Home > Consumer Reviews > Philips DVP642 DivX-Certified Progressive-Scan DVD Player

I've bought a total of 4 various Philips DVD players including two of these. Only one still works after a year (not this one). Until they fall apart, they're great. Lots of features. But, DVD players aren't supposed to be disposable are they?

By the way, just for more detail as to the specific problem, all 3 that have stopped working had problems with the DVD loading, unloading, and spinning system. Basically, they either would not unload once they were in, or would not spin up.

I'm a Laurel and Hardy fan. Most of their sound films are available in England, but not in the U.S. You can order them on DVD from Amazon/UK, but unfortunately, films for the England region can not be played on conventional DVD players in America. This is for two reasons. 1. They use PAL encoding format which is incompatible with the US encoding format, NTSC. Second, they can't be played because discs from there are Region 2, and U.S. is Region 1. U.S. DVD players lock out discs from all other regions. However, this Philips DVD player is a marvel. It can play PAL discs by converting them to NTSC. It also can play discs from any region - Europe, Japan, Asia, etc. The unit has progressive scan and the picture quality is so fine we now use this player for all our DVD's. There are other similar players on the market made by companies you've never heard of for less money, but I prefer the Philips because if something goes wrong with the machine you know it is backed by a reliable company which will honor the warranty. I give the unit a 4 rating instead of a 5 only because the "remote clicker" is not as flexible for use as it should be. Still, this is a fine unit and well worth the price. One caution, however. This fine player is offered in two versions. One can play every region, the other one can't. Be sure you order the unit that can play all regions.

The DVD player does not come 'region free' from the factory. You must set the player for this yourself.

1) Open the disc tray.

2) ON THE REMOTE, press the following buttons: 7, 8, 9, "ok", 0

That's it! The player is now region free.

There is probably nothing left to say about this wonderful device so here is an extra piece of info you might find useful:

When playing Divx disks you might find that the image looks horribly garbled. To fix this, press the System Menu twice.

I can't offer an explanation as to why it works. But it works.

Hacker friendly DVD player that let's you play all the movies and TV shows you download with bit torrent.

Older versions of the firmware and instructions for region free hack are here: http://home.ica.net/~robert/Philips/
Apparently the region free hack does not work with the latest firmware.

Useful hints: Find the "Menu" button on the remote, use it to bring up a list of all the files on the disk. Hit the "System: button twice if the movie starts to stutter or pixelate. Hold down "Stop" to eject.

Philips DVP642 Region Free Hack:
- Open Tray
- Press 7 8 9 OK
- Press 0

To verify what version of firmware you have do the following:
-Open the tray.
-On your remote punch in 5, 6, 9, OK
-firmware version will be displayed on the screen.

Alternate region free hack for some:
-Hold stop until the tray opens
-Press 0-0-0-0-OK-0 (will see one 0 appear)
-Hold stop until tray closes