Home > Consumer Reviews > Philips DVP5982 1080p Upscaling DVD Player

To go along with my HDTV, I decided that I needed to upgrade my DVD player. While my Insignia DVD Recorder/VCR didn't look awful, it certainly didn't look good. And while the quality of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are definitely impressive, the on-going format war combined with the cost made those players inviable options.

Enter the market of upconverting DVD players. These players, which take your standard 480i DVDs and scale them to high-definition resolutions are as common as regular DVD players these days. Places like Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Circuit City, are full of them. I've actually owned two of them.

I started with the highly-touted Sony DVP-NS75H which is truly a great machine. It has a great design and a super picture quality. Sadly, it only upconverted to 720p or 1080i, not 1080p as my set is capable of. While I'd like to think that I'm not a total videophile, I noticed some of the ghosting and artifacts that interlaced video can expose when put on a big screen. Despite the claim of my HD monitor to do de-interlacing, I was finding that it didn't do an especially good job.

Enter the Philips DVP5982. Based on Philips well-received 5960 the 5982 adds support for 1080p output as well as improved USB compatibility. I returned the Sony, picked this one up, and set it up. Here are some of my observations:

The basics:

The DVP5982 is a basic upconverting player that you can get for around $70. It includes an HDMI output for upconverting along with coaxial digital audio outputs, plus the standard analog outputs (component, s-video, composite, and stereo audio). There is no upconverting over the component outputs however. It supports DivX file playback (as long as they're standard resolution and not too large) over USB from a FAT32 formatted device. The menu system on the 5982 is a bit archaic and hard to read, but it's manageable.

What I Like:

- True 1080p output. I was suspect of whether the 1080p output would make any visible difference over the 1080i of the Sony. I was wrong, the 1080p output made a huge difference in certain troublesome scenes from movies. I had noticed with the Sony that whenever there was a light or white background (such as a white wall or the sky) and there was motion in front of it, there were artifacts left all over the screen. In the same way, motion scenes would blur and leaving ghostly lines on the screen. Those problems are largely gone with the Philips.
- DivX playback. I have a 160GB hard drive attached to the USB and loaded onto their I have various movies that I've captured onto my computer from my cable dvr. Rather than burning all of these onto DVD or having to hook my computer up to the TV to watch them, I can just transfer them onto this hard drive and hook them up to my DVD player and they play. Pretty much every file I've thrown at it has played no problem (but I don't have any DivX HD files). The only exception was some movies that were encoded at incredibly high data rates. Even then, for the occasional really large or really high data rate file you can put it onto a DVD in DivX format and play it from the player.
- Image Quality - although its not as good as the Sony with some adjustment to my tv settings the image quality is still very good. There is some minor pinching

What I don't like

- Audio Output - this machine will either output over the HDMI cable OR the digital coaxial out - but not both at the same time. This really is only a minor problem, but it can make things more complicated than they need to be
- The Disc Tray - The tray feels kind of floppy and cheap
- The Menu System - Simply put, it's awful. Once you figure out the fonts and how it works, it makes sense, but the visual appearance really leaves something to be desired.
- The Image Quality - As I said above, it's not quite on par with the Sony, although the elimination of the ghosting and artifacts make it a worthwhile trade off.

The Summary:

Well, seldom am I so glad I spent $70 on something. Some minor inconveniences aside, for the price you cannot beat this player if you're looking for 1080p (or want to future-proof you DVD player). I feel very comfortable waiting out the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray battle with this player attached to my HDTV - DVDs look fantastic. The DivX playback, while somewhat limited by what USB devices can be attached, is a really nice added feature. But for me it was the combination of price and 1080p playback that convinced me - and I haven't been disappointed.

I purchased this DVD player so that I could play DVDs from other regions. When I put my first non-US DVD in the player, it wouldn't play which was fairly frustrating. However, after finding instructions to set the player to Region 0 (which plays everything) the problem was fixed. The DVD player itself produces a high quality picture, is easy to operate, reasonably priced, and as an added bonus is great looking. My one issue is with the DVD drawer, it appears the new thing in DVD players is to make the drawer as slim as possible, which makes it hard to get the DVD in the tray right the first few times. It's something that takes a little getting used to, but once you do, it's not an issue so I didn't take points off on my rating. I would recommended this product if you're looking for a DVD that can play more than one region.
Below are the instructions posted by another Amazon reviewer for setting the DVD to Region 0.
Power Up the unit with NO Disc in the tray.
Open the tray
Press the SETUP Button on the remote control
Navigate to the PREFERENCES page using the Right Arrow Key
Press the DOWN ARROW one time to select
Press the 1 button on your remote control
Press the 3 button on your remote control
Press the 8 button on your remote control
Press the 9 button on your remote control
Press the 3 button on your remote control
Press the 1 button on your remote control
The current Region Code Setting will display
Use the UP/DOWN Arrow Keys to select the region required or '0' for All Regions
Press the PLAY Button on the remote control

I have been a happy user of Philips DVD players for some time, having at owned several models. Yes, I have had minor cosmetic issues in the past with the overly small and lightweight remotes, and the not-so-great on screen menu layouts and design, but overall they have delivered a quality image. I recently bought two Sony Bravia HDTVs and decided to go with this upconverting Philips model until I see how the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray war plays out. I have been astonished by the fidelity and quality of the image of regular DVDs played through this unit! Although my Bravia's only support 1080i (and not 1080p) I am still amazed by the detail this unit seems to tweak out of SD DVDs. Also, the footprint of this unit is tiny and matches the base of my Bravias in color and size, so it's a perfect design fit. I have not an issue with the on-screen menus. They are far better than previous Philips models. Also, the remote is the new-style design (where it looks like an actual product designer and not an engineer figured it out... but it's still small and a bit too light). My only complaint is that the upconverting happens only via the HDMI output. My Bravia's only have a single HDMI input, so I had to sacrifice that to the Philips DVD player, and use the component inputs for my DirecTV HD signal. I use quality cabling and could discern no difference to the DirecTV signal. I also used a quality HDMI cable and the DVDs I've played are pretty breathtaking with the upconversion. I watched Pan's Labyrinth recently and there was astonishing detail in the foliage especially. I plan to watch the (non HD-DVD versions) of the Planet Earth series and hope they are almost as spectacular as the Discovery HD Channel broadcasts. (Sorry, I just couldn't handle the Sigourney Weaver voice over on those, and had to get the original Attenborough versions!). Bottom line, if you want to wait out the HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray war, then buy this for $70 and enjoy what you've been missing in your SD DVD collection! Also, I receive and play a lot of commercially purchased DVDs from the UK. With a simple series of remote control commands, I was able to unlock this player and make it region-free. It even handles the PAL conversion flawlessly! Try doing that with many Sony and other models!

I already own the previous version of this player, the DVP5960, and decided to get the DVP5982 for another room where I have a 1080p capable TV. The only difference between the two versions is that this one has 1080p up-conversion and USB 2.0. It also looks a little cooler with black trim and new button layout.

PROS
Size - smaller than many DVD players
Plays everything
USB - connect USB stick or external hard drive, no need to burn
Video quality is great

CONS
Remote control looks & feels cheap, lacks functions -- same as DVP5960
Very basic & unintuitive interface with minor bugs -- same as DVP5960
No long file name support

If you already own DVP5960, I would stick with it as this is not a major upgrade. I would say USB 2.0 is the biggest improvement here, but a lot also depends on the speed of your media so you may only see marginal speed improvements.

Pros: Plays PAL DVDs (region hack needed), plays Divx/AVI and MPG, plays files from DVD media and USB port (using an USB flash or external HD drive), supports DVI TVs with 5.1 digital audio, can update firmware and fix known bugs by downloading files from website (then burning to a CD-R and loading), 1/3rd of the cost of an Oppo with similar features.

Cons: Doesn't play WMV, somewhat "buggy" and unpredictable, takes more than 10 seconds to "power on", video file names are truncated to 8 characters (e.g., "mysummervacation07.avi" is displayed as "mysummer~"), no HDMI cable(s) included, no eject button (need to hold the stop button for 3 secs instead), no digital optical audio (has digital coax with no quality difference, but it would be more versatile if it had both), PAL DVDs only play at 480p setting

This is an excellent buy as a secondary player, but I wouldn't recommend it as a primary player because of having to adjust picture settings for each movie.

I needed a player that could play PAL DVDs, and the 5982 does the job. I just popped in an original, mail-ordered PAL DVD, and it played (BTW, it was region "0" which plays in all regions). :) However, it only plays PAL at the 480p resolution. If you try playing at 720p or 1080p, you'll get a blank screen (but audio will come through). Just keep pushing the HD Upscale button on the front of the 5982 until you see a picture. I noticed a very slight picture stutter due to the different NTSC/PAL frame rates every 30 minutes or so, but otherwise, the picture was clear. I was thinking of buying the Oppo 971H (discontinued) or Pioneer 400V, but then I came across this player in my online search for a PAL-to-NTSC player. There is no mention in any "expert" review, store specs (Best Buy, Circuit City, etc.), or even on the box itself that the 5982 is PAL-capable, but it is listed in the detailed specs on the Philips website and mentioned in some user reviews. I took a gamble and picked one up at Best Buy this weekend.

The 5982 is hooked up to my DVI HDTV using a HDMI-to-DVI cable to the TV and a digital coax output to my HT receiver (I just used a spare high-quality RCA composite cable, not a digital coax cable). The reviews here initially dissuaded me from picking up the 5982 because I read that you could not get 5.1 audio from a source other than the HDMI cable. In other words, no audio from digital coax if the HDMI output was being used (for me, through a HDMI-to-DVI adapter) instead of the component output. As you know, you can't upconvert through the component output on this player, and you cannot get 5.1 audio through RCA composite red/white cables (only through digital optical or digital coax). So how was I going to get a DVI picture (no audio through DVI) and 5.1 audio as well? Maybe the firmware in the latest 5982s fixed this issue, because I am getting 5.1 audio through the digital coax while viewing the picture using the TV's DVI port. The amber lights on my receiver tells me so. :) So if you bought an earlier model, try updating the firmware. (The firmware version out of the box ended in .40. I updated to the most recent version ending in .43 only recently.)

As for upconverting, I initially wrote that it was only fair. My fault because I was only watching at 480p (a bug in the 5982 causes it to switch to a lower resolution randomly for the same DVD). When the upconvert is working properly at 1080i, I see a noticeable improvement in picture details in comparison to my standard-definition Sony. I see a big improvement on LoTR and X-Men. I didn't notice any pixelation when I watched LoTR/RotK, but I did notice slight pixelation in F4: Silver Surfer during the Human Torch chase scene. Still, it was minimal. I can't compare the picture quality to an Oppo (because I don't have one), but the 5982 met my expectations of what an upconverting DVD player should be in terms of picture quality.

I played a few generic AVI (not necessarily Divx) and MPG files on an UDF-formatted (not standard ISO 9660) DVD-R. Not all of the assorted files played, but that most likely is because of the many different video codecs that people use when encoding. I read that the 5982 has problems playing very high bitrate files (it won't play HD AVIs). I played a few video files from a USB flash drive that I just plugged into the front USB port. No skipping as reported by other users. I read that the 5982 supports USB 2.0, but the actual USB speed is version 1.1. (Could this be why some users report playback stuttering? Does the picture stutter on all files or only on higher bitrate and larger files because the 5982 can't access it fast enough?)

The bugs? It occasionally drops from 1080i/720p to 480p for no reason. It switches from widescreen to standard 4:3 for no reason. I find turning the TV and player off will fix it sometimes, but this is why I said the 5982 should not be used as your sole or primary player. ;) It takes alot of fiddling with the on-screen menus to get the correct aspect ratio, letterbox, and pillar box, and it seems I have to make adjustments for every DVD.

The manual says the 5982 doesn't support HD drives because there's only 500mAh of power to the USB port, but external drives like Western Digital's MyBook has its own power supply. Users (from online comments)reported the player works with an external HDD without a power supply though.

BTW, there's about 40 web pages of users discussing this particular player at the AVSFORUM website (Google it). Very informative. I visited the forum to confirm that I could play 5.1 audio over digital coax while using the HDMI/DVI port.