Customer Reviews

Toshiba SD-5980 Progressive Scan DVD Player with HDMI Output

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I now have either owned or own 8 different DVD players and am very familiar with idiosynracies of each. This is the second Toshiba that I have owned and partially decided to purchase this one because I had a very good experience with another much older Toshiba that is still running strong.
-Decision Making Process:
I bought this for the HDMI Up-Conversion after just having purchased a Panasonic 42" HDTV Plasma (Awesome TV). I had heard the HDMI hook-up was stellar and wanted to find out. The decision was between an LG, Toshiba and Saumsung. Although the Toshiba was priced $30 less at Best Buy, I initially opted for the LG due to its good looks and slim profile. Bad move on my part. The LG was not compatible with my TV (There are disclaimers saying this can happen. I tried every kind of hook-up (component, composite and HDMI) and none of them would show me a picture. After reading some poor reviews of Samsung and having another Saumsung DVD player die on me previously, I decided to go with the Toshiba. It's not a great looking player, but not horrible either. I'm glad I did!

Positives:
First of all, the positves way outweight the negatives.
1) Stellar picture with HDMI output. I'm using the freebie HDMI cable that came with the player and the picture looks significantly better than my other player with Component (a solid Panasonic DVD recorder).
2) Free HDMI cable. These things are expensive and even if it's not the greatest quality cable, it's good enough to reap the benefits of HDMI outputs and notice a difference.
3) Great sound. The sound might even be a slight improvement over my Panasonic, which I love.
4) Card reader is an very nice extra that Samsung does not have. Looking at pictures in "HD" with HDMI is awesome!
5) When you press "Display" it will display the time surpassed and the total time of the movie so you have an idea of how much longer you have to go in the movie. Too many DVD players do not let you know how much longer you have before the movie is over.

Negatives:
1) It's a little complicated. Like most players, you need to read the manual to make sure your audio outputs are correct so you will be able to hear your audio in Digital. This is standard on most players I have dealt with.
2) Pay close attention with which mode of HDMI you are in (there is an HDMI button on the remote that toggles between 420p, 750p and 1080i. I was trying to play DVD+R's that I had burned and finalized from my computer and the picture kept flashing on and off. The sound was fine, but the flashing was unbearable. I thought it was because they were burned DVD's and it wouldn't read them, but I didn't have that problem on either of my other 3 current DVD players. As it turns out, the shows I was watching are not able to be viewed in either the 420P or 750P mode and can only be viewed in the 1080i mode. Once I switched to 1080i, those DVD's worked great.
3) When I was using the card reader, I had the picture in 1080i and it blinked on an off again. Once I switched it to 420p, it worked perfectly.
4) The player itself is not really that attractive and the display is downright ghetto. I'm not sure what Toshiba was thinking when they designed this thing. Perhaps they really wanted to keep the price down, but the display literally only shows you the minutes that have surpassed on the DVD you are playing in archaic looking number. For example, if you are 31 minutes and 29 seconds in, the display will read simply "31." The chapter is not listed nor are the seconds nor can you change it to display anything else.

In summary, I strongly recommend this player to anyone that is looking for an upgraded picture via HDMI cable. The HDMI up-conversion IS for real. THe picture is great and so is the sound. Having an digital card reader is cool and the player overall is fairly likable. If you have the patience to work through some of its quirks and don't mind the so-so looks and absolutely horrible display, you should make this one a purchase.

I have always trusted Toshiba products after consistantly good performance. Last year, I purchased their Upconvert SD-5970 model and that changed my mind. That model was just a complete disaster (hardly read disks, skipped, shut down/couldn't even turn it on at times-even by pressing the power button on the unit itself, froze up constantly, remote control did not respond at all or took 5 seconds to respond, disks wouldn't eject, etc.). You name it, it went wrong. I tried several replacements of the same unit and all of them had the same issues. Seems a lot of people had similar issues with that model from user reviews on the net.
The bad thing was, I ended up losing my receipt and had to put up with it when it went from bad to worse over the following months. I became a bit soured on Toshiba for releasing such a bad product.
About a month ago, I saw the SD-5980 advertised (The follow up to that model) and some positive word that most/all of the issues that people had with the 5970 were corrected now. I was hesitant at giving it a try. But long behold, after picking one up, they actually seem to be corrected.
I have had the 5980 for a little over a month and have not had 1 problem with it. It's really been like night and day between the two models and I really am pleased with the performance so far.
Picture quality seems about the same as the previous version, but it actually works now all the time. What a concept. Not a techie by any means, but the picture looks great and will get me by until HD-DVD comes out. I really have only tried previous Toshiba and Samsung upconvert models to compare picture quality on, so there may be something better out there and I have not seen it. I imagine it's probably on par with most of the other upconvert models available, though - especially in this low price range of $149.00.
The build of the unit is extremely slim, again, and you still get the HDMI cord included with the unit so that saves you money right there. I also have not had any overheating problems with the unit after playing it during long periods, so that is better than the previous model, as well.
Reading various disks has gone smoothly so far, and this includes burned DVD's/DVD R's, so that seems fine, as well.
Remote control works flawlessly now and you will not throw it the way you did the 5970 model when that one did nothing. Very responsive and nicely laid out. Another nice improvement.
Really, even after a month, I am still amazed I can turn this on and get it to work flawlessly every time I use it, after having such a nightmare with the 5970 all the time. That model was that bad.
The 5980 model so far has been excellant and my faith has been restored in Toshiba players once again. Nice job on the unit and a very nice price for those in the market for these upconvert models. For price point, quality, and reliability/features, I gave it a 5.

I was curious as to the quality difference the HDMI and brand name gives me in a DVD player, so I decided to hook up 2 DVD players, one cheap one and one expensive one, and see if I could tell the difference.

For this I used a Portland brand DVD player (cost roughly $39.99 at a large dept. store) and a Toshiba SD-5980 (cost roughly $135 here). I hooked them both up to my Sony Grand WEGA KDF-42WE655 42" HD LCD Projection TV. I connected the Portland via Monster S-Video cable, and the Toshiba via the provided HDMI cable. The DVD I used for this experiment was the BMW short films DVD available from the USA bmw site (also found in online format at bmwfilms.com)

And to be honest, it was tough. I thought *maybe* the Toshiba HDMI player was a little better picture quality, but wasn't sure. I also thought I may be subconsciously biased due to knowing which one cost 3x more, so I repeated the experiment in a blind test for my wife (I made her leave the room when I was loading up the DVD player and setting it up to a short film). And she picked the Portland as a better picture. Neither of us could tell the difference in the sound quality.

Maybe using a $200 third party HDMI cable would have made a difference, but I wasn't about spend that kind of money on a cable!

As neither of could tell the difference, we returned the 5980 and use the cheapo for all of our DVD needs.

There may be other differences between the two in terms of features, but as we don't use alot of advanced features, we didn't test that.

You would think that for an expensive player, they would spend a little effort making sure the thing was easy to use. First, to even get it to play using the HDMI cable, you initially have to hook it up to your display using component cables, go into the DVD menu, adjust its output to HDMI, and then hook up the HDMI connection. Otherwise you just get a blank screen. It took me hours to figure out because the manual didn't say anything about it. Second, the tray that holds the DVDs is horrid - the sides have no cutout, so it is tricky to take the disks out. And the HDMI output is always stretched to widescreen - which is terrible because many of my DVDs are 4:3 TV series. It's hooked up using component cables right now (which look as good as HDMI anyway).

The player also has the neat feature of pausing or even crashing at the most exciting parts of movies. I'm sure it took some brilliant engineering on Toshiba's part to pull off.

Took less than a min for me to connect this DVD to my
HDMI compatible TV (Toshiba 52HM95) and it worked like
a charm. The picture quality is lot better compared
to a normal progressive scan DVD.
Inititally I bought a Panasonic S77S (after reading some awesome
reviews but unfortunately the HDMI did not work with my
TV, so I had to return it).

Another plus with this DVD is that it comes with a HDMI cable
so you don't have to spend 50+ dollars for the cable.

I purchased this unit because it had an HDMI output to match my television along with the price. It may not be the of the highest quality unit, maybe a little flimsy but it is feature laden and it performs well. It seems Toshiba is targeting second line equipment, for budget minded consumers. I purchased thier Cinema Series TV for 2005, and they cut back from the previous year on Features and Quality. I paid $129.00 for the DVD Player with all the features you could want on a DVD Player, its not going to be build like a tank.

This is a nice DVD player and it includes a HDMI cable, which is really nice since they cost 20+ bucks. Anyways only thing holding this player back from being great, it doesnt play ALL dvds, it plays most of them. I have come accross a few that it wont play and it is disappointing because my cheap mintek player plays them all. I just dont understand why they cant make a player play all formats. It is a beautiful player

this dvd player looks great on my HD screen with the HDMI cable that comes with it (most do not come with). options and features are good. card reader is a great and easy way to view photos.

Followup 11/07 --------------
Still going strong, but seems to have developed an annoying habit of going to sleep. In the middle of playing, suddenly playback stops and the blue Toshiba screen saver screen comes up. Hit play and we're off and running again. Never happens more than once per DVD and not on every or the same DVD.
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I got this because it had a great price/feature tradeoff. I needed an HDMI-type player for a Samsung DLP TV. It works well for this, but does have it's quirks. The most annoying is the occasional glich when changing chapters in the DVD program - a momentary freeze frame, then it moves on.

Playing still images from a card (SD in this case) is kind of a joke, especially when the files are larger (7 MP camera) - it seems the machine needs a faster processor and a better algorithm for reducing to the display size. Anyway, I didn't buy it for that - but thought I would try it for fun.

As a DVD player it's decent, especially if you need HDMI and have a TV capable of 720p or 1080i resolutions. Like another reviewer, I found that it took awhile to get it dialed in to both the TV and AV receiver but once set, it's a capable player.

This is the 4th Toshiba player I've had and the only problem I've had is the first one (new in 1999) died after a LOT of use after nearly 5 years. I'm sure my next player will be a Toshiba.

Followup: Sorry Toshiba - going to Blu-Ray I have become a Panasonic fan!

This is a sleek unit, very thin, that has performed well for the past 2 months since we've gotten it. As in other reviews, I agree that the buttons on the front of the unit are not terribly easy to press but since we use the remote most of the time, this is not a big issue.