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Sony DVPFX720W - 7" Portable DVD Player
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(4.5 out of 5)
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Most Helpful First | Newest First | + Share18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
It's a Sony...it does what it should do and does it well.
(5 out of 5) by B. Pritchard on Oct 24, 2008 (Manchester, U.K.)I originally bought the Toshiba SDP71S from Amazon, but quickly returned it upon learning that it jumped/skipped with a great many home authored DVD's. The Shinco models looked good, but reading reviews it became apparent that they too struggled with various writeable media. So that left me with one choice as far as I was concerned - Sony - the brand you turn to if you want something to do the job well, and do it for many years without breaking.
The DVPFX720W (W for white) looked a class act the moment I took it from the box. Upon loading a disc I was surprised to notice that despite having the same 480x234 resolution as the Toshiba I had returned, it's display was 1000x better, and also better than the previous portable I had owned, a Bush model. The Sony's clarity, colour and contrast were all FAR superior to any 7inch player I had seen in action - perhaps because of the 12bit video DAC this player uses. The sound from the internal speakers was also better than the models I have used in the past as it utilizes a 96 kHz/24bit audio DAC, but like with any portable player, the small speakers pack relatively little bass...and the sound only ever comes into its own on these machines via the use of headphones - and with headphones, especially good quality ones, the sound is very powerful and bassy. DivX and Xvid playback was a dream - I loaded a DVD-RW with 3 DivX films and 3 Xvid films and the machine quickly loaded all six to allow me to choose which I watched first, and all played through without incident. The unit limits the name of DivX/Xvid files to 14 characters in length, but the Toshiba I returned limited them to only 8 characters...so that was also an improvement on what I'm used to. I then tried the full range of DVD+/-R/RW and all played back without incident...happy days! The battery EASILY makes its 5 hours advertised usage when you turn the backlight down and use headphones. The battery is also better than those with my previous players as it doesn't stick out of the back like a sore thumb, but rather attaches perfectly flat to the bottom of the unit...so as not to increase the overall footprint. Note that a five hour capacity takes a five hour charge.
As regards accessories, the Sony DVPFX720 comes with: A 5 hour Li-Poly battery, AC mains cable, 12v car cable charger, AV in/out cable and the obligatory remote control. No carry case/mounting straps or headphones like you get with some brands, but then again other brands don't put all the expense into the actual main device like Sony has here. [Note that Amazon sell portable DVD carry cases with car mounting straps if you really need one]. The outside white sections of the player are made of metal, and the gloss finish is utterly beautiful...quite what you'd expect from Sony. The embossed silver Sony logo on the top completes a very elegant look. On the side there are 2x headphone inputs, an optical audio out socket (optical mini jack adapter needed) and a switchable AV input/output socket. This will allow you to connect the player to a larger screen TV, or monitor output from your other AV devices on the player's small screen, depending on the player's input/output switch position. On the other side of the unit there is a USB input - sadly the manual only states that this is for MP3 and JPEG use....not for DivX files, which is a great shame, as that would have been incredibly handy. I will not be deducting points from the overall score for that, though, as the player's pluses far outweigh this one niggle - and I never even knew it had a USB input until I got it. Overall I think the player fully deserves its five shiny stars. Just buy it.....I can assure you, you will not regret it.
The DVPFX720W (W for white) looked a class act the moment I took it from the box. Upon loading a disc I was surprised to notice that despite having the same 480x234 resolution as the Toshiba I had returned, it's display was 1000x better, and also better than the previous portable I had owned, a Bush model. The Sony's clarity, colour and contrast were all FAR superior to any 7inch player I had seen in action - perhaps because of the 12bit video DAC this player uses. The sound from the internal speakers was also better than the models I have used in the past as it utilizes a 96 kHz/24bit audio DAC, but like with any portable player, the small speakers pack relatively little bass...and the sound only ever comes into its own on these machines via the use of headphones - and with headphones, especially good quality ones, the sound is very powerful and bassy. DivX and Xvid playback was a dream - I loaded a DVD-RW with 3 DivX films and 3 Xvid films and the machine quickly loaded all six to allow me to choose which I watched first, and all played through without incident. The unit limits the name of DivX/Xvid files to 14 characters in length, but the Toshiba I returned limited them to only 8 characters...so that was also an improvement on what I'm used to. I then tried the full range of DVD+/-R/RW and all played back without incident...happy days! The battery EASILY makes its 5 hours advertised usage when you turn the backlight down and use headphones. The battery is also better than those with my previous players as it doesn't stick out of the back like a sore thumb, but rather attaches perfectly flat to the bottom of the unit...so as not to increase the overall footprint. Note that a five hour capacity takes a five hour charge.
As regards accessories, the Sony DVPFX720 comes with: A 5 hour Li-Poly battery, AC mains cable, 12v car cable charger, AV in/out cable and the obligatory remote control. No carry case/mounting straps or headphones like you get with some brands, but then again other brands don't put all the expense into the actual main device like Sony has here. [Note that Amazon sell portable DVD carry cases with car mounting straps if you really need one]. The outside white sections of the player are made of metal, and the gloss finish is utterly beautiful...quite what you'd expect from Sony. The embossed silver Sony logo on the top completes a very elegant look. On the side there are 2x headphone inputs, an optical audio out socket (optical mini jack adapter needed) and a switchable AV input/output socket. This will allow you to connect the player to a larger screen TV, or monitor output from your other AV devices on the player's small screen, depending on the player's input/output switch position. On the other side of the unit there is a USB input - sadly the manual only states that this is for MP3 and JPEG use....not for DivX files, which is a great shame, as that would have been incredibly handy. I will not be deducting points from the overall score for that, though, as the player's pluses far outweigh this one niggle - and I never even knew it had a USB input until I got it. Overall I think the player fully deserves its five shiny stars. Just buy it.....I can assure you, you will not regret it.
52 of 55 people found the following review helpful:
Sony vs. Shinco
(5 out of 5) by Tilted John on May 24, 2008 (Liverpool, UK)As I spend a lot of time on trains, and I'm tired of dragging around a big laptop, I thought I'd buy a portable DVD player. I was initially attracted to the Shinco 7 inch because it's a region-free machine that supposedly plays DivX and MP4 stuff and comes with a pile of goodies -- headphones, carry case, etc.
I wish I'd read all of the 40-odd reviews before buying because several said that it struggled with home-burned disks, and DivX/MP4. When mine arrived, it wouldn't read any of them. It would read anything in standard DVD format, but anything outside of that format was unreadable.
Also, the picture was rubbish. It looked like the old 625 tv sets, where you could count the lines. And despite its being brushed aluminium, the quality of the finish of the case was nothing to write home about.
So, back off to Amazon with that not-fit-for-purpose piece of junk, and a return to my usual first choice when it comes to television/video/dvd/etc. You knows it, claart, it's a Sony. Why buy anything else?
Sure, the spec is always slightly conservative on Sony hardware. It's never out on the Bleeding Edge. That's why it's as reliable as it is.
And the product oozes quality the moment it arrives. Nice packaging. Beautiful fit and finish. Quiet understated elegance in the product design. I plug it in, switch it on, it starts quietly (in contrast with the Shinco, which sounded like they were turning on the generators at Sellafield), I slip in the disk -- a DVD-RW, with a variety of and DivX, Xvid files, some with subtitles, some without.
The disk is immediately recognized. I run through the menu and play one file after another and everything plays without a hiccup. It's a Sony -- its like a Honda insofar as they just do what they say on the tin. They do it well, reliably and repeatedly, with a minimum of fuss. Picture is pixel perfect. No flaws on the screen. This is how all consumer products should be.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Elegant design
- Five hour battery
- It just works. Perfectly
- Its a Sony.
Cons:
- No MP4? (Come on, Sony? Give us a break here. I very nearly bought the more expensive Toshiba because that did have MP4 playback.)
- No additional tchotckes? No headphones, no carry case, etc
- Single region.
- No MP4!
It's still fairly new so I can't talk to reliability yet, but if its anything like the other Sony products that I've owned, the product lasts longer than its functionality. Twenty years later, you'll be saying, 'Sheesh, if only I'd bought that Mahatmacoati, it would have been dead years ago and I wouldn't still be using this twenty year old Sony portable DVD.'
I'd buy another without giving it a moment's thought. Unless Sony introduced a model with MP4 decoding, in which case, I'd buy that one instead. Also, you can save around £30 by going with the white one rather than the pink, the red or the blue.
I wish I'd read all of the 40-odd reviews before buying because several said that it struggled with home-burned disks, and DivX/MP4. When mine arrived, it wouldn't read any of them. It would read anything in standard DVD format, but anything outside of that format was unreadable.
Also, the picture was rubbish. It looked like the old 625 tv sets, where you could count the lines. And despite its being brushed aluminium, the quality of the finish of the case was nothing to write home about.
So, back off to Amazon with that not-fit-for-purpose piece of junk, and a return to my usual first choice when it comes to television/video/dvd/etc. You knows it, claart, it's a Sony. Why buy anything else?
Sure, the spec is always slightly conservative on Sony hardware. It's never out on the Bleeding Edge. That's why it's as reliable as it is.
And the product oozes quality the moment it arrives. Nice packaging. Beautiful fit and finish. Quiet understated elegance in the product design. I plug it in, switch it on, it starts quietly (in contrast with the Shinco, which sounded like they were turning on the generators at Sellafield), I slip in the disk -- a DVD-RW, with a variety of and DivX, Xvid files, some with subtitles, some without.
The disk is immediately recognized. I run through the menu and play one file after another and everything plays without a hiccup. It's a Sony -- its like a Honda insofar as they just do what they say on the tin. They do it well, reliably and repeatedly, with a minimum of fuss. Picture is pixel perfect. No flaws on the screen. This is how all consumer products should be.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Elegant design
- Five hour battery
- It just works. Perfectly
- Its a Sony.
Cons:
- No MP4? (Come on, Sony? Give us a break here. I very nearly bought the more expensive Toshiba because that did have MP4 playback.)
- No additional tchotckes? No headphones, no carry case, etc
- Single region.
- No MP4!
It's still fairly new so I can't talk to reliability yet, but if its anything like the other Sony products that I've owned, the product lasts longer than its functionality. Twenty years later, you'll be saying, 'Sheesh, if only I'd bought that Mahatmacoati, it would have been dead years ago and I wouldn't still be using this twenty year old Sony portable DVD.'
I'd buy another without giving it a moment's thought. Unless Sony introduced a model with MP4 decoding, in which case, I'd buy that one instead. Also, you can save around £30 by going with the white one rather than the pink, the red or the blue.
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
Impressive little portable dvd player
(4 out of 5) by G on May 8, 2008 (UK)This arrived with a scratch on the cover, quite an obvious one, but Amazon very efficiently sorted this out, great customer service, I was really impressed! The dvd player is a very attractive looking thing, a bit heavy when the battery pack goes one. The picture quality is really great, better than expected. Features are very basic, but straightforward and easy to use. The only disappointing this I find is the 'tin-like' sound from the speaker, but when headphones are used the sound is really is great, as good as the picture quality. Headphones are not included, which was a little disappointing. A great quality product, well built, and highly recommended, and at an unbeatable price here on Amazon.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
Just what I wanted!
(4 out of 5) by Karl Savage on Nov 26, 2008 (Barnsley, South Yorks, UK)Wanted a portable DVD for a while and after reading the reviews on Amazon decided to plump for this little baby. Looks extremely swish and as for performance...the first disc I loaded was Foo Fighters live at Wembley - WOW! The picture is so good you do forget you're only watching a 7" screen. Maybe it's just the novelty but I'd swear it's better than my 32" LCD in the living room. As you'd expect, the sound from the built-in speakers isn't much cop but with quality headphones strapped to your lugholes it's dreamy. The only reason I can't give it a fat five is because I haven't had it that long so I suppose there's still time for summat to go wrong - though looking at the other reviews that seems a remote possibility.
16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
better than expected
(5 out of 5) by Mrs. V. L. Skidmore on Jun 11, 2008 (uk)after researching a few dvd players i found this one, read the reviews and decided to buy it. i was not dissapointed, the screen size and picture quality are excellent and the sound is great too.
Also the 5hr battery life is perfect as you can get a couple of films out of it, especially as i will be using it to keep the kids occupied on a 4 hour flight. I didnt realise that the outer casing was a shiny gloss white but i thought it looked really stylish and i liked the look of the whiite.
Also the 5hr battery life is perfect as you can get a couple of films out of it, especially as i will be using it to keep the kids occupied on a 4 hour flight. I didnt realise that the outer casing was a shiny gloss white but i thought it looked really stylish and i liked the look of the whiite.