Customer Reviews

Philips PET1010 Portable DVD Player

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

 

 

Pros: It plays DivX, Xvid, DVD+R(W), DVD-R(W), SVCD, VCD, MP3s plus great screen! Battery life is a little over 3 hours.

Cons: If you have a CD full of MP3s, it becomes rather slow in selecting the song you want. No SD/MMC cardslot. Audio output as a standalone player is rather low but hooked up to an audio system, PC speakers, or headphones sounds great!

I have been holding out on a portable DVD player since I really wanted a portable DVD player with DivX & Xvid support. Finally these players have arrived!

Since I have a whole bunch of DivX & Xvid CDs, I immediately booted up the DVD player and started throwing random CD movies. It played them all excellently. Since the specs don't mention Xvid support, I was even surprised when it played my Xvid CDs as well. The movie files need to be encoded in DivX/Xvid with MP3, AC3, or PCM for audio. It also played my SVCDs and VCDs without any trouble. If that's not enough, I also tried playing a DVD recorded in DVD-R media since the specs only mention DVD+R(W) media. Well, it played the DVD-R media without any problems.

I believe that the original design of this player intended to have SD/MMC card support. Too bad it doesn't because it would have been great to play my videos/jpegs pictures off a SD card. But that's a minor quibble.

Battery life is better than the specs mentioned. After I fully charged the battery, I tested it by playing a DivX movie that was 2 hours and 14 minutes long. It not only played it but it actually lasted 3 hours and 7 minutes after I selected to play the movie again! Better than expected!

For those of you who have considered buying a portable DivX/Xvid player like Archos AV420 (which I almost bought until I saw this DVD player), the screen is much larger and the price is much cheaper (even if it is less portable than the Archos AV420).

In short, I'm very delighted with my Pet1000 and is exactly what I have been waiting for. Great job Philips!

After waiting and waiting and waiting some more I finally jumped into the portable DVD player market. Believe me when I tell you that I looked at every available player on the market. There was always a reason that stopped me from buying a portable DVD player whether it was price, bad picture quality, features, whatever. Then it happened. I stumbled onto this unit during one of my many internet portable DVD player research sessions.

Unfortunately, no retail outlet in my area had one on display. So I did something I've never done before: that's right, the sight-unseen purchase! I bought this unit from Circuit City after I had to convince the sales person that, yes, you do carry this unit and, yes, you probably have one in stock. He checked the in-store inventory and lo and behold, they had one.
I decided that since I had one month to return it, I'd give it a shot. Am I ever glad I did! What an awesome unit.

First, picture quality.........It actually looks like a mini-plasma screen TV in terms of brightness, color and sharpness. I honestly don't know how the picture could be any better. Easily, the best I have ever seen in a portable, by far.

Second, sound quality........With headphones: tremendous, incredible. Without headphones: honestly, not too good. But why would anyone listen to the teenie little built-in speakers on a portable instead of using headphones? You wouldn't. There are several sound options with different EQ configurations but I found the factory default settings to be the best. Just keep the surround sound feature on all the time and you will get sound quality equal to your local theater.

Third, features...........too numerous to mention but this unit has everything you need and more and comes with a great little ultra thin remote. Fortunately, for basic movie watching, everything can be accomplished on the console itself, no remote needed. I guess the biggest negative about this unit is the battery life rating. It's only rated for 2.5 hours of viewing time. The good thing though, is that it is a Lithium-Ion and during my personal tests, it lasted for over 3.5 hours, about an hour longer than it's rating. Not too bad really.

Summary........all-in-all I very, very highly recommend this unit but please don't take my word for it. If you are fortunate enough to find one of these players on display, by all means check it out for yourself. You will not be sorry.

At the risk of piling up the "unhelpfuls," I'd just like to question the warranty on this machine (and, to be fair, some other portable DVD players). What does it say about the manufacturer's confidence in a $350+ product when both parts and labor are only warranted for 90 days? OK, so I guess in today's electronics marketplace, you pay your money and you take your chances, but at least 90 days/1 year doesn't seem unreasonable at this level.