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I purchased 5 of these DVD players and sold them to friends. In less than 1 year, 4 of the 5 players broke. Unless you plan to use this player as a paperweight, do not buy it.

Nice picture and audio when it felt like working.

The unit died.

Constantly had problems playing DVDs. I would sometimes have to clean DVDs over and over to get them to work. Should have returned it immediately. After about 13 months, the player completely froze and died. Apex agreed to repair the model for $60, however, they actually sent me a new less costly AD-5131.

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None

plays CD-R''s.

Not many features and many of those don''t work. A real lemon for us. Never will buy another APEX product.

I never could get the DVD player to work well. The CD''s work fine. The DVD seem to stick and then the sound isn''t in-sink with the people''s lips. Tried a number of DVD and it happened on almost all of the movies. No longer use it for movies just CD''s.

play everything

quality built and no power button.

well this product is really good for the price. i have it for over a year now and it still working find. i use it mostly for movies and it doing an excelent job. i do sometime use it for singing. yes i have notice that the player jam when i play saving private Ryan and that the only movies that the player jam on so i think it just that movies but i try it in my other player it work fine. i think jamming when play back is depend on how the dvd''s is written. i really like how it can play everything, svcd vcd dvd mpeg man it just good. i would recomend this player. but just becareful when load the dvd and also buy the extended warrantee. i only give this a 4 because there are product that is better but just cost a lot more.

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other apex product

Plays just about everything: Dvds, Vcds, SVcds, Mp3s, and audio cds. They built in dolby digital 5.1 rules

After extended use it begins to skip - design flaw
it also has NO power button - design flaw unless you have a entertainment system that you turn off at once

When I first bought this it was sweet. Can you find a single unit that can doo everything for this cheap price... probably not. Before buying it I read several reviews. Some people had problems with it skipping, but many didn't have that problem. Many of those that didn't, I later found out, had only had their players for short period of time. It wasn't until about 4 or 5 months after I got mine that it started skipping. It wasn't really noticable and I could ignore it since it only happen once per movie. I've had it for 6 months now and it skips almost every five to ten minutes. Its not my dvds, they play in the other two players I own just fine. Filling all trays do not help this at all. It skips no matter what. Just consider this as a warning.

Everyting

Weak Tray

This thing rocks, This is my second Apex and have had no problems. My First is still going strong (AD-600)I have had it for over two years and no problems have arrised. I have burned my own VCD's for the 703 and also no problems have arrised everyting I've tried have worked. Great Machine!! Great Money Value!!!

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APEX AD-600

Plays Everything

Dosn't Play DVD's

Well, I had the 703 for some months. I had been using it to play burnt VCD's and SVCD's. I finally started a DVD collection and found out it does not play DVD's. So I call apex and tell them what's going on. They advise me to send it in and they will replace it with the AD-5131 which looks like a much better unit with a power button on the remote. I will let you all know how the swap goes.

DVD, CD, CD-R/RW, and MP3. Great price for the changer.

Weak remote (an APEX trademark) No shuffle. Picture quality is about first generation quality.

I have seen many reviews for this in the Apex 600 areas. For the most part I agree. This unit is a fantastic unit for the price but it is not a high end anything. The sound is stellar on every format but the picture is average. I have not experienced any problems with playback branching or otherwise. (I also have two 600s around that I will be upgrading the firmware soon!) I have tried X-Men, Matrix Many special edition formats.

Overall I would suggest this as a MP3/CD player first a DVD player second. At $225 I overpaid, look for $200 with an additional $25 rebate. What a steal!

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Phillips and Sony DVD players.

MP3, CDR-RW, DTS compatible, Coaxial Output, 3-Disc Carousel, PRICE!! Upgradable firmware!

No Power button on remote!! Stutters every so often. No Component Video out, or Optical audio out.

I sold my Toshiba prior to purchasing this unit. Overall, I feel I made a mistake. There were a few options the Toshiba didn't have that the Apex AD703 DID have.

The AD703 has a great price to begin with, $159! This is retail price now, not after rebates or anything like that. The AD703 also has support for CDR-RW, MP3, 3-Disc (great for trilogy viewing, Alien/Aliens/Alien3), and is firmware upgradeable. The weaknesses however are glaring to say the least.

I purchased Gladiator and Cowboy Bebop (anime) for use with this player. Throughout both movies, every 10-15 minute intervals there would be a loud pop in my speakers (the kind you'd get if your DVD/CD disc was scratched). mind you, these titles I purchased were taken out of the shrinkwrap and directly into the player. No smudges whatsoever. And still I get these pop noises. Also, the image stuttered, almost as if it were in slow motion, with garbled sound (lasts about 1-3 seconds at most). NOT GOOD. I must say, the it handled the menus perfectly. No lockups there, so no complaint from me. But then there's also the problem with the remote. Standing 8ft. from the player on my couch, sometimes I had to press the remote 4-5 times for it to acknowledge the command. Sometimes it wouldn't accept it at all. NOT GOOD. And while were on the subject, who the heck designed this god-awful remote? I understand Apex is a Canadian company, but I never knew Canadiens were that backwards-ass that they dont even include Power On/Off button on the remote?! You have to get up from the couch whenever you decide to turn it on/off?! What a waste. There is a nifty volume on the remote, if you want to lower/raise the DVD volume. But other than that, its pretty much standard fare.

The image quality was about average when compared to the Toshiba 3109. I used the S-Video out with the Ad703, and everything looked as it should. No component video option on the AD703 so I cannot comment on that. One thing you will hate about the Image Zoom, take note: With the Toshiba 3109 you could zoom the picture when viewing letterboxed films and you'd get a perfect size, covering up the black bars. With the Apex AD703, no matter how much you zoom, the black bars remain. What is the point of zooming in, if the black bars remain? Again, who the heck designed this system?! And when you zoom in to the maximum allowed, dont expect to see much. It is SOOO grainy, that you can barely make out the faces, features of the picture. No filtering is BAD.. The sound on the other hand was phenomenal. This is where it gets an extra star. DTS never sounded better. I ran the coaxial out through my receiver and the lions in Gladiator sounded like they were sitting on top of me. GREAT!

Overall, for $159 retail "would" technically make it a steal. But the problems I stated make this only average. Something that a college student might not mind. But if you're anything like me (afficionado, going on audiophile) you simply wont get over the annoyances. Hell, if it weren't for the great sound, this player (as well as most anything from Apex) deserves a 2 rating. Check out this page for upcoming players from Apex: http://www.smr-home-theatre.org/ces2001/sources/page_02.shtml Hopefully by this time next year, some of these great ideas (MP3, CD-RW, etc) will be incorporated into other quality players, so we wont have to just deal with Apex.

As a side note, I returned my Apex and exchanged it for the Toshiba 3109 back. I lost my CD-RW, MP3, extra disc features with the AD703, but I got back my sanity!!! I figure when I get my $1499 HDTV next month, I will use the 3109s Composite out. And I'll eventually upgrade to Progressive scan featured DVD Carousel with CD-RW, MP3, and Optical out but NOT from Apex. I learned my lesson. I hope you wont make the same mistake I did.

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Toshiba SD-3109

plays MP3s, karaoke feature, great for trilogies

picture freezes, colors bleed, skips a lot

I bought this unit on a whim and am on the verge of returning it. I've played 5 new DVD movies on it, and they all skipped, froze, or the pictures bled. It is very disappointing.