Home > Consumer Reviews > Sony DVPCX995V 400-Disc DVD Mega Changer/Player

Warning: These multi-disc changers from SONY scratched $200 of my DVD's. Buy at your own risk but the unit I purchased from Amazon has ruined many DVDs with arc-shaped scratches running from the outside of the disc inward. You risk ruining your DVD collection with these multi changers. The added convenience is not worth the risk. Deserves negative stars.

Here is the short of it. There are three things that are prevelant in almost every review. everyone is happy with the video, the user interfce is complex and finnally the auto resume feature is a pain. Sinch the video is not a complaint, i will address the cataloging feature.

I have never entered in the disc information in my sony. What I did was load my disc in and, on my computer, I created a excell sheet ( a Previous reviewer also listed this method) My computer monitor is on my coffee table, so whenever I want to watch a movie from my changer, i would refer to my excell list, and enter in my number. The same would be said for printing out the sheet. This proved to be a very good catalouging system. until.....

I found out an even better way to catalog. The review guidlines say not list urls, but if you where to do a yahoo search for panther studios, you will find a product called SAVR. It is really cool. Its catalogs, sorts, and displays your entire DVD collection and controls the changer from your computer. A single click plays the desired movie, so you dont need the remote. if you go to there website, there is more info on it. I dont work for them - it just love the product. I loce that i can browse through the movies based off a minture movie poster, instead of a big list.

The auto play feature. When you finish a movie, you press the stop button. Press it again and you should not have a problem.

Also, another piece of advice is if at all possible, keep your old dvd player connected. If you are purchase this changer, you probably have an existing single disc player. This makes life so much easier for playing rented or borrowed dvds. Trust me. It took me a half hour to find a rented movie that i had put in the changer, becuase it wasnt catalogued and i had viewed other movies before ejecting the rented one. i have sinch re implemneted my single disc player back into my system.

Once the changer is set up and you either make a printout sheet, or the savr program instead, it is a great product.

I recently purchased the unit, despite the complaints in several reviews. After reading the manual and going to Sony's site for their FAq on the machine, it appears to me that several of the reviewers have not explored fully the options on this machine. To speak to a couple of the issues: DVD's start automatically despite the setting of the AUTOPLAY feature. This is built into many DVD's. You can easily overide the autoplay without having to wait for the DVD to get through the FBI warning, etc. Just press the folder button. Not very intuitive, but it works. The disc explorer is then brought up on screen. Another issue: DVD text info is not picked up on many DVD's. Again, a function of the disc itself, not the player. Issue #3: No page up or down function to page through the discs. Incorrect, there is a page up/page down function, but the switch on the remote must be set to the explorer setting for it to work.

All-in-all, I am very happy with the unit. It does everything it advertises, produces a great picture, and best of all, puts all my discs in one place. Despite what some others say, I believe if you buy the unit and take the time to really understand how it works, you'll be very happy.

Hope this helps bring some balance to your research on the unit.

We purchased the Sony 400 DVD player in August 2005 and had no problems for several months. However, in early 2006 we lost all the title information we had manually entered. Essentially, the machine "reloaded" all the discs, wiping out all the information. We reentered the information a few times and it kept doing it.

We called Sony and they suggested that our power wasn't "clean" enough, so we purchased an expensive power conditioning unit (it cost more then the DVD player!!), retyped all the information and had the problem again. We contacted Sony for a replacement unit. We had the same problem, and the unit was replaced a second time.

With our third unit, we haven't taken the time to reenter the information. Instead we are using printed spreadsheet to keep track of our CDs/DVDs.

Sony says they have no record of anyone else experiencing this problem, but I see from other reviewers on this website, Yahoo Shopper and Remote Central that this is not the case. It's been very frustrating.

I OWN 3 OF THESE UNITS. A SHORT WHILE AGO MY DISCS STARTED TO FREEZE UP. I INSPECTED THEM AND FOUND THEY WERE ALL SCRATCHED , AT THE SAME PLACE, ABOUT .5" FROM THE OUTER EDGE. ALL MY DISCS ARE RUINED! ALMOST 1200 OF THEM. I TRIED TO NOTIFY SONY ABOUT THIS PROBLEM AND GOT NOWHERE. I TRIED THE CD/DVD REPAIR KITS, BUT THEY DIDN'T HELP THE SCRATCHES ARE TOO DEEP. SONY CUSTOMER SERVICE SUCKS! I WILL NEVER BY SONY PRODUCTS AGAIN!