Panasonic S700EP-K Multi Region 1080p Up-Conversion Code Region Free DVD CD player Xvid USB Playback and photo slideshow

I had tried two other all region players and sent them back . This was so far worth what I paid. Works very smoothly with quiet operation and great picture reproduction. I tried every feature as soon as it arrived to make sure it was okay and it was. Do not know if it will last , only time and use can prove that out. I did put in my German movies first and they were great . Then of course USA DVDs and no problems , I ran a USB drive with pictures and it also worked as expected. I am glad I went a bit further in price , the player itself is not tiny like the others , not that it makes a real difference , you may actually want a mini sized player , good sized remote with all features . Panasonic is an age old company and that makes a difference to me. Having been over two years now , no problems . Still looks and functions like new. Read more

After reading mixed reviews, I wasn't sure if this would work for me as I have multiple DVDs from around the world. But I was delighted to find out it plays every type of DVD I have with absolutely no issues whatsoever. No special programming needed either...it worked right out of the box! Hook up was a snap as well as I had purchased an HDMI cable for it (which I would recommend). The picture was noticeably sharper than the DVD player this replaced (which I replaced because it was having issues playing some of my home-made DVD-Rs, but this Panasonic played them all with absolutely no problems!!). My only criticism of this player is it has no display, so you have to rely on your monitor to find out where you are on the disc, and if you have the unit in an entertainment center (like I do), it's difficult finding the eject and power buttons because they are on top of the unit, and everything is black (you have to therefore "feel around" for the buttons). After a while, you just get used to where they are located. But given the price and performance of this player, it's hard to not give it 5 stars despite this design flaw. Read more

Having lived overseas for many years, I have quite a few Region 2 and 4 DVDs; in fact, some of my all-time favorite movies were purchased outside the U.S., and so, my need to have a DVD-player that can accommodate such DVDs is substantial. For about 15 years, I have found ways to make DVD-players manufactured and coded for the U.S. market region-free, but like most consumer electronics, DVD-players will eventually stop working. So it was with the unit I had until late August, 2017 - it had served me well for eight years but became unreliable in a matter of weeks before giving it up altogether, and the time came to buy a new DVD-player. It had been several years since I last bought any product manufactured by Panasonic, but my past experience had always - and I mean always - been positive, so I went ahead and bought this one. After a few weeks, it started having problems playing Region 1 DVDs - not every time, but often enough that I deemed it a problem. A message would appear on the screen saying the discs' formatting was incompatible with the DVD-player. But, I thought, isn't that the very point of a region-free DVD-player - that it should be able to accommodate all kinds of DVDs, no matter the regions for which they are coded? I should note that, without exception, the DVDs the machine wouldn't play were commercially produced DVDs; there were no DVD-R discs among those that were unplayable. The workaround for these Region 1 DVDs was playing them on a standalone Blu-Ray player instead, but this was the first strike against this Panasonic unit. Another issue with this machine was the remote control. For my preferences, it was not very well configured; many buttons were in the "wrong" places and, as if that weren't enough, I found the remote a bit unresponsive - getting it to do what I wanted it to do would sometimes require buttons being pressed more than once. A few days ago, around six months after it was first plugged in and put to use, this DVD-player stopped working altogether. Two days earlier, it had worked just fine, playing both foreign and domestic DVDs without any issues at all. But now, it just wouldn't play anything. Every single DVD I tried yielded the same error message: "Error read." These were DVDs from a variety of regions. No matter what I tried, the thing was dead. Apparently, this is an issue many other purchasers have had to confront - several other reviews here describe the same situation: all of a sudden, after about six months' use, the DVD-player just doesn't work anymore. It's done. Dead. Perhaps this is a case of "you get what you pay for" - the unit cost me less than $75 (including shipping) - but what about Panasonic's good name and reputation? Clearly, I can't count on it the way I used to do. This is most disappointing. Today, less than 48 hours after this sucker died, a new region-free DVD-player, manufactured by ********, was delivered. Here's hoping this one won't let me down the way the Panasonic S700P-K did. For anyone considering buying this particular DVD-player, my only advice is: "don't do it." Read more

Worked perfectly out-of-the-box. Needed no setting adjustments and plays all my DVDs regardless of region. I subtracted one star simply because what is the point of an up-conversion HD DVD player that intentionally does not include an HDMI cord? If you are buying this item for the up-conversion you are, presumably, connecting it to an HD TV, and to get the full quality that requires an HDMI connection and cable. I doubt that many customers are buying an up-converter for older tv's that don't have HDMI ports, so it's rather odd that an RCA cable is included. Even a bare bones 3 foot HDMI cable would be a sensible add-in for this product. There are cheaper DVD players out there that are not multi-region that are the more likely purchase targets for a non-HDMI customer base. Overall, very good buy for the price and does what it says it will do. The picture is very crisp on our older 52" HD 1080p plasma Hitachi TV. Don't forget to provide your own HDMI cable, at least for now. Read more

My high quality 15 year old Oppo DVD player finally died after 15+ years. I have a pretty sizeable DVD collection I still want to watch occasionally and was looking for a region free player like my Oppo. This Panasonic fits the bill just fine. It's compact, quick to load and easy to use. I can't judge the upscaling ability since the 4K TV I have it hooked up to does that job from 1080p to 4K anyway. That said, at a distance of 10 feet the picture is acceptable on a 55" TV. Not great, but OK. Until last year I had a 37" 1080p TV and it had a better picture - no continued upscaling to 4K like this current TV. Again though, I don't want to get rid of that DVD collection so this is fine. I did hook it up to my main 75" TV and it looks awful, so I wouldn't really recommend anything larger than 50" really. The smaller the screen the better quality the upscaled picture is going to be. Read more