Home > Consumer Reviews > Philips DVP5990/05 - HDMI 1080p DivX Ultra DVD Player

Region Hack

open tray
press Setup
select the Preference page/tab
Press 1,3,8,9,3,1
Press up/down key to select "0"
and hit setup to exit

you can now enjoy dvds of any region!

I wrote this review to justify this item's overall rating, as its 1 star right now due to the guy below (or above me) whining about the place he ordered it from (Pixmania), and not getting a UK plug and ultimatley putting off prospective buyers.

Right, i'll make it quick.

The DVD player just works, as any should now days straight out of the box. Simple scart lead (not provided so get a spare) into your TV and power cord into wall. If you want a little extra quality through the HDMI connection, and you have a HDTV then use a HDMI cable (also not provided).

I havent used the upscaling feature yet so i cant comment but as with most, it wont be a big step up from DVD, for the true high def experience you need HD content. But for £63 i dont mind my DVDs being upscaled.

The DivX is great, i have a few films i have on my PC and i can now watch them on my TV anytime. Just copy the file onto a USB stick if its above 700mb and plug it into the players front port (usb 2.0 as well), and it plays smoothly off that (my usb stick is good quality, 1gb about £15 so i didnt notice any skipping, but could happen with cheaper drives). Or you can also just copy the file onto a blank CD using Windows copy to disc and it plays no prob on the player. You just navigate to the file using a folder tree system.

Overall 5 stars, did everything i wanted it too. Looks good, very slim. Simple to use interface menus, good price - recommended.

The rather odd review giving this a low rating is quite out of place - Pixmania often supply European spec kit in my experience but usually give a plug adapter.

Bought from a UK company this will be a UK spec and it performs very, v-e-r-y well indeed. If you have an HD TV you'll need to buy an HDMI cable (don't waste money on a Curry's/ Comet con-job cable at £30.00+! Silly shops.). The up-scaling of ordinary DVDs is truly excellent and really makes the TV show what it can do. The previous nearly identical model received rave reviews and this one is its equal and more. Well done Philips.

I bought this to replace my highly flawed Sony DVP-NS38 as I needed a machine that would display correctly on a 16:9 TV, and offer subtitle support.

So, first the good points.

* The picture quality is excellent, with no noticeable cropping of the picture. The only cropping you will suffer will be from your TV's overscan (which, sadly, the vast majority of TVs have).

* Subtitle support is excellent - it recognises a wide variety of subtitle formats - essential for fans of foreign language DivX films. Simply name your subtitles the same as your avi file, put in the same folder, and the DVP5990 will automatically find them. You can put in several subtitles for the same film should you wish - simply add the relevant extension for your language, e.g. mymovie.avi could be accompanied by mymovie.en.srt for English subs, plus mymovie.fr.srt (French), mymovie.ge.srt (German) etc. (and not just limited to srt format).

* The USB 2.0 port is brilliant. No more burning downloaded material onto a DVDR in order to watch it (always a laborious task) - simply drag the movie and sub files onto your USB, then plug it into your player for immediate viewing.

* It is a 'DivX Ultra' machine, meaning it will recognise the latest DivX technology that can feature DVD-style titles and chapter menus on screen. Personally I find that a bit gimmicky - although having chapter markers within a film can be very handy.

* Upscaling to HD - I have read this is a good feature of this machine, although it is not something I have used, since I do not have an HD TV.

* Final good point: it plays many non-HD (720 pixels wide or less) WMV movie files. There are some it doesn't seem to support (and I'm not sure why) but it happily plays many, and that's a bonus since I never saw this feature advertised.

Now the bad points.

* The pre-installed firmware is horrible - menus look horrible and subtitles are displayed in a feeble grey-coloured font that is difficult to read and displayed almost a third of the way up the screen. Happily there are plenty of firmware updates on the net (both official and unofficial) which improve menus and subtitles no end. Having downloaded and installed one firmware update, I can now choose my favourite subtitle font, colour, size and position on the screen, which is great. Just a shame the original firmware was so awful that I had to go to this trouble.

* USB program material is accessed not by simply inserting your USB device; you must also hit the USB button on your remote to open up the USB folder. Fine - but there is no corresponding USB button on the player itself. This effectively means: lose or break your remote, and you lose the use of your USB port. This, to me, is a glaring omission.

* There is actually one other bad point on my player - it has no disk / USB memory, so if I put the player onto Standby halfway through a film, I lose the position it was stopped at. However, I have read elsewhere that this machine has a 10-disk memory, so I suspect this may be a problem with my firmware version, hence I am not letting this affect my score.

Conclusion: A very nice DivX player that on balance is well worth the money. In fact I was so impressed I immediately bought another to give as a gift (and updated the firmware on that one too). I'd give this 8/10.

I purchased this yesterday 14th Dec from Amazon Uk. Received today 15th Dec. Qucik and excellent service. HDMI cable not included. One connected the HDMI/1080p picture is amazing on a Philips LCD TV. Used Easylink which philips provide to link up various entertainment kits. The picture colours, contrast and sharpness is amazing.

A very small DVD Player that would fit on a glass wall bracket if needed to connect on the wall.

I recommend this to anyone who enjoys 1080p and High Definition picture quality.

Impressed with Amazon and the kit itself. Philips do provide quality. The remote control is quality too.

May purchase another one for the bedroom.