Toshiba HD-A3 720p/1080i HD DVD Player by Toshiba
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List Price: Our Price: $78.00 You Save: $71.99 (48%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Home Theater See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Toshiba HD-A3 720p/1080i HD DVD Player
Digital camera Review: A big resolved problem..
Summary: 1 Stars
We needed a new dvd player for our movie room and decided on this one. We received the player from Amazon in good condition. The first thing I did was update the firmware. I tried via the ethernet with no luck regardless of what I did. I own a pc repair business and could not get this thing to connect to the internet in any fashion. I've been networking and fixing computers for about 20 years...I find that strange. I finally burned the firmware onto a cd and did the update and it worked.
So now I have an updated HD-A3. I put a movie in and it looked and sounded really great. I was highly impressed. Until I put in a Netflix movie and/or ANY HD movie with even the tiniest scratch. First the video pixelates and then the sound cuts out and the player locks up until I unplug it. I put these same movies in my Xbox360 HD add-on and they all played flawlessly. Now we have tried about 25 HD movies from Netflix and 0 will play all the way through. Superman Returns only had a couple barely visible scratches and did make it through after I unplugged it and restarted it 2-3 times. This is simply not acceptable for a product.
I called Toshiba and they basically told me that it was the HD movies fault because they had scratches on them. I keep my media in pristine condition, but cd/dvds to get tiny scratches over time regardless of how careful you are. The customer service reps knew absolutely nothing about their product. I kept calling back until I reached someone who knew what they were doing. She gave me the info and I had to pay to ship it to them.
Fast forward to the present time...Toshiba says they don't know where my HD player is. They think they have received it but aren't sure because the whereabouts are unknown...no one knows when it will be fixed or if I will receive a new unit...what happened or when. I'd like my money back. This is just unacceptable. I'm not hard to please, but a HD player that only plays perfectly flawless new HD media isn't good enough. What happens when your collection starts getting imperfections years down the road...have fun repurchasing your movies at $20-$30 a piece. I didn't even get that far. I guess I'm out $200. Thanks.
Update: I did finally get my money back after the player was deemed faulty. =)
Digital camera Review: A good deal for the cautious, despite the obsolete format
Summary: 4 Stars
You buy an HD TV, and you'll soon need a hi-def DVD player. Most of the videos you'll watch on it will still be standard def, but even so, you'll want a player that can upconvert them so they look as good as possible on that new set. A Blu-Ray disk player will set you back another $400 or so: Ouch, especially if you've already shelled out that much for a Tivo HD. Besides, there are rumors that the Blu-Ray format itself is due for a major update, and that prices on disk players will be coming down now that the format wars are over.
What do you do? Buy this disk player for around $100. You'll still be able to view all current and future standard-def DVDs in all their upconverted glory, and there are many HD-DVD format disks still out there if you want to see what high-def DVDs can do. The one thing you won't be able to view are forthcoming DVDs in the Blu-Ray format (though most of these disks also include the standard def version of the film). If you can do without that minor advantage for a couple of years, you can probably buy a Blu-Ray player later in the updated format at a cheaper price, or you may find you don't need a DVD player at all because you've switched to digital downloads.
Granted, this plan wouldn't suit the hardcore DVD collector who wants to own the next Spiderman sequel in the best possible format, but how many new movies are good enough that you actually want to own the thing? Between Tivo's excellent Wish List feature allowing you to record new releases in HD off of cable, and Amazon's Unbox option, you've got a perfectly adequate solution for the average viewer whose wallet has already been badly depleted by an HD TV upgrade.
Digital camera Review: A great unit, still a great value
Summary: 5 Stars
Had one for a month,(bought on EBAY for $60). Just bought a second one on EBAY for the bedroom. Have purchased a handful of HD DVDs to play and subscribe to Netflix HD DVD.... the up conversion works great and have had few problems in playing.... once had to take and wash a movie from netflix to get finger prints off, but then it played fine... for those not wanting spend the big bucks for bluray and then live through all the firmware upgrades until they get it right, this is a good option... Toshiba still supports and when I called them they sent me the latest firmware to upgrade. We love watching the movies on it and feel this is a good value... HD DVDs are about 1/3 the price of bluray right now so can pick up your favorites for around $10.. I expect to be downloading HD movies before I find a need to move to bluray...Digital camera Review: A lot of misinformation here re. "upconverting"
Summary: 3 Stars
Depending on your circumstances, this could be a wise buy. But don't be fooled by the "upconverting" voodoo call. If you have a high-def t.v., it already upconverts standard dvd resolution to the high-def resolution that your t.v. is capable of (whether 720p, 1080i or 1080p).
Manufacturers and retailers are making a killing on this very misleading scenario: after months of research, lunchbreaks spent longingly walking the aisle of Circuit City or Best Buy ogling the big flat-screen plasmas and LCDs, John or Joan Q. Public finalize plops down $1500 hard-earned (or, more likely, plastic) for the dream t.v. What's next? "You'll want an 'upconverting' dvd player to take advantage of you new HDTV with standard DVDs. It'll make them look almost as good has high-def dvds." I overheard this exact conversation at a big-box store the day I bought my HD-A3 Toshiba HD-DVD player.
As stated by Consumer Reports, the high def t.v. already does the upconverting. What difference does it make if the 480i resolution of a standard dvd is converted to, say, 1080i (which is as high as the HD-A3 goes) in the player or is instead sent into your HDTV for conversion there?
Does this mean that standard dvd's won't look any better on the HD-A3 (or other "upconverting" dvd player)? Maybe yes and maybe no. In my case (I have an older Denon 480i, non-progressive dvd player), the answer is "no." This player is hooked up to a Denon AV receiver for audio, and by a quality component video cable (three cables) to the component video input on my HP 42" 1080p LCD TV. I've only played a few HD DVD titles (300, Borne Identity, Full Metal Jacket) on the HD-A3 (since I cannot rent them at my local Blockbuster or Hollywood Video, and they are not availaible now at Netflix). But I have watched a larger number of stardard dvds (Matrix series plus lots more). I hooked the HD-A3 into the back of the tv with the HDMI cable (even tried two different cables to make sure I did not have a bad one), and did "A/B" comparisons with the same dvd on the same t.v. between the Denon and the Toshiba. No difference (they both looked great).
Does this mean that all the folks here who report better quality video on their standard dvds are delusional? Probably not all of them. If (i) they have a poor quality standard dvd player, the Toshiba may just be better at playing these dvds even on the same cable arrangement, and even on an older, standard def. t.v.; (ii) more likely, the difference they are seeing is because they are comparing a standard dvd hooked up to a high-def set with a composite or s-video (in either case, single cable) analogue feed on the one hand, to the Toshiba hooked up to the HDTV through the HDMI cable on the other hand. In the former arrangement, there is more signal loss (in addition to digital to analogue to digital conversion); or (iii) the "upconverting" circuitry of the Toshiba HD-A3 is somehow better than the similar circuitry already built into their HDTV (I am very doubtful of this one).
If you like to own your (hd)dvd library (I don't really get this, either--how many times do you need to watch a particular movie? Are you guys all film students?) and want to take advantage of the (actual) higher resolution of HD-DVD disks, then this player is a good value. If you (like me) want to see really spiffy HD-DVDs that truly take advantage of the higher resolution of your HDTV, but don't want to pay $15 a pop for the privilege (cheaper to go to the theater--even bigger screen and higher resolution and I don't have to microwave the popcorn), and you know how to hook up your quality old (standard) dvd player, then this does not really make much sense. I'm going to return mine in a couple of days. Better to save the $100 and put it toward a blu ray player down the line.
Yes, I managaged to upgrade the firmware to the latest (2.0). No, I did not manage to get the thing to talk to my home network/internet gateway.
Now, if somebody could hack this thing so as to enable you to download high-def. content directy from the internet over that internet connection and play it on your HDTV (a la xbox media center extender), now THAT might be interesting . . . . Cheers!
Digital camera Review: A lot of work for Toshiba
Summary: 2 Stars
I'm not quite sure what happened to my first review. Maybe it was so bad that they decided not to post it. Anyways, I bought this and set it up with ease. Played clips of '300' and 'Bourne Identity' out of the box just fine. Great pictures. No complaints, except it takes a long time to boot up (35-45 sec). Don't even bother pushing the eject button because it has to boot up first then eject. I rented Smokin' Aces Friday night. 1/2 way through the movie, it stopped and displayed the dreaded '408bc504' message. For non-techies, that's the same as your computer's 'blue screen of death'. I stayed up til 4am trying to figure out this message. So, my options are simple, download the firmware and hope that solves the problem or return it. I chose the former. But that itself was a headache. The instruction on how to download was flat out wrong. After reading online posts for this player, I find out I'm not the only one with this problem. I guess it's something we have to deal with when we are early adopters. Now that the firmware is updated, I've had no problems (cross my fingers). The picture is stunning. I only have this as a warning: IF YOU'RE NOT A COMPUTER PERSON OR DON'T KNOW HOW TO DOWNLOAD FIRMWARE VIA ETHERNET (you don't have broadband internet at home) OR BURN ISO FILES, THEN DON'T BUY THIS!!! YOU WILL RIP OUT YOUR HAIR TRYING TO FIGURE OUT THE ERROR MESSAGE.