Price Paid:  $0.00

Summary:
I purchased this player about 1 year ago and was very excited to receive it. It has worked flawlessly and then it started having problems. Certain disks (Office Space, Gone in Sixty Seconds) will play fine and then once it switches DVD layers, all sounds/voices will drop one octave. Hearing Nicholas Cage talk in a really low voice is an interesting experience.

Strengths:
5 Disk Changer MP3 Capable

Weaknesses:
No SVCD support. No Power Off button on remote. Does not work with some DVD's. A little slow to boot.

Similar Products Used:
Samsung 905 Playstation 2

Price Paid:  $300.00 from Crutchfield

Summary:
I have this connected through the composite connections to a 51" Sony Widescreen TV and the picture is beautiful. The sound I have going to the Kenwood VR-6070 with a surround setup. Watching DVD's is a whole new experience. We love it! I bought this as an all-in-one player for music and dvd, but I was not happy with the music quality and use a Pioneer CD player for music. I had problems with DVD's skipping and took it to a Kenwood repair center. They replaced the optics under warranty. It could have cost me $190.00. Since the repair the player has performed flawlessly.

Strengths:
DVD picture looks great! Can load 5 CD's or DVD's Good looking unit

Weaknesses:
Small remote with hard to read buttons Automatically starts searching for a disc, then starts playing it if it finds one. CD music doesn't sound as good as my Pioneer CD player. Had problems with DVD's skipping. Kenwood replaced optics under warranty, now it works great!

Similar Products Used:
Harmon Kardon model in same price range. It skipped on DVD's so I returned it within 30 days.

Price Paid:  $400.00 from Future Shop

Summary:
This thing is a peice of crap. Kenwood makes the cheapest japanese crap possible. Do not buy this player.

Strengths:
none

Weaknesses:
Everything. This player skips, won't play many DVD's or CD's.. even scratched some disks up. Worked fine for first 6 months then went to hell.

Similar Products Used:
Sony's Toshiba, arcam

Price Paid:  $0.00

Summary:
Good product if you have no other choice. Overly basic in function and design. I had only minor problems with the unit, but it's SEVERE lack of features pushed me away immediatly.

Strengths:
Both Component video and S-Video out, Both digital co-ax and digital optical out, 5-disk, MP3 support

Weaknesses:
This is the DVD Player from the stone age. The remote is terrible. There's a hard power-button on the player, you can't switch it off from the remote. You can't eject a DVD until the player has already read the first disk, which takes too long. It's a 5-disk changer, but there is no multi-disk random!!! It's supposed to play MP3s, but none of my MP3 CDs would work in this thing (not overly important to me, but it may be to others). Slipped out of surround modes often when skipping tracks, going through DVD menus, etc. The unit itself is fairly noisy as well.

Similar Products Used:
Sony JVC XV S40BK JVC XV S500BK (current)

Price Paid:  $260.00 from circuit city

Summary:
Summary: When I first set the unit up I liked it. But then I noticed that it clipped music that had constant tones in it such as "bagpipes." This seemed odd to me and I tested the bagpipes CD on 2 players in my cars, a DVD player in my den, and my son''s CD player, even the computer played this CD flawlessly. Thinking that maybe I had a defective unit I returned the first unit after 1 week. While in the store I tried the "bagpipes" CD against every other brand and none of them had a problem. The weird thing was that every model of Kenwood had the same problem. Now this may seem odd and it was only a bagpipes CD which I could live without, so I just took home a new 505 unit and used it for 3 months. I noticed that movies would flicker at times but the same movie would play flawlessly on my other DVD players. I noticed that constant sounds like mood music in the movie where they play organs or strings would clip like the bagpipes (you talk about distracting right in the middle of Spock''s funeral ceremony the music clip, clip, clip). I tested this clipping feature in digital and analog modes. Finally I gave up and returned the unit to the store. I brought home a different brand and it works great. Actually had a noticably better picture which my wife commented on (normally she doesn''t care.) I bought Kenwood because of good experience with the receivers. But a previous purchase of a Kenwood CD player that never worked quite right made me hesitant to get a Kenwood DVD player but I took the chance and frankly I was disapointed. I love the VR-507 Receiver it works great. I also noticed that it automatically played whenever it could find a disk in the tray. Even if you pushed the stop button or the open button. It would continue doing what it wanted and not do what I was wanting until it finished. I don''t care for it when electronics act smarter than me :) I am not trying to bash the Kenwood but I feel that others should watch for these nuicances and return the unit if they notice it. It is NOT the CD or DVD disk.

Strengths:
Looks nice. I was able to program the VR-507''s remote to operate the DVD player.

Weaknesses:
Would not play constant tones without clipping (bagpipes or organ or strings etc) on DVD''s or CD''s Noisy DVD carriage, this was noticably louder mechanically than many other DVD changers. Would not execute commands immediately, you had to wait for it to finish doing what it wanted first.

Similar Products Used:
Panasonic Sony DVP NC600