Customer Reviews

Polaroid PDV-0820T Portable DVD Player with 8-Inch LCD

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

I'd been waiting well over a year to buy a portable DVD player. I'd done my research and I was looking for a player that was a brand name, had an 8 inch screen with a sharp quality picture at a good price. I finally found it and this is it.

Likey the most important feature for most people shopping for a portable DVD player (besides price) is the image quality of the screen. You want to know how good is the picture quality on this player. The answer in two words is very impressive. The main problem (and the reason I waited so long to get one) is that the affordable players all had rather poor image quality. So poor that it was distracting from what you are watching. If you wanted a nice crisp picture you had to pay an arm and a leg. This player however has a picture quality that I thought was just about as good as the $400+ players. The colors are sharp and vibrant. It was very easy watching a movie on this to get involved in the film and forget that you were watching it on a smaller screen.

Sound wise the player has two small built in speakers. While they will work in a pinch, you simply are not going to get quality sound from speakers that small on any player you buy. The player is designed to be used with headphones so you'll want to invest in a nice pair of quality headphones to use with this. The good news is this player has not one but two headphone jacks, one on each side. So if you and your spouse are on a plane together you can both plug in and listen to the film together without having to try and use the built in speakers. This is a very nice feature.

So, if you are like me and have been waiting for a name brand player with a nice quality screen to come along at an affordable price, then give this one consideration. I think you will find it to be a very good player for a decent price.

One last note if you do buy the player about the default settings. The default factory settings on the player for sharpness is LOW. This will give you a very soft poor quality picture. When you get your player, go in and make sure to change that setting from LOW to either MED or HIGH. It makes a big difference.

I bought this little unit as a gift for my children, and within the first month, I would have given it five stars. At some brick-and-mortar stores you can still get the players with small screens, but when the screens are that small, any increase in size is significant. Anyway, this unit has a nice appearance, and gave us no problems when watching the DVDs.

However, after about a month and a half, the unit suddenly went dead. I tried contacting the company's on-line support, but repeated e-mails produced *NO* response. I finally called their support number, and was informed that the unit is no longer under warrantee, but that for a wee fee (about half price) they will replace the unit.

So, overall, I am pretty disappointed. Will I pay for a new unit? I just don't know, that's a lot of money for 1.5 months worth of DVD watching. Overall, I do not recommend this unit.

Also, if you DO get this unit, ignore the on-line support and call in right away, so you do not fritter away your warrantee time like I did!

We have had the DVD player for less than a year and it is already broken. The problem is the plug outlet. At first you can wiggle it and the DVD will play, but the problem eventually worsens. Don't buy it, but if you do GET THE WARRANTY.

I am now on my third unit since my initial purchase two months ago. The first unit had problems with the LCD screen. The second problem had problems with the audio connections. Let's hope the third unit works.

Spend the extra money and get a better quality player.

After spending about $300 for this in October 2004, I was disappointed when the power cord stopped staying in place. Unfortunately, I waited too long to report it, so it will be cheaper to buy a new unit than have this one repaired. Also, even though we did not use the battery very often, it will no longer hold a charge (not even a minute). No more Polaroid electronics for me.

I bought this one for my daughter. The first unit broke after the first use. The screen would not show anything. I exchanged for another one. The second one kept saying that the door was open and rebooting the movie from the start. This was the first time I used it. I returned it to the store for my money back.

I purchased my 1st player (the one w/o the pivatol screen) 2 years ago. The adaptor for the car was a loose fit and seemed to get more loose over 6 mths until it didnt work at all. Received 2nd player under warranty. It developed the SAME problem. Received THIRD player under warranty. Didnt work at all. They replaced it with a FOURTH player which was this model with the upgraded pivatol screen. I've owned it for less than a year, its been used less than 25 times, and now THE CAR ADAPTOR IS TOO LOOSE AND WONT WORK!!! What's just as bad, the fitting wont hold the charger either, so I cant even charge the battery or watch it by plugging it in an outlet.

THIS WHOLE SERIES IS GARBAGE.SAVE YOURSELF MULTIPLE DELAYS WAITING FOR REPLACEMENTS AND MULTIPLE "HEADACHES". DO NOT SPEND YOUR MONEY!!

The car adapter cord started coming loose after only a few months of use. Which means the movie stops and has to be restarted by jiggling the cord (VERY upsetting for a small child!) We finally solved this by leaving the battery pack in even while it was plugged in (which the product advises not to do as the battery has a memory.) Then we discovered that the Polaroid had been ruining our DVDs! There are circular scratches on them. My husband tried to salvage them by copying them onto a new DVD but many of them he could not save. The DVDs will only play part way and then the screen starts getting stuck. We have also had issues with error messages from the Polaroid thinking there was no DVD in or that the door was open to the DVD player. This product only has a 90 day warranty - I think it is quite clear why they don't warranty it longer!

These Polaroid DVD players are not worth the money unfortunately.

Went thru two units with swivel screen.

First broke on intial use. Second unit lasted exactly 5 uses, when the hinge snapped as it was being closed, (very gently I might add, since these things feel like they will fall apart in your hands.)

The cheap plastic facing surrounding the screen also split in two when the hinge broke. Polaroid units may possible be rebranded Malata's as I saw the exact same models in Shanghai in December sold as Malata's.

If you are willing to live with the risk of it breaking on you, on the plus side, battery life really was excellent (altho the battery is very large,) and the screen quality was very good compared to more expensive models.

Your mileage may vary of course, but if you are making the investment, consider spending a bit more for a real name brand, and avoid Polaroids.

Got myself a Samsung, which is just awesome

I did like the product in the beginning. Two months later, it stopped running the disk. Having read other reviews, now I do not even think about bringing it back to the retailer to fix it. Polaroid is always my favorite brand so this experience was quite dissapointing.