Outstanding value and superb player!
Over the years, as part of my music collection, I acquired a number of CD and DVD sets where I could enjoy the CDs but the DVDs were PAL so I was unable to watch them. I tried a number of pay and free 'cracks' on several domestic DVD players that were supposed to make them region-free. None ever worked and a few trashed the players. The price of many of the region-free players were always cost prohibitive. In my way of thinking, if I have $500 to spend on digital entertainment I'd rather buy $500 worth of CDs than a $500 player to be able to watch several dozen DVDs. (I'm the same way with tools and tool boxes- If I have $1000 to buy gear for my shop with, I'd rather spend $700 of it on tools and maybe $300 on a minimalist tool box to hold them than spend the whole $1000 on a more fancy tool box and not buy more tools!) The day I bought this player I had decided to see if prices had changed any since I last looked. They had indeed come down for many units. I was actually quite surprised at both how affordable many region-free players had become and even more amazed at how widely prices varied for the same unit from retailer to retailer. There were many units that sold anywhere from near $500 at some places to less than $150 at others. Seeing the prices I decided I wanted a region-free player right then and there! Since I still wasn't 100% certain these things would actually work without forcing me to assign a region I chose a moderately priced one, this Panasonic. Since the PAL DVDs in my collection were all standard definition (meaning not Blu-ray) and that the region-free Blu-Ray players started in the $150 to $200 ball park, I price shopped and this is what I bought. I bought Panasonic because I wanted a brand name and I felt comfortable with the Panasonic name. (Yeah, yeah, somebody else likely makes it and Panasonic is one of several names that get hung on the unit.) I owned Technics audio gear too many years ago and it was good stuff! I still have a set of Technics SB2760 speakers as mains on my living room TV/surround sound system. When I got the player my first impression was I am amazed at how small the unit is. It measures 12" wide, 6" deep and 1 1/2" tall. (I also recently bought a Sony BDPS 3500 Blu- Ray player for same main audio/video system which is also surprisingly small for all its features. It measures 9" X 7" X 1 1/2" ) NOTE: The Panasonic player was an addition to my bedroom audio/video system. Outputs on this unit are sparse: one HDMI and an RCA component set, yellow (video) and white and red (stereo audio, left and right). The absence of an optical output wasn't an issue. What's there is fine for my application. The HDMI plugs into my 32" LCD monitor and the stereo outputs connect to a vintage Nakamichi RE-1 receiver which drives a pair of fully restored vintage JBL-L100s (These were JBL's first home speakers sold to the public). After playing many discs over a couple weeks I can summarize with this: The Panasonic S700 kicks butt! While I know the audio I hear and video I see are ultimately the result of the quality of the receiver/speakers and TV monitor, if what was being fed to those devices was lacking, the resultant output would also be lacking. In use I have no problem playing PAL discs and finally got to see some live Golden Earring and Pink Floyd discs I have been wanting to see for years. I have played DVDs, DVD-Rs, CDs, CD-Rs and they all work splendidly. I get DVDs from Netflix and some are, well, not in the best condition and the player has worked perfectly with every one with nary a skip or stutter. I haven't tried a dual layer DVD simply because I don't have any and I have encountered maybe two or three of them over quite a time span. Of course, this player isn't Blu-Ray capable, so that's a moot point. A comment on audio quality: I have a music only audio system in my bedroom as well that consists of a Sirius/XM Onyx II satellite radio receiver, an NAD Monitor Series Stereo Preamp 1000, AudioSource Model Eight Series II equalizer, an NAD C565BEE CD player, Parasound HCA 750A High Current Power Amplifier driving a set of old Sansui S917 3 way speakers. It is surprising how close in sound quality a CD sounds playing in the Panasonic/Nakamichi/JBL system compared to the NAD based system! It's that good! I'm not saying they are equal, but they are closer than I would have believed! Relate that quality to the audio coming from DVDs and this Panasonic player is nothing to sneeze at! A feature I do like about it is that it turns itself off after a period of inactivity which compliments the TV monitor I use which has the same feature. I can doze off without worrying about shutting everything off. The player has a remote and I'll just say it works. The button configuration is a bit different than what I'm used to. Skip forward a chapter and skip back a chapter are side by side and fast forward and fast reverse are side by side, all in the same row. I'm used to, from left to right, skip back, fast reverse, fast forward, skip forward across a row. It just took a bit of getting used to, especially since the remote is smallish with the buttons close together and I am blessed with fat little fingers! Then again, I never had a remote for anything I felt was perfectly laid out. The ultimate question is "Would I buy it again now that I have had it and used it for several weeks?" The ultimate answer is "Absolutely!" In fact I am looking at region-free Blu-Ray players for my main entertainment system! . Read more
