The Toshiba SD-3109 is our first DVD player, but we are really pleased. I just got it last week after a month of shopping. I did my homework and the Toshiba seemed like the best choice and the best value in my price range.
It has definitely met my expectations and I would recommend it to anyone. I bought it from WHolesale Connection, and they provided prompt delivery. I paid $349 plus $25 shipping (FEDEX).

Great sound and picture, plus some useful features.

double tray isn't as useful after all,it takes its time and yours.

It almost seems as a matter of "luck" to get a DVD player that really works for you, therefore I will only talk about my personal experience with this piece of equipment.
The reason why I mention the word "luck" is because I don't see why anybody would give a poor rating to such good piece of entertaining system. I guess you already know what I'm going to say about this DVD player. I like it a lot. Over the year I have owned it, it has never given me any problems whatsoever. The only thing I can say about this DVD player is that the twin tray system is rather silly.
The audio and image quality is one of the best for the price. I say this because when I was first out in the market looking for a DVD player I bought a Samsung 709(something) DVD player, and boy what I surprise I had when it wouldn't play my double layer freshly unpacked Matrix DVD movie. I took it back to Best Buy and they gave me my money back because Samsung had done a recall on the product due to its uncapability of playing double layer DVDs. After this I took home the SD-2109 and liked it a lot but it was lacking Dolby Digital decoding so I ended up returning it too. That is when I bought the SD-3109 and have been happy with it ever since. One feature that attracted me to this toshiba product was its HDCD decoding capability but in order to take advantage of this feature you have to have High Definition encoded CD'S(consumerism,cosumerism!). I decided it wasn't really worthied after all, regular Cd's do the trick for my ears. If your are looking for a dependable DVD player, this may be the answer for you.
The reason why I don't give a perfect rating to this DVD player is because it is still just another machine!
Good luck!

Similar Products Used:

Toshiba SD-2109, Some piece of crap Samsung DVD player model 709 something.

Dual trays,built in dolby digital decoder,HDCD

Wish remote was really backlit

In a word-AWESOME!!! Picked up this baby for only $229 bucks!! What a steal!! This machine has everything you need in a dvd player and then some!!! Component outputs,s-video outs,coaxial and optical audio outputs,built-in dolby-digital decoder 3x zoom and the list goes on and on,this player is truly awesome,picture and sound quality rival models twice its cost,the HDCD feature is also very good. I did a lot of homework before making this purchase and it paid off!! The only minor gripe I have is with the remote,the buttons are glow-in-the-dark,not back lit,but other than that,excellent player!!!!

Similar Products Used:

GE1105p,Panasonic DVD-A320

picture quality and DD encoder

loose the remote your screwed can not do anything except the basics (play, pause stop open/close)

overall this has been a good machine but I would not pay any
more than 250 for it even new the picture is good but it is not any better than my sony DSP300(1st generation dvd player) but I have not been able to utilize the component inputs so maybe this is not a fair comparison the one major problem with this machine is that you may not even be able to get past the main dvd/menu screen without the remote this is a problem, but olny if you loose the remote other than that I have had no problems with this machine it does freeze once and awhile but so do my sony,s most of the timit,s because of dirty or scratched discs

Similar Products Used:

sony DSP300 & DSP550d

Price vs. features ratio is superb; great sound and pic (but see caveat below)

The great picture and sound lasted one day until I got the dreaded "insert disc" error message and it "died"

Well, I read all of the earlier reviews a couple of months back, and it sounded like a great machine. The problems that some people experienced seemed to fit the pattern of the earliest models of new technology, so I thought I'd wait until the early models had their glitches sorted out.

I eagerly opened my box, rented out "Any Given Sunday", spent $50 on connectors to my 5.1 CH A/V receiver, and enjoyed great sound/picture for about....53 minutes. Then, a freeze. Hit 'play' - nothing; hit 'rewind', then 'play' again and, the scene played through. Oh, well, maybe just a glitch on the rental DVD. Three more freezes later, I had watched the film, but blamed the problems on the DVD (it was a day old, right, what could go wrong?)

Woke up the next day and stuck in an audio CD: 'loading', then 'insert disc' appeared. What? I'd already 'inserted' the CD; dumb machine. Eject, try again, same message. Eject, put DVD into top drawer and another, brand-new audio CD into the other. Power down, then power up....the dreaded error message continued, and continued, until I gave up.

So, I guess that my experience is a summary of those of other peoples'. Whilst it worked, I was extremely happy with what I saw/heard (one whole day). But the laser pickup would appear to be a tad unreliable (maybe the clue is what another reviewer noted when he opened the box up - the mechanism is made in China). So, back in the box it goes (return to sender) I shall continue to try and find a RELIABLE machine.

Similar Products Used:

None - DVD newbie

have never had a problem with this unit, loading takes no longer than any other player

none

I can't believe the last two reviewers paid so much for this unit. I would probably be concerned too if I paid $330+ for this unit. People always pay too much at Ebay.

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Sony (don't know the model)

PURCHASED UNIT AT MAGNOLIA HI-FI FOR $380. THE FIRST REASON FOR PURCHASINGA TOSHIBA UNIT WAS BRAND SATISFACTION, MY WIFE GAVE ME A TOSHIBA VCR/2 HEAD PLAYER 14 YEARS AGO, HAVE NEVER CLEANED THE HEADS AND THE UNIT HAS NEVER
BEEN IN THE SHOP !! TRACKING IS ROCK STEADY ! MY 3 YR. AND 18 MO. OLD NOW USE FOR VIDS.
THE SECOND REASON FOR PURCHASING WAS THE BUILT-IN DIGITAL DECODER, A MONTH PRIOR TO GETTING THE SD3109 MY BELOVED MARANTZ 2216B OF 23 YRS., THE VERY UNIT I HAD LEARNED TO PLAY AIR GUITAR ON DIED. IN MY HASTE AND STILL IN MOURNING I PURCHASED A DENON AVR2400 WITHOUT DOING PROPER RESEARCH FOR $350, IMPROPER BECAUSE I DIDNT KNOW I HAD TO GET THE "ADDITIONAL" DENON DECODER UNIT FOR DIGITAL PROCESSING, AN "ADDITIONAL" $225 - DUH ...... ANYWAY AFTER PICKING THE BRAIN OF MY 15 YR. OLD NEPHEW, WHO ELSE HAS ALL KNOWLEDGE OF ELECTRONICS, TIME TO RESEARCH, AND FOR THE PRICE OF A LATTE SPEWS OUT ENLIGHTENMENT "DUDE SAVE THE BUCKS, UPGRADE FROM THE SD2109 (MY ORIGINAL PURCHASE THOUGHT) TO THE SD3109, WITH BUILT-IN DECODER, HDCD, AND DUMP YOUR CRAPPY 12 YR. OLD MAGNOVOX CD PLAYER IN THE TRASH ! " THIS FROM THE MOUTH OF BABES.
OK, SO NOW THAT I'VE OWNED THE UNIT SINCE APRIL (TAX RETURN PURCHASE) I CAN HONESTLY SAY THAT IM EXTREMLY PLEASED, I PLAY 1 TO 4 RENTAL DVD'S A WEEK AND CD'S ALMOST DAILY, THE ONLY GLICHES I'VE EXPERIENCED COULD BE ATTRIBUTED TO
SMUDGES OR SCRATCHES ON THE DISKS.
BECAUSE I DON'T HAVE 5 QUALITY SPEAKERS CONNECTED TO THE DENON RECEIVER IM CURRENTLY USING THE FACTORY SUPPLIED RCA CONNECTORS FOR THE DVD OUTPUTS, WITH
A HEAVIER VIDEO CABLE FROM THE RECEIVER GOING TO A PROSCAN 32", GREAT RESOLUTION, ENHANCED BY THE "EXPANDED BLACK LEVEL" SETTING, SEE PG. 38 OF THE OPERATING MANUAL.
FOR SOUND QUALITY THE HDCD IS A REAL PLUS, CD'S ARE LIMITED BUT WELL WORTH FINDING, FOR AN UPDATED LISTING OF RECORDINGS CHECK OUT www.hdcd.com, AS
MENTIONED IN A PREVIOUS REVIEW, CHRIS ISAAK BAJA SESSIONS IS WELL WORTH SPINNING. AS FOR WHAT HDCD IS CHECK OUT THE SAME SITE FOR FORMAT INFO.
FOR THOSE WHO ARE HAVING PICTURE PROBLEMS REREAD PG. 8 FOR "PRECATIONS"
AS FOR US WITH KIDS I'VE PLACED MY PLAYER AS HIGH AS POSSIBLE, ATOP THE RECEIVER !, ON A HIIIIGH BOOK CASE ! ITS NOT ENCLOSED WITHIN A CABINET AND I
HAVE'NT NOTICED ANY PROBLEMS WITH HEAT GAIN. PERHAPS IF SUMMER EVER COMES TO THE NW I MAY SEE/HEAR PROBLEMS.
AS A NOTE: THIS TO DATE LEMON FREE UNIT WAS MANUFACTURED IN MARCH 1999.
I'LL GIVE IT A SOLID 5 STARS! BUY, BUY !

Bought it from webauction.com more then 3 months ago and it worked right out of the box, but I did experience the "Insert Disk/Disk Error" problem when I initially put in a CD. I opened and closed the disk drawer and the problem went away. Since then, I've only viewed movies on DVD and had no problems. I didn't see any of the problems listed below about screen artifacts, etc. I haven't played a HDCD on it, but I did play a VCD and it worked fine. My DVD player is sitting on top of my reciever which one reviewer advised against. Hmmm. Maybe I should move it. But I haven't experienced any of the problems below. Maybe I got a non-lemon? Since I haven't had a problem and I found it was a great value for around $340, I give it 5 *'s.

zoom capability and dual tray. and "NO LIPS INC"

none so far

For the money this a cool piece of equipment. I've had no problems with it what so ever. Like the zoom feature. Paid $289 best A/v investment so far apart from my DSP-a1

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SONY 330 & 530

Can't select opt in menus from remote... 2nd tray jams... Only 1 set of A/V outputs. No shuttle capabilities.

Not happy... 1) the options menu on the remote takes several attempts before it actually comes up on the screen. does. 2) the Matrix & Blade Runner can take up to a min to load. 3) Noticed lip-sync problems on Blade Runner. 4)The remote is crap nor does it have many codes for TV's, unless it's a Toshiba. 5) The front panel does not have shuttle capabilities and the remotes shuttle capabilities are jerky. 6) The unit will not auto-play the 2nd CD/DVD. 7) The unit only has one set of A/V of outputs. 7) The transport(s) can jam and takes a power on/off to spit it out.

Good news, it does supports HDCD's & the older Pro-Logic Surround sound via 6 RCA audio output connections... I am sure tubes will come back soon too...

Similar Products Used:

Sony 530d