Customer Reviews

Panasonic DVD-F65S Super Slim 5-Disc DVD Player , Silver

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I previously had a Sony 5-disc DVD changer which did not play CD-R. So I had to keep my old CD player. The DVD-F65S replaces both of these components and is slimmer than either. Plus picture quality is far superior.

-Likes
I like the progressive scan output on my HD-ready TV. The picture has an almost 3D quality to it. I noticed an immediate difference compared to my Sony player which was no slouch itself. The sound quality is excellent, though I think this has more to do with my receiver. I like the feature set and the ability to play my burned VCD's and MP3's. Plus the price is incredible for what you get. The best deal on a progressive scan DVD changer bar none.

-Dislikes
I would prefer to have access to all controls on the unit itself as opposed to on the remote only. I think all players should have menu access available on the player in case you can't find the remote. The buttons that are on the player are quite small and feel flimsy. The display is almost useless from my regular viewing position. Thankfully there is an onscreen display if needed. The owners manual does a poor job of explaining some of the unique features of the player. Finally I would have liked to have a remote that could control the volume of my TV and/or receiver. But for a list price of $ (I paid [less $] including tax & shipping) it is hard to really fault this player.

Note that the editorial review has a couple of errors. The DVD-F65S does not include Depth Enhancer or Bass Plus (It has no other audio outs except for the stereo analog and optical). But it does include the Cinema modes and Dialogue enhancer which I feel are more important and useful.

It plays DVDs, CDs, CDRs and MP3s, allowing our family to retire a CD player, move the old DVD player to the basement and begin listening to MP3s at dinner. Great combo, and the five disk tray minimizes switching. The remote is very easy to work and the on-screen displays are easy to navigate. Didn't even pick up the manual it was that easy. It's also very slim, taking up little room in our entertainment center.

There may be others just as good, but it's hard to imagine one better for the price. Give this one a look if you are in the market.

I actually had to special order this one from my local electronics store based on a lot of research. I'm pleased that I did every day.

The picture quality seems very good with rich colours. Sometimes it is abit slow navigating through menus but I've never had a problem with playback. The picture quality on every movie I've played has been very good. But this isn't really why I bought this player.

The real kicker on this player is for those of us who have discovered DVD-Audio discs. If you don't know, DVD-A is a high-resolution audio format that encodes up to 6 channels of very high quality audio on a DVD disc. The quality of these discs (most of these discs) is stunning and if you have it hooked to a quality home audio system, you will realize a depth to your music that you never heard with regular CDs.

The video from this player is as good as most others, but the audio coming from anything you put in is far superior to other players that are even close to this price range.

I recommend this player to anyone who is critical about the audio quality coming from their speakers rather than just the image quality on their movies.

I bought this with some reluctance - it was less money than the equivalent Sony player, and didn't specify whether it could play the DVD+R format - in fact it indicated it wouldn't. But as the Sony player was out of stock, and the day after Thanksgiving deal meant I got this player for only $79.99, I went for it anyway.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that all the DVD XCopy backups of my movie collection, in DVD+R and DVD+RW format, played just fine.

As for the quality, everything is superb. I haven't had a single problem with any format of any disk, so I'm not sure why the first reviewer had problems.

The sound quality is great, and even though neither my $50 6-speaker home theater kit, nor this dvd player have any sort of Dolby or DTS decoding ability (just some sort of emulation mode), the sound output from the combination of both is nearly perfect, which the correct sounds going to the correct speakers. Planes sound like they are flying over and past me, etc. Occasionally I lose some of the center speaker and subwoofer sounds - but this is not surprising considering the cheapness of my sound system.

The other features are superb, especially the incremental zoom function - together with the presets, this helps deal with the stupid 16x9 widescreen format that the movie industry has decided to inflict on us - which is the reason we get black bars even on wide screen HD TV's. Only the original widescreen format movies will fill the screen of a widescreen TV, so why we have to have this butchered format is beyond me.

As for the Lord of the Rings comment, both the extended versions of the Fellowship and the Two Towers play without any glitches in my player - however these disks are incredibly delicate. I was forced to replace the Fellowship after a minor scratch destroyed 50% of disk two, so that no dvd player, Sony, Magnavox, even the PS2 would play it (which in turn was the reason I invested in DVD XCopy, so I no longer run the risk of damaging the original copy of any of my more prized movies).

If you intend to use this on a non high-definition TV, then I would highly recommend it. It looks sleek, is easy to use and works well. I have had it for almost two years, and it still works well.

However, if you are buying this for a high-defition TV, I would look somewhere else. I had originally purchased this for my 55" High-Definition TV, but I could see the progressive scan on the screen. It was a line going from right to left vertically across the screen. It was not very visible, but once I saw it, I could not forget about it. I then bought the Sony DVP-NC685V and moved the Panasonic to my basement where I do not have a high-definition TV and thus do not use the progressive scan. Since then it has worked out great, and I have no complaints. The Sony had a better picture quality for high-def, but broke after a year.

have had this dvd player for about 2 months with no problems so far. the only complains are small - takes a while to read the disk and can't rotate all the way around when open (only to adjacent disks).

I thought this would be a great solution for us since my toddler son is the main "user" of the dvd player and switching dics is a pain and exposed them to scrathes and so on. Unfortunately, after having this player for two weeks, it's obvious that it's just not up to snuff. Just last night I had to stop watching Lord of the Rings because of dropped frames and pixelation that kept annoying me. I plop the disc in our portable player and no problem. The same scenes play without a hitch. I think Panasonic cut too many corners on this one.

Perhaps it was just the particular unit I received, but this player had a problem recognizing DVDs and often wouldn't play them. Thankfully, Amazon has a great return process which made it easy for me to send it back for a full refund, and order the F85S model instead, which is so far working great!