Customer Reviews

Initial IDM-830 8-Inch Portable DVD Player

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I purchased this item in Albuquerque. I played a DVD in my hotel room and discovered that after about 30 minutes, multiple white bars appeared at the top of the screen. I took it back to Circuit City and looked at 4 other identical players and they were all defective. I tried different DVD's and the same problem occurred. I took my original unit home to Kansas City and took it to Circuit City there and tested another Initial player and had the same problem. I ended up buying the new 7" Sony. It was $200 more. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

I've had this unit for about 2 months now and have never experienced the problems I've read on this site. What I like about the player is how light and portable it is..Not only can you use it in your car while traveling but you can move it to your other TVs in your house and hook up to the audio video input on your sets and your're ready to roll!! The picture is amazingly sharp compared to some of the other players I have seen and the screen is designed for widescreen DVDs..in other words the film fits perfectly in the screen!

It comes with a car adaptor and a really nice and thin remote control that works wonderfully! I highly recommend this unit!!

We bought this product before Thanksgiving. It worked OK at times, but would get a bar across the screen at other times. We exchanged it for the same model. The second one didn't work at all. The DVD cover would not lock, ran loud and could not play the movie. We are returning it and looking for a different brand.

I purchased the 853, it's the same unit with an 8.5 inch screen. The first unit I purchased had bright red pixels all over. I took it back and exchanged it for the same model, the second one played the DVD for about 30 seconds and then choked. So I turned it off and back on again, but all it would do is say "Disc Unknown". I took it back for a full refund. This company makes the worst DVD players I have ever seen.

This player did not work. The screen went totally black within 10 seconds after putting the first dvd in it. It had sound, but no picture whatsoever. Had to return and did not buy it again. Went with a Mintek instead and it is working fine.

Player worked fine the first couple of movies and then, the multiple notorious white bars across the top of the screen appear. I'm taking it back to the store with hopes of a discount, however, I'm worried about the bars growing larger?? Will that happen? Does anyone know??? What an fn shame, and at such a decent price too. From another disapointed DVD Addict.

I like these 'Initial' dvd players because they play CD+G (karaoke) format disks; most other brands do not (Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic do not play CD+G). I own three Initial dvd players.

I just owned this unit for a few days so I am unable to judge its long term reliability. I had one glitch right out of the box: the LCD screen was completely dark! I connected it to a TV and everything looked OK. After fiddling for a while then I finally found the culprit: the "line select" switch was kind of set in the middle. After moving it to the "out" position then the picture came up and there are no dead pixels. However, there is nothing mentioned in the manual about what's the exact funtion of this switch. In summary,

The Cons:

* Poor documentation.

* The vertical view angle is limited.

* Not S-video cable which requires a special connector.

* No "seek" buttons on the console.

* Display dot pitch is kind of big (the screen door effect)

The Pros:

* Versatile audio capability, good speakers.

* Works with DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD+R DL, DVD+RW.

* Changeable region setting as mentioned in the previous review.

* The screen brightness, aspect ratio and color is easy to adjust.

* Relatively low price (from another vendor)

This is the worst electronic product I have ever purchased. Returned once to store, then the next three times to the company due to black and white bars at the top of the screen every time and had to pay them an extra $50. for the aggrivation. Now they think to appease me by sending me a model that is much cheaper than the one that I originally purchased. I have since read numerous reviews following the same problem. And to think, they continue to make this DVD player.