Customer Reviews

Sony DVP-CX985V 400 Disc Progressive DVD / SACD Player

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Expectations are everything. My experience with the incompetence of the consumer A/V industry must lower mine. I've heard the complaints about the speed and clumsiness of this unit but I have no major complaints about it. I must admit that I place a higher priority on picture and audio quality, and this unit is awesome on both counts. In addition, the transport is well designed, quiet and well balanced.

For those of you shopping for one of these, make sure you read the dimensions. This sucker is HUGE. It's much deeper than any of my other equipment, including my Sony ES receiver. I had to cut the back out of my A/V cabinet in order for it to fit. Again, no biggie. I'd have bought a new piece of furniture for it.

The time required to set up this unit is nothing when compared with the nightmare of displaying, storing, and handling 350 DVDs. My wife and I spent about three hours inserting the discs and entering the titles, using a keyboard and a spreadsheet of our movies. It took me another hour to divide the DVDs into the four included groups in the Disc Explorer. I divided them into Family, Action, CDM (Comedy Drama Musical) and Other (special features, yoga, documentaries). Seems to work so far for me.

Is the Disc Explorer the greatest thing in the world? Nope, but it works fine if you are too lazy to have a printout of your movies nearby. The best part is that it's not required in order to use the unit, which gives you lots of flexibility. If you are serious about your video system, use DVDlobby and you'll never use Disk Explorer again.

I've heard complaints about the speed of the transport on this unit. Again, expectations are everything. How long does it take to look through the movies in your media cabinet, decide which one you want, open the sometimes bizzarre packaging, load the disc into your player, take the old one out, and put it away?

With this unit, it takes 18 seconds to load and play a disk on the opposite side of the platter. It takes 9 seconds to go from viewing a movie to viewing the Disk Explorer. It takes about 4 minutes to navigate through all 400 disks with the Disk Explorer. It's faster if you don't add pictures to the disc names, and some of the names from the disk manufacturers are just wrong, so you might be better off not letting the unit detect your disks.

The only movie I had a real problem creating a title for was Confessions of a Dangerous Mind since there was only room for "Conf/Dangerous M". I settled for "Dangerous Mind". I know my movies well enough that I don't require an entire paragraph to remind me.

If you are interested in using this unit for SACD, remember that you must have a 5.1 channel input on your receiver. If you have more CDs than DVDs, don't expect this thing to be a good CD player. It isn't, but I've never seen a DVD player that was. Buy a megaCD changer and save yourself the trouble.

First the fundamentals: this unit works--it stores and plays 400 DVDs with very good picture and sound quality; but there are so many little things that make it hard to use that the only reason to recommend this over another mega-changer is the price.

The biggest problem is the amount of your time this unit wastes.

As other reviewers have noted, with the cover art installed, it takes over 1.5 seconds to display the next item when scrolling up or down. That really adds up in a 400-disc player. You can cut down on this by alpha-sorting the folders and scrolling rapidly without having the unit display the titles as you go, but even with this it still can take over a minute to find the disc you want. Definitely longer than when I had my DVDs on the shelf.

It is also very annoying that the player locks-out the stop button during the FBI warning, so if you start playing a disc unintentionally, you have to wait until the warning is done before you can go back. That can easily add a minute or two.

Which leads to another big frustration: an extremely bad remote control. There are lots of little buttons that are very difficult to tell apart. Some of the buttons can kill a viewing experience if hit by accident (eg., if you hit disc skip you need to sit through the entire FBI warning for the DVD you are moving to, and then again through the one you are watching, and then you have to find your place again. A potential 5-minute delay because your finger slipped in the dark).

There is also a strange bug that causes the unit to sometimes start playing the current disc when you hit the power button. (There is a feature to do this, but I have it turned off). To continue the ongoing theme of this review, when this happens, you need to sit through the entire FBI warning before you can go select the disc you want to view.

Two features that I've seen mentioned about this unit (though not by Sony) are not present at all. First, some places refer to this as a 400+1 disc changer. There is no 401st slot; you need to remove a disc to put the 401st in. Second, I saw one site say that this unit could play both sides of a DVD. This is not true.

I have ended up printing out a paper list of the installed DVDs and their slot numbers, and I navigate using the dial on the base unit. I control the unit during play using a universal remote that doesn't include any changer functions.

Not an ideal solution, but not bad for around $350 delivered.

After reading numerous reviews regarding the Sony DVP-CX985V, it became obvious that Sony's interface needed to be avoided altogether. Since I also happened to be looking for a way to avoid another remote in the living room (I'm embarrassed to say I've collected over a dozen somehow) I found the Harmony SST-659 universal remote can catalog all 400 slots and display them on the backlit LCD.

In short, you look at the remote to choose the movie, not the painfully slow and inaccurate Sony "Explorer" mode... which does a great job at making you feel as if you are truly exploring some vast, unknown and mostly empty wasteland.

You might not like the idea of buying a new DVD player and a fairly pricy remote just to make it all work. But if you're like me, and were ready to get rid of some remotes anyway... it's a winning combo.

What's the catch? The remote itself requires patience and an internet connection to program it... remember, it can control all of your systems.

The silver lining? I shopped around and bought both for a little more than the retail price of the DVD player alone.

So I actually love the DVD player now. The quality of the picture is superb. The sound decoding is faultless. It plays every rewritable disc I've thrown at it, and finally, it's just too cool. Watching the blue backlit carousel spin your library around gives my 3 year-old the giggles every time.

And I LOVE the door locking feature. We can keep his DVDs out of his hands and locked in the carousel. This has actually saved us money, since he's been able to find several of his discs in the past and frisbee them to death.

Bad kid. Good player.

Thanks to the dire warnings in reviews like these, I purchased this item with low expectations. I chose a local retailer instead of an online one because I knew I might want to return it. Got a floor model for $345, so I was satisfied with the price.

One reviewer mentioned that he avoided the Disc Explorer entirely by typing up a list and accessing discs by disc number only. I took his advice, and after a cursory look at the Disc Explorer I haven't used it since. Sony screwed up here, but the rest of the player is great.

(It's inexplicable why Sony designed the Disc Explorer the way they did. It shows only 5 titles at a time, you can't page down and it doesn't load titles automatically from most discs. It's really terrible. WTF, Sony?)

If the remote had a jog dial so I could dial up a disc number, I'd be in heaven. As it is, I use the
+/- keys or press "Folder", then type in the disc number, enter, enter. This works fine. I'm happy with the disc-loading speed.

What I'm most thrilled with is that it plays all my DVD+R home movies perfectly. Whew. Didn't know whether they'd play when I bought it. Having 20 years of my life on deck changes everything. I can go to my kids' birthdays, Christmas of any year or specific vacation memories in seconds. Without a player like this, most home video lies unwatched and even if you pop a tape in, you can't locate anything quickly. With everything transferred to DVD and loaded in a jukebox, I can finally really use my home movies. Same with my complete Monty Python and Seinfeld sets. If you want to put on The Argument Sketch or The Contest, you can go right to it. Oh, and children are incapable of putting DVDs back in their cases. Problem solved.

One nightmare I read about but didn't have was scratched discs. My player is fine in this regard.

My wife asked my why I bought it if it had so many annoying problems. Here's the deal:

1. This player costs $200 less than the Pioneer.
2. This player is progressive scan.
3. The Pioneer is much older.
4. It does what it's supposed to do.

I can't comment on the picture or audio quality since I'm not a videophile or audiophile anymore. I have the thing plugged directly into a 27" tv, not even stereo. But I'm sure if I get a plasma tv and hook it into a surround system it'll be awesome.

My wife is happy it plays CDs. She rarely listened to CDs before because it was too much trouble to find them and put them on the player. Now, she can just dial up (on the player) what she wants and press Play.

Buy one and work around the shortcomings. It'll change your life.

Pros
1. This player costs $200 less than the Pioneer.
2. This player is progressive scan.
3. The Pioneer is much older.
4. It does what it's supposed to do.
5. Plays DVD+Rs.

Cons
1. Disc access interface. Just avoid Sony's Disc Explorer and you'll be fine.
2. Huge, but that's not a big problem for me.

I liked the thing so much I bought two. Hate the remote, can't figure out the Disc Explorer feature, but it swallows up the discs. Until you have emptied the shelves of hundreds of jewel boxes and DVD cases you just can't fully appreciate the miracle of this machine. Forget all the features--it plays just about everything and if there is a sound quality difference from my old one disc Denon player, I'm incapable of hearing it. The DVDs play perfectly and I'm much more comfortable if the kids merely press buttons than if they are handling the DVDs.

Sure, in a few years everything will probably be kept on harddrive, but it is important to me to have my collection instantly accessible. DO NOT attempt to use the features--I spent hours entering title information and somehow it all got erased. I keep a log on the computer and a recent printout right next to the machine--it is so easy to dial up the disc you want that you find yourself re-discovering your music collection--not to mention the instant access to all your movies. This machine is worth twice its price.

I just purchased this unit yesterday, and have almost completed the loading of my media into the player.

First let me mention the things that I do like about it. I like that it holds 400 disks, and how the motor transport transitions from disk to disk. I am pleased with the audio quality from either the Digital Fiber connection or the 6-channel direct connection. I like that it plays so many media formats, and I'm glad it has a keyboard interface. It would take even longer to program without it.

This brings me to one of the worst designed menu systems, and disk recognition systems that I have seen. Only twenty of my sixty two DVD's were automatically recognized and populated in the menu, the rest I had to manually enter into the 16 character space, even though there is another blank line below, you cannot select it to edit the contents to have one line for the Artist and the other for the title. The ratio of recognized CD titles is even worse. It recognized five out of one hundred and seventy eight CD's, one of which was the SACD demo CD of Bob Dylan that comes with the player. It would be better if there were a couple of customizable genre categories as well.

Although the menu system stinks, I am still glad that I made the purchase. It eliminates the need for a media rack in my living room, and I have re-discovered some of my forgotten about CD's while loading them into the player.

I am writing this review because nobody else seemed to discuss the features I really like. It reduced my premium cable channels lug of nearly $40.00 bucks a month! How many good movies can you own for $40 bucks a month. You can turn on the random shuttle and play all or a part of your movies continuously(no FBI warnings). I did not have a problem with the disc explorer as others have. I disconnected my keyboard from my computer(PS2)and plugged it into the front of the unit and it was ready to input titles! Another feature no one has discussed.
One warning: If you have 150+ DVD's you will want to spread them out over the full 400 slots, makes it easy to add movies you haven't aquired yet if you like keeping them in alphabetical order.

I've seen so many negative reviews of this machine that I feel the need to comment myself. The user interface is definitely it's biggest flaw. I, too, have resorted to using secondary lists to know where my discs are. At first I used a paper list, and now I have a file on my laptop for my CDs and use my IMDB account for my DVDs. (Just type the slot number in the URL section of your movie notes) Anyhow, it is a big area Sony can improve on. What I would ultimately like to see is an ethernet connection to get the info off CDDB, etc. I was one of the folks who bought this for CD's, opting for the DVD version because of the small price gap between the two. What I absolutely LOVE about this machine is having all (or most) of my CDs able to be played though randomly. Granted, a few minutes are spent setting up with the akward menu system, but once set, this thing will play forever until I stop it. I have to wonder why I have to scroll though a menu for such a common function as shuffle, though? Here is the exact procedure for starting the process. Turn on machine. Default folder is "ALL". Hit folder button once to show the "ALL" folder, again to move to "DVD" folder, and once again to move to "CD" folder. Now, you cannot access the menu that contains the shuffle function unless a disc is playing, so hit play. After disc loads, hit "display" button twice to get to correct menu. Scroll down 6 items, then hit right arrow to enter shuffle menu, then down once for random disc, or down twice for random tracks across all discs [my preferred]. So yes, there is definitely truth in the poor menu design complaints. But, after doing this daily, I basically can do it with my eyes closed, and don't even need the TV on. As far as performance, I have had this nearly two years now and never had a single problem other. I often leave it playing CDs at random for hours, if not days at a time. Playback is flawless (I use the optical output). DVD,s too (via component)all play perfectly. I too wish more DVD manufacturers would include pictures and title info. One last thing that bothers me...I had dreams of burning comp discs of MP3's to load and play randomly, but after trying the few I already had, the machine really doesn't like them much. It pretty much ignores MP3 discs in random mode. Also, MP3 discs cannot be put into folders. Additionally, VCDs are auto grouped with CD's which can get annoying on random. I stopped storing VCDs in my machine for this reason. Well, I'm not sure my review will come across much better than the others. It is harder to expand upon the reasons I love this machine, and easy to draw out the negatives with detailed descriptions of the problems. All in all, I think most people with a sizeable collection would appreciate all that this unit has to offer, and like myself, overlook even it's glaring flaws.

I really like this player BUT it can, at least on some units, develop a problem that scratches your DVD's. Not saying you should not buy one... just beware and current owners, be vigilant. I like SONY and they have a boatload of my money and I am being honest in this review.

SYMPTOM:
Some DVD's may sound a little out-of-balance (mechanical rotation sound). Intermittent play of certain DVD's, remove DVD to clean/inspect it and you see one or more half-moon shaped scratches... deep with curled plastic and "DVD dust" that has been gouged out of your DVD.

I entered a service call with Sony about this scratch issue and they asked me to unplug it for two minutes... oddly enough, this did not solve the problem :) So I opened the player and after viewing about 50 DVD changes... it all became clear.

BACKGROUND:
To get so many DVD's in the unit and minimize the player depth dimension, Sony designed it to NOT totally move the playing DVD into the player section unlike their 300+1 disk changer that I also have. They leave the edge of the spinning disk inside your storage tray. To keep the two DVD's on either side from getting in the way, a forked-bracket comes out that is supposed to separate/move them away from the spinning disk.

PROBLEM:
Sometimes the forked bracket that is supposed to move the side disks apart either doesn't or FORCES the DVD to the right of the spinning disk into your spinning DVD which, like a saw, grinds away during the entire time you are watching the playing DVD. Heck, if you are watching Titanic it may actually saw the poor thing in half. If I wasn't serious that may have been a joke.

(Note: Original review written in December, as of February, NO MORE SCRACHES since my "screw" mod.. See "MY RESOLUTION" BELOW)

MY RESOLUTION: (Try at your own risk)
SONY was of no help and did not admit that anyone had ever reported this (evidence in chat forums tells me this is less than honest) So... I made a slight mod to the back screw of the laser assembly (has a small blue rubber boot over the screw) Added a thin washer so it points the leading edge of the spinning disk a little to the left and away from the exposed play side of the next DVD. So far (viewed about 200 disk changes) so good. BTW, my unit is level, the disk tray is in alignment so that is not it and the forked bracket is tight. I think this is just a poor design with enough variables in the mechanism that it works "most of the time". Some players may never see the issue but mine, and others obviously have.

You could send your player to SONY and perhaps they have a solution they are not making public, perhaps not.

SONY, shame on you for this design (would rather have a few less DVD's and no chance of damage) and also for not being honest with customers who have reported this.

Good luck fellow DVD lovers!

I bought one of these players, upgrading from a Sony 300+1 disk player that had been filled and because I also wanted the progressive scan my older unit had lacked. The slowness of the Disk Exployer has always been a problem that I was use to, so that was nothing new to me. A wireless keyboard makes a GREAT difference when putting in movie names, howerver it still took me about two weekends to program 320 DVD titles (about 5% of which had been pre-programmed with DVD-Text).
The first problem showed up as I was loading the movies from the old player. Slot number 141 would not load a disk into the drive, no matter what disk I put into the slot. This was a minor problem as I had 399 working slots.
The bigger problem showed up after I had put in about 380 DVD's (about seven months into ownership). The unit started acting up. Sometimes the power would turn itself off for no reason, sometimes programmed disks would be lost from Disk Exployer and more then once the player would simply lock up while playing a disk - the picture would freeze and no responce from either the remote or front-panel buttons. I would have to unplug the unit to reset it.
And on the 8th month, the power supply failed. I was on 383 DVD's, all programmed, with picture jackets ... I nearly cryed thinking of all the time it had taken to program the player. It has been in the shop now for two months. Luckly, I had not yet sold my old 300 disk changer, which is still working.
For those that don't like programming in all those DVD titles, I have recently purchased the Kenwood DV5900, it links to your home computer and gets titles off the internet. It is a much better, though much more expensive unit ... and still supports changer linking (up to three), which the newer Sony units seem to lack.