Toshiba SD-4990 Upconverting Progressive Scan DVD Player

by Toshiba

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 16.9 x 1.6 inches ; 12 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 6 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• Shipping Advisory: This item must be shipped separately from other items in your order. Additional shipping charges will not apply.
• ASIN: B000F3SB6C
• Item model number: SD-4990
• Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,575 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)
  • #58 in Electronics > Televisions & Video > DVD Players & Recorders > DVD Players

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Watch your favorite DVDs on your high-definition flat screen television with no loss of video quality thanks to the Toshiba SD-4990 upconverting, single-disc DVD player. Using the HDMI connection and a compatible TV, you'll get uncompressed digital video up to HDTV level resolutions of 720p or 1080i. And since this conversion is performed within the player, the signal remains free from excessive digital-to-analog conversion artifacts. You'll also be able to view your high-megapixel digital camera snapshots in enhanced resolution via the HDMI connection.

Measuring just 1.65 inches high, this stylishly silver, super-slim player is compatible with a wide variety of disc and digital file formats, including DVD-R/RW, CD-R/RW, and VCD discs as well as MP3, WMA, and JPEG (Kodak Picture and FujiColor CDs) content burned to disc. It's also DivX Home Theater Certified, meaning that it's compatible with video burned to disc using both the DivX video format.

The SD-4990 performs 3:2 pulldown detection and reversal, too--a handy feature for watching progressive-scan movie programs in their native 24-frame format. To adapt 24 frames-per-second movies to 30 fps video, frames in the original movie must be duplicated; 3:2 pulldown digitally corrects this duplication by removing the redundant information to display a frame-accurate picture.

With the JPEG Viewer, you can easily display your favorite digital photos and create custom slideshows with a few simple clicks of the player's remote control. The interactive Digital Picture Zoom feature allows you to select an area of the video from a DVD and magnify it. Other DVD playback features include fast scan, slow motion, multi-angle selection, multi-subtitle selection, and parental lock.

You get vivid, realistic sound, thanks to Toshiba's 24-bit/192 kHz pulse code modulation (PCM) audio processor. PCM audio translates digital signals from your DVDs and CDs into warmer, natural sound. The DVD player offers Dolby Digital and DTS decoding, and you can connect to a multi-channel home theater surround sound system via the coaxial digital audio output. It also produces 3D virtual surround sound from two speakers. It features the following video and audio connections:

• Composite A/V: 1
• S-Video: 1
• Component Video: 1
• HDMI: 1
• Digital audio: 1 coaxial, 1 optical

Tech Talk
DivX is a compressed digital video format (like MP3) that's based on the MPEG-4 video compression standard. It can reduce the video from a DVD (MPEG-2) to around 10 percent of its original size while still retaining good video and audio quality, enabling you to store several two-hour length movies on burned DVD media.

HDMI is a lossless, uncompressed, all-digital audio/video interface to link any audio/video source (such as a set-top box, DVD player, or AV receiver) with your TV--all over a single cable. HDMI supports standard, enhanced or high definition video, plus multi-channel digital audio on a single cable. It supports all ATSC formats--standard (SDTV), enhanced (EDTV), and high (HDTV).

Component video (also called Y/Pb/Pr) features a three-jack video input, which provides separate connections for luminance (Y), blue color difference (PB) and red color difference (PR). This results in increased bandwidth for color information, resulting in a more accurate picture with clearer color reproduction and less bleeding than you would get with S-Video or composite (RCA yellow video plug) connections. You will need a separate RCA left/right audio cable for sound.

What's in the Box
Upconverting single-disc DVD player, remote control (with batteries), printed operating instructions

Product Description

PROGRESSIVE SCAN DVD PLAYER W/HDMI DIVX

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Less than a DVD player, February 15, 2007

By 

R. H. (Denver, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Toshiba SD-4990 Upconverting Progressive Scan DVD Player (Electronics)

For just upscaling and producing a picture and even Divx playback, this DVD player is okay. However, it has a ton of negative aspects that make this upscaling DVD player more worthless than a regular DVD player. Here are some of the problems I have with it on a regular basis.

Some divx files just won't play.

DVD player won't turn on or off.

Player freezes up and you have to unplug it to turn it off.

Won't eject disc.

Randomly stops many times per play for 2-5 seconds while playing a DVD.

Changing output settings can be difficult and won't always save.

Doesn't always scale pictures to fit my HDTV.

To explain, sometimes there is black on all sides of the video. It doesn't always fill the screen like it should. Some movies have black above and below because of scaling issues but if a movies is supposed to be full 16:9 it should have no black to the left or right, this DVD player doesn't always display full screen.

I would not purchase this player. I would still stick with regular DVD players with progressive scan. I haven't tried other upscaling players but none of them seem to work as well as a regular DVD player.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent picture - and a fix for problems, May 15, 2007

By 

Kenneth Stuart (Northern California) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Toshiba SD-4990 Upconverting Progressive Scan DVD Player (Electronics)

I play both Divx (and Xvid) files and DVDs, and I have had several Toshiba DVD players due to their excellent picture quality for a low price, and this one is no exception.

They upgraded from 12bit video processing on the 4980 to 14bit on the 4990, and the picture quality is indeed yet better.

I won't detail all the Divx playing features that are described in other reviews, but suffice it to say that is plays a wider variety of files than the Philips 642 (which I also own) with better picture quality.

I recently upgraded to an LCD HDTV, and selected a somewhat more costly model because the upconverting of SD content was better than the entry model. However, the upconverting on this Toshiba player is better yet, and both Divx and DVD content upscales very well.

In summary, the picture quality, upconverting, and Divx playback compatibility are all excellent.

One flaw of the player is that it has some sort of "memory leak". In order for the player to work well, it has to be unplugged (not just turned off) when you are done using it. This clears the memory. If you start a session by plugging it in, it works fine 99% of the time, and the other 1% of the time, just uplug it again for a moment. That is definitely inconvenient - but there is a fix for that. Simply plug the 4990 into a cheap $5 power strip and plug the power strip into your usual outlet. Put the power strip in an easy to access place, and simply turn off the power strip using its switch after using the 4990. Then flip that switch right before inserting a disk. This should cure all the problems that people report with the one star reviews.

PS People talk about HDMI cables costing as much as the player. They are a ripoff ! There is a place called monoprice that has HDMI cables for under ten that are high quality.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Decent player for the price, May 11, 2006

By 

vxmqzz (IL Usa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Toshiba SD-4990 Upconverting Progressive Scan DVD Player (Electronics)

Basicly this is a cheap upconverting dvd player with divx, picture quality is 9 of 10 on my westinghouse 32 lcd, besides dvd disc, it can play .avi and .wmv files. So far I haven't had any problem like pause during playback. The appearance is ok, not fancy. One thing worth mentioning is that this unit requires to connect by composite (or s-video) first to set up, if you connect it by hdmi or component, it wont work. After you change the settings to HDMI or component, it will work with hdmi or component.