Sony DVP-NS700H DVD Player

The Sony DVD-NS700H Upscaling DVD Player that takes the standard 480p DVD image quality and upscales it to 1080p in order to get better looking results on an HDTV. It is available in black and silver, and can be found at a very reasonable price of around $60-70. A five-disc carousel model is also available, but the cost is almost twice as much as this single disc model.

Have you ever taken a wallet-size photo and tried to blow up to fit an 8x10 picture frame? If so, you probably noticed some loss in quality in the larger size. Some edges might be a little jagged, especially when there is text in the photo, and the overall picture may seem a little more blurry than before. Playing a standard DVD on a 1080p quality HDTV is akin to doing the very same thing as blowing up that little picture to make it fit the bigger frame. You lose some of the image quality in the process.

A few months ago, my wife and I bought a Philips 47" HDTV with 1080p support, and we love it. My PS3 games look amazing, and so do the Blu-Ray movies I play on it. However, we were still using our old Panasonic DVD player connected via component cables to the television. Even with components, we were only getting a 480p quality signal on a HDTV that supports up to 1080p. To connect this new Sony DVP-NS700H upscaling DVD player, we used an HDMI cable, which is needed to get the full 1080p signal.

I never knew how much I was missing until I played one of my DVD's on this Sony upscaling DVD player. It made the video look almost as good as Blu-Ray. When I installed this Sony player, I left my old Panasonic connected so that I could switch between the two and compare the differences. Let me tell you - the difference is incredible. I feel silly for even watching DVD movies on my old player with the new TV, because the quality is horrendous compared to what this Sony upscaling DVD player can put out.

For example, I watch a lot of TV-on-DVD, and I used a season of Smallville for testing my old and new DVD players for comparison. On the old 480p one, the most noticeable difference in image quality came during credit sequences when the text was placed over video. The edges of the letters had a slightly distorted look, and just weren't as clear as they should have been. Even the regular picture looked a little distorted, and people's faces didn't seem very sharp. It was still watchable, but kind of hard to look at it after you've been spoiled by Blu-Ray. On my new Sony DVD player with the image upscaled to 1080p, the picture looked darn near perfect. Everything was crisp and clean and I was surprised by how great it looked. I had always thought it was just the video quality on the DVD, when in fact it was my equipment.

This progressive scan DVD player will play just about any kind of disc you put in it. All versions of CD/R-RW and DVD/R-RW are accepted, as well as VCD and SVCD, and it'll even play discs full of MP3 and JPG files. When it comes to upscaling, it can output at either 720p, 1080i, or 1080p, depending on what your HDTV supports. Just make sure you have an HDMI cable to connect in order to get the higher quality video. Without HDMI, it still supports 480i and 480p resolutions, but what's the point in getting an upscaling DVD player if you aren't going to upscale?

I have this DVD player connected to my Panasonic surround sound system via digital coaxial cable. This unit also has an optical audio out port, plus one set of composite, S-Video, and component outputs, in addition to the HDMI. It only comes with cables for the standard composite output, so you will need to buy an HDMI cable. Don't go spending a ton of cash on that HDMI cable, either. I got mine for less than 10 bucks on Amazon.com and it works great.

The only real complaint I have about the Sony DVP-NS700H is that the buttons on the player itself are located at the top of the unit. I have my DVD player and surround sound receiver in a shelf underneath my TV, so I can't get to the buttons on this DVD player so well. I can always use the remote to do the same functions, so it is not that big a deal - just something to think about when deciding where to place this DVD player in your home theater setup.

If you have an HDTV and are still using your old DVD player, you are shortchanging yourself on video quality. Go ahead and upgrade to an upscaling DVD player like the Sony DVP-NS700H and see what you've been missing!