Pioneer Model DVF727 301-disc DVD Player

Old technology still selling at top dollar! How can this be?

Strengths: Rock-solid construction and reliability. Titles are assigned to the disc, not the slot. (See comments)

Weaknesses: 12-character maximum for movie titles. Pretitled discs overwrite entered titles. Remote has lots of little buttons.

Summary: 2006-03-15 11:12:33 Just when this model was introduced, I don't know. I've had mine almost seven years and it was released well before. Can you think of any other electronic component with a 7+ year lifespan still selling at well over $400? And this, despite not having progressive scan, upconversion, MP3 playback or any of the other "whistles" that current-day players have. How is this possible? In a word, RELIABILITY. After seven years of watching (on average) four to five movies a month, I've had NO player-related problems with this unit (I did have what turned out to be a connection problem with my set up). I would not have thought this degree of reliability was possible in this day and age without resorting to spending premium dollars for high-end equipment.

The best feature of this unit is disc identification. Once you put a disc in the player and enter in the title and artist information using the remote or optional keyboard (and trust me, if you DVD collection is large, you'll likely want to hook up a keyboard), the disc can be pulled out and moved to another slot where the player will read the disc and transfer your title / artist information. And the player never forgets. I've removed discs for weeks, even months, put them back in, and the player reinstalls the title and artist information you entered. Ah, but that neat feature also brings us to its worst design flaw: 12 character movie title limitation (including spaces). Awful! It results in some fascinating abbreviations of movie titles. "A Fish Called Wanda" becomes "Fish Wanda" or "Wanda Fish" and "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" just ends up being somethin' ugly. Worse yet, if the disc is pre-titled, it will overwrite your creative title every time the disc is played (and I've got one pre-titled movie where the title is SPELLED WRONG!). The remote is a bit old school, too, with lots of tiny buttons that big fingers will have difficulty with. If you can live with those flaws, and progressive scan is NOT in your future plans, this deck is perfect. It DOES have component video out, and it can be daisy chained (master-slave) with a second DVF727. Its specs are fine. In fact, the CD performance is great even by today's standards. It's one of the few components I've had that I have never had the desire to upgrade. When I finally exceed the 300-disc capacity of this player, I'll likely pick up another one to use. I really can't give a better recommendation than that!

Update 2006: Well, another year has gone by and I'm using this player more than ever! Still amazed at its rock-solid reliability and still frustrated with its 12-character titling limitation. But it's a trade-off I will gladly accept. I can't think of many audio/video components that one could expect 8 years of trouble-free operation that do not have megabuck price tags.

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Wished I had bought one earlier

Strengths: Fantastic convenience, excellent picture, very reliable

Weaknesses: 12 character limitation on DVD titles is ridiculous but tolerable, smallness of print on remote is not made for older citizens, I need reading glasses to see what the buttons do

Summary: I LOVE this product. I had never known that this type of product was available. The Pioneer hasn't been upgraded in seven years but is still the best one made. (Can you imagine an electronic product that still is viable after seven years?) Sony makes a more updated one with upgraded specs, HDMI, progressive scan, etc. but the reviews regarding mechanical reliability were terrible, and when I found one to look at in a store it felt shabbily made. The Pioneer, on the other hand, was given top marks for reliability afterbeing in use for seven + years, and as the mechanics of a juke box are the most basic (if that doesn't work well the rest becomes irrelevant) I elected to go with the Pioneer despite the oldness of it's specifications. Pioneer has always been at the top of the game regarding signal processing and picture and I suspected that even without progressive scan or HDMI that the picture would be superb. And it is. I haven't even been tempted to test it's picture against my progressive scan deck sitting right next to it.

It seems ridiculous, but the trouble of having to locate a specific DVD to play out of cabinets containing over 200, getting up, putting it in the machine, was more work than I was willing to do, unless there was a special occasion or NOTHING else was on TV. But with Tivo that was almost never the case. As a result, my DVD's languished unused. Since I have had this unit I have used it everyday and have re-discovered why I bought or recorded these DVD's in the first place. They are my favorite films!

The initial setting up and inputting all the DVD titles can take several hours if you have a large collection, but is worth the effort. It is true that the 12-character limitation for titles and artists is frustrating and foolish. Also, that the remote has print and buttons in a size for people with much better eyes than mine, but these are minor quibbles compared to the incredible convenience of the product.

Here is a genuinely under-promoted product. I would never even have thought of it if I hadn't see a $21,000 home theatre system that transferred DVD's to a hard drive. It made me research if anyone made a DVD juke box, which I assumed would be less expensive than the hard drive technology. This is a $450 solution that works just fine. I read every review I could find before I decided on the Pioneeer, sight-unseen, because I couldn't find one in any store to look at. (Many of the other reviews contain more detailed technical information and you should read all of those as well.)

Have I mentioned that I LOVE this product? Get one, put the time in, and I promise you that if you love movies that this will change the quality of your life. It is that great a device.

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