 1xSpeed)
DVD+R:
JVC (written at 2.4xSpeed)
Verbatim (written at 4xSpeed)
TDK (written at 6xSpeed)
DVD+RW:
Verbatim (written at 4xSpeed and 2.4xSpeed)
CD-R:
TDK (written at 60xSpeed)
CD-RW:
TDK (written at 40xSpeed)
The CD/DVD writers I have used are:
Pioneer DVD-RW (Supports: DVD-R(W)),
Pioneer MultiDVD (Supports: DVD-R(W), DVD+R(W), DVD-RAM),
Iomega DVD+RW (Supports: DVD+R(W)),
Lite-On CD-RW (Supports: CD-R(W)),
So far all the software that I have used to make DVD movies seemed to be accepted by the player without any problems. The DVDs played back perfectly with crystal quality picture and an equally impressive audio output.
There is only one downside to this incredible DVD player is that volume is low. By comparing sounds from the PS2 and the Pioneer, the volume level on my TV is 6 when playing DVDs on the PS2 and at 17 for the Pioneer but maybe I might not have configured it correctly. There are audio enhancement options but they are only effective if some kind of external device is connected. It also features methods of video enhancement by applying different methods that can improve picture quality depending on the TV. It has many options and I had little time setting it up as I was busy trying out the type of media (CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW) that it could read/supported.
In order for me to cure that problem I connected an audio/video amplifier (costs about £15) that allowed to further increase the sound from the Pioneer DVD player, now the sound level received at 17 can be achieved at 4. The audio/video amplifier can also boost the video signal but I leave that at zero since I only need the sound signal to be boosted.
But all in all it is a great DVD player!
