More Media Players (Article 69 of 74)

DVD Combo - In The Lab


(continued)

Michael Antonoff
December 2001

Panasonic PV-DF2000
DIMENSIONS 23 3/4 inches wide, 20 5/8 inches high, 19 3/4 inches deep
WEIGHT 66 pounds
PRICE $900
MANUFACTURER Panasonic, Dept. S&V, One Panasonic Way, Secaucus, NJ 07094
www.panasonic.com
800-211-7262
IN THE LAB
The lack of video outputs prevented us from making any direct measurements of the DVD player in this combo. But using the Avia test DVD, I got the sense that the player is capable of much better performance than the attached display. Grays, for example, tended toward the brownish at lower picture-brightness levels, making fade-ins and fade-outs in B&W movies begin and end with a somewhat sepia-tinted picture.
The combo also had an onscreen resolution of only 400 lines, substantially less than DVD’s 540-line standard. There were also a couple of geometric issues. First, the DVD image was not centered and had overscan measuring 6% at top, 3% on the bottom, 7% to the left, and 5% to the right. Second, circles came out somewhat squashed, making faces look a little pudgy. The set came out of the box with its contrast set way too high (all the way up), but unfortunately that’s standard operating procedure among TV makers today.
— D.R.

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