Customer Reviews

Samsung DVD-L100 10-Inch Widescreen Portable DVD Player with MemoryStick Port

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

 

 

I just received my SAMSUNG DVD-L100 Portable DVD player. When playing a full-screen (3X4) movie, the picture is stretched to widescreen (16X9). There are three settings for display in the setup (Pan and Scan, Wide and Letterbox) One would assume that the Pan and Scan setting would fix this problem. It does not. I tried contacting Samsung through their Web page but have yet to recieve a response.

The picture, while very sharp, is quite dark, even at the brightest setting. Even viewing the screen in a darkened room there is very little shadow detail.

If a disc is paused for more than about 20 minutes the unit turns off and one's place on the disc is lost. There is a bookmark function but one does not always remember to use it.

If all you watch is bright widescreen movies it is excellent product but if you like old movies or television shows or something filmed at night it is an iffy purchase at best.

I was eventually able to get in touch with Samsung. They said that the format problem would have to be fixed by a service center. I would have to pay for shipping it to the service center but the warranty would cover the repair. I chose to return it for a refund.

J&R credited me for the cost of the player but not for the original shipping or the cost of shipping it back. These costs came to about $35.

I recently purchased the Samsung DVD-L100 "portable" DVD player.
The unit I received worked real well, with a nice clear, crisp picture and beautiful color. Also, the sound from the on-board speakers is good for a unit this size, although in a high-noise environment, headphones are recommended. The unit is a nice size that brings a 10 inch screen.

However, for all the fine work Samsung did here, the unit fails miserably in what it was intended to do, be a PORTABLE DVD player. The battery is a HUGE clunker that attached to the back and from it's size, you would think the unit would run forever on a charge. It does not. I was lucky to get 1 1/2 hours of play time before it died. Also, if you leave the battery attached without re-charging, it drains itself overnight.
This defeats the entire purpose of a portbale DVD player. A portable DVD player should be able to play for at least 4 to 5 hours on the battery charge, or it is not "portable".
An extra battery is 150 bucks! WOW! And as far as I know, there are NO extended life batteries, and the unit DOES NOT come with a car adaptor for use in the car. This unit is useless. What can be done with it other then for use in the home near an AC adaptor? For that, you can get great DVD decks for under 100 bucks.
The unit at 700 bucks, plus an extra BATTERY AT 150, PLUS OTHER GIZOMOS OR ADAPTORS FOR USE IN THE CAR, and you are over 1,000 bucks for this unit. At that price, we are approaching laptop prices.

Luckily, the dealer I bought it from allowed 30 days for a return, and mine went back today.

Let's start with the good features of this product. The screen is the largest available at this time. And it is very thin. Now for all the poor features of this player. First the screen is hard to see in daylight even when at it's brightest setting. Second the battery only lasts about 1 1/2 hours. Not enough time for even one movie. The battery also needs to be charged immediately prior to use. After a couple of days it depletes it's charge. Replacement batteries are about $150! Samsung promises a high capacity battery soon but not at this time. An auto adapter is only available from an after-market company.

The sound is so low that I am forced to purchase a device to play it through my auto's radio speakers. It does work well with the headphones and there are two jacks available. But while traveling in a car you can not hear the sound coming from the speakers.

The memory stick reader is a nice feature, but if want to view pictures over two megapixels it takes an eternity to load them.

My advice is to spend your hard-earned money on a different product!

I have to admit that I was tempted to buy this DVD Player just because of the big 10" screen. I was looking for a player that both kids could watch from the back seat of the car, so that they wouldn't make me crazy on long drives. After making the investment of near a grand, I was sadly disappointed in its performance. Face it, for this kind of price, it would be reasonable to expect a player that had a nice durable case, either metal or impact-resistant resin, but the L100 is sadly plain old PVC and not very heavy duty at that. The picture quality is not as good as the 8" Panasonic; it is not as sharp or bright, and off-angle viewing is less than great. Battery life too, is short, so that I had to deal with the kids protests, when they couldn't watch the end of the Lord of the Rings on a long flight. If you get one as a gift, see if you can dig up a spare battery. One pro for this player is that the spindle is detented, and there is a switch to flip the picture upside down. Too frustrated to use the player for travel, I mounted it under a counter top to watch a movie while I was making dinner. It folds nicely up when I need the space, and a little home engineering buried the wires. This unit is not a total disaster, so it gets 3 stars, but overall, it could have been way better. For waht I spent, I just about could have bought a 12" iBook with a DVD player, had a better picture, and answered my email when the kids weren't playing Warcraft. If any of the Samsung folks read this, be advised: you could have shaved a few bucks off the margin, built in the kinds of durability and display that would have made this player a killer, and sold a whole lot more of them.

Poor build quality mars this feature-rich portable DVD player. BTW, I measured the screen with a ruler and it's less than 10" as advertised, and the screen quality is terrible, especially when ourdoors. The worst thing, I had two units and both had 5-6 bad pixels, you know, dots that show just one color (red in one case and orange in the other). The buttons also feel loose, and the overall quality just feels subpar. My only other experience is with Toshiba portable players and they have much better screen and quality.

the ten inch screen is fabulous. colors are beutiful and this machine has everything one could ask for. i purchased it today and although the price is high, it is worth it. the remote is small like a credit card. the only negative is the battery charger. it is a three prong plug that goes into a two prong holder. if it is not placed just right,then it will not charge. took a few minutes to figure that part out. the instruction manual is also excellent that's how i found the problem.

First of all, let me say that I love my L100, I have been the envy of so many people on planes or car trips. It is a really cool and useful thing to have if you love movies and have time to waste. But there are a few things you should be aware of.

Pro's:
Huge 10'' screen, really is gigantic One of the largest on the market, I think they just came out with a 12''.
Comes with a carrying case.
Comes with AV cables to connect the dvd player to the tv.
The sound quality is great when in a quiet environment.
Plays cds, mp3s, and picture cds.
The unit itself is really small.
It has 2 headphone jacks, so that more than one person can listen.
Screen is great, and you can view it a lots of angles.

Con's:
The unit is not well ventilated and dvd processing is somewhat labor intensive so the unit becomes very hot on the bottom after about 30 minutes.
If you don't unplug the battery, it will drain all the juice, and carrying the battery around with the rest of the accessories can become a bit cumbersome.
Personally, I have gotten a good 2 1/2 hours max movie time, and that was with headphones and the screen on medium brightness.
It takes like 4-6 hours to charge the battery from zero.
The unit will not charge while being used.
The sound does suck on occasion, get a good pair of sound cancelling earphones, and that will alleviate most of the problem.

All in all its pretty cool, if you love techno thingys like me.

I bought this product for my kids (road trips) as well as the large screen. The picture is wonderful but the battery life is horrible. Additionally, I cannot seem to find a car adapter to work with this product... Bottom line, make sure you ABSOLUTELY charge this item fully before taking it any place where there is not an AC adapter. I would have given this unit four stars if I could find something to make it more road-compatable.

You can hear the motor running while playing the DVD, which is annoying, unless you use headphones. Also the battery life stinks. I bought this specifically for it's known battery life and was very disappointing. The battery life is from 30 min to 1 hr. There are no replacement batteries. However, Best Buy has a universal battery for $54, but I'm learning they can vary from 1 hr to 4 hr - - so be aware of false claims. Basically, I was ripped off buying a used DVD player. I called they guy and his response was, oh, sorry for your trouble! Watch out for dishonest people making claims "like new".

Just want to add a review on how the Samsung DVD L100 player works with the sony memory stick: Near perfect. You can switch to memory stick via a button that toggles between the different modes (dvd, memory stick, direct signal in). You can then browse trough digital pictures in a number of modes: slide show, one at a time (advance with keystrokes), or browse through thumbnails (8 at a time displayed if I recall right). I was able to view/show my digital pictures that I took from morocco with my Sony Cybershot 717 to friends right after the trip in europe.

That being said, here a few problems I found:
a) my camera takes up to 5 Megapixel pictures - that the Samsung can not handle (3 Megapixel max).
b) 3 megapixel pics take rel. long to load, i.e. 30 sec or so per picture, that was a little long. I used the time to talk about the shot and hit "next" right away, but see c)
c) while loading a picture, a little window "loading" appears in the middle of the screen. that should better be located at the bottom of the screen, since it blocks some of the pic (about stamp size) and see b) it takes so long to load some pics.
d) pics are displayed in widescreen and thus everyone looks a little fatter

Other comments:
I was unable to get a extra battery from anywhere (Dec 02) - sold out even at samsung, and the 6hr battery is still vaporware - not in production yet.

The player can also be hooked up as a monitor to i.e. my digital camera. Pic is not very good, though, but for my studio shots it worked all right (friends could see what I was going to shoot and comment/help out before I took a shot).

While flying around europe, we watched many movies on planes. Even stewardesses were stopping by to check out the player - brag factor a 10 for certain. Unit is small/thin and not very heavy, and we got nearly 2hrs out of a fully charged battery - good for one movie (but not for lord of the rings:).

The samsung works with 110 and 220 v, thus all you need is the plug adaptor for europe, and you are ready to watch movies in the hotel room / charge the battery.