Home > Consumer Reviews > Toshiba SD3750 Progressive-Scan DVD Player

I spent all day yesterday and today researching DVD players online, and then went to three major electronics stores to try them out and figure out which one was the best. I knew I wanted the following features:

Progressive scan - even though I don't have a TV that can utilize, I may upgrade soon
Advanced Menu System
MP3/CD - with MP3, I wanted a navigational system, and most importantly I wanted to be able to random play the disc.

I took an MP3 CD to the store and popped it in each of the MP3/DVD players. I tried probably 20 or 30 of them in the end, and I was most impressed with the Toshiba. It loaded the disc the quickest, and random play worked like a charm. Scan time was the quickest when it had to jump around the disc. It has a navigation system online, but only supports the first 8 characters and ends with the ~1 characters.

It has S-Video output and the newer colorstream component output. I'm stuck with the A/V typical jacks. Regardless of me being stuck with the worst grade video output because of my older TV, the picture looked great. I watched O Brother Where Art Though, and as far as I could tell, it looked fantastic. Sound is hooked into my Sony receiver and it sounds great, too. I pop an MP3 disc in and hit shuffle and it works as expected. No support for tags...nor can you fast-forward through a song, though. When I got home, I compared this model to other more expensive models, and it had all their features and more...so I feel like I made a wise investment, and am very happy with the product. It also comes with an advanced remote which allows you to do angle shots, zoom in/out, record and loop frames, turn on subtitles, etc., etc.

This Toshiba SD3750 is the 4th DVD player I've purchased, and this blows all the others out of the water! First I had a Phillips (...) player (I forget the model) which worked okay except that it was slow playing MP3's, and the power button started only working sometime after a few months (doh!). My second player was a TEAC 5 disk changer, but this one refused to play DVD's or CD's right out of the box and only played my MP3 disk. After about an hour of use, it stopped working completely and my disks got stuck in it! My third player was a Panasonic RV21U-K which was okay except that the display was a bit flickery, it didn't display MP3 song names, and it didn't zoom.

The Toshiba is by far the best machine! It has all the features I've wanted:
- very nice, readable menu system
- MP3 playback is quick and it shows the names on the TV
- CD playback shows names on the tv AND on the actual dvd player LED display. This is pretty cool!
- zoom in/out feature with DVD movies
- nicely designed remote control
- large, descriptive manual

Anyhow, I'd highly reccomend this player. Other Toshiba models that also look good are the 2710, and the 4700.

Overall is the best DVD player I have tried. Considering the feature set and price and I am very pleased with this unit.
Pros:
- Excellent image quality (however I can't comment on the progressive scan feature - I purchased this for the other features).

- Nice menu navigation - accessable from the front panel as as well as from the remote.

- Easy to use remote.

- Nice zoom (I currently and will for some time stay with a 4:3 conventional TV) and I like to use the zoom the when watching the extreme widescreen format (I actually prefer the 16:9 high-definition viewing format that some DVD releases have).
This player zooms the ultra widescreen first to close to 16:9 and then to close to fullscreen zoom.
The first step (16:9) zoom has incredible zoom resoulution - almost as good as the original ultra-widescreen image.
The only better zoom I've seen is the Toshiba 2300 NUON which I think has been discontinued although I think I saw a Samsung NUON unit that claims a good zoom. The Toshiba 2300 lacks other features though.

- Operates and feels like it has some quality.

Cons:
- All DVD players that I tried have limited MP3 playback capability. I have a RioVolt portable that does a much better job of playing MP3 files than any home CD or DVD player I have seen.

- Toshiba 3750 does not support CD-RW MP3 disks on this unit and sure enough, my unit will not play CD-RW MP3 disks at all. Normal CD-R MP3 disks seem to work OK.

- MP3 playback is either sequential or full disk random and is user selectable. No directory only sequential or random.

- I had to burn my MP3 disks using the ISO level 1 (8 character music file names - no extensions) which is almost useless for me if I want to actually figure out the filename in the directory listing because I rip my MP3 files using a "artist - song title" filename format and there is no tag support so all I see in the Toshiba directory listing is artist~1,artist~2,artist~3 for example (in contrast my RioVolt plays the extended format and supports tags - so the full artist name and song title is displayed in the directory listing).

In closing I think this is a great DVD player.

The MP3 feature is limited but still useful for playing a disk full of songs either sequentially or randomly.
In general there is great potential for nice MP3 navigation with these players because the video screen is available for MP3 file navigation and selection - even playlists could be supported, but no one in the DVD player arena seems to be close to this yet.

The Video features and quality are great.

After having a nightmarish experience with the Panasonic CV50, I decided to go with a different brand of player. I couldn't have made a better choice. This player delivers all it claims and more. I found CD-R, MP3, and DVD's all play flawlessly on this player. It even plays CD-RW's, although Toshiba dosen't recommend it. I found layer changes to be almost seamless, and the player "warms" up quickly. The remote is easy to understand, and the player will even beep to let you know you've pushed a button on the remote (this can be turned off, if you wish). Anyone out there who is considering trying to save themselves fifty bucks or so by buying a cheaper player should think again...the Toshiba is definately a bargain at under 200 dollars!

I don't claim that this player is a top-of-the-line MP3 player. It contains that function to benefit the consumer, but for its primary function of playing DVD's, it absolutely rocks.

I own a corresponding flatscreen Toshiba TV, thus utilizing the component inputs. In addition, I use a digital optical cable connected directly into my a/v receiver. The video quality is as crisp and clear as any I've seen on a midrange player. The audio quality in DTS or DD mode is superb given that you own a fair home theatre system. Even, if you do not own a high end TV or home theatre system, this DVD player will improve the experience substantially, but it will not be fully utilized. If you can afford it, I highly recommend buying at least a flatscreen TV with component inputs. I've observed the difference between an RCA cable, S-video cable, and component cables and the difference is startling! Using an RCA cable is a disservice. If you do not have at least an S-video input, you won't realize the true worth of this machine.

The remote is not user friendly or the most functional remote out there, but Toshiba normally does not make good remotes. If you buy Toshiba products, you just have to put up with it. I was close to buying the top of the line Toshiba DVD (SD-9200), but backed out last minute, though it is one of the top DVD players out there, due to the huge price difference. For the price, $..., depending on where you buy it, the Toshiba SD-3750 is difficult if not impossible to beat, especially given its progressive capabilities.