Initial 1731 Portable DVD Player

Author's Rating:

Pros: Plays most any disc, easily connects to a TV

Cons: Not true widescreen, built-in sound is weak

The Bottom Line: 
For the price, this is a great machine.

Author's Review
The Initial 1731 portable DVD player is one of the best deals you can find for a 7-inch widescreen model. I shopped around online and in real stores and ended up finding the best deal on this thing at Amazon. Their price has gone back up a little bit and now some stores, such as Circuit City, are offering the same model. Be sure to shop around before you buy because the prices on these things vary store to store from $20-30.

This little DVD player is packed with features and will play just about anything you can put on a disc. It will play regular DVD movies, VideoCDs, audio CDs, and mp3 CDs. It will read DVD-RW and CD-RW discs as well, meaning you can make you own compilations to play on here. The box did not say anything about playing VCDs, but I personally tested one of my own and it worked just fine.

Another really cool feature of this machine is that it can function as a normal DVD player to connect to your TV. It has RCA and S-Video outputs that will allow you to hook it up to a regular television, and it supports DTS and Dolby Digital Surround Sound as well. In short, this thing does it all.

In the box, you get the Initial DVD player, a rechargeable battery, a remote with battery, an A/C power adapter, a car cigarette lighter power adapter, and all the necessary cabling for hooking it up to a TV. Pretty much all you need comes with it. You may want to buy a separate bag to carry it around, but that's about it.

When you first put a disc in this machine, it makes a noise sort of like a Sega Dreamcast loading up, then once it gets the disc spinning it is relatively quiet. I guess it needs a minute to get warmed up.

This thing looks sort of like a miniature laptop. It is encased in lightweight silver plastic that could probably get scratched easily if you don't take care of it. In other words, don't turn a bunch of kids loose on it or you might have to go buy another one before long. The screen part is pretty solid and doesn't bend when you fold it up. The buttons are all flush with the unit and give a nice click when you press them. The flip-top DVD cover seems a bit flimsy, so be gentle when you are taking a DVD in or out. I am the type of person who takes good care of my stuff and so delicate things are not a problem, but I know some people abuse their stuff like this. If you are the type that needs rugged and sturdy electronic products, then you might want to get something a little more durable.

The included battery back is this giant thing that fits on the back of the player like a docking station on the back of a laptop. I was a bit shocked at the size of the battery, but I suppose you need a lot of juice to play a movie for 3 hours. It does recharge very quickly, which is always nice. I don't know how much it would cost to replace. The battery will give you enough power to watch a two-hour movie without any problem. I would recommend you run it off the A/C or car power as often as possible, just to preserve the battery.

The included remote offers a few extra buttons over what you get on the player itself. It is only about a quarter inch thick and comes with its own battery. To be honest, the remote is cool to have, but I don't see myself sitting so far back from this player that I would need a remote to change anything.

The volume control is a wheel on the side of the unit, so you can't control the volume with the remote. I didn't really like this feature, but it is most useful when listening with headphones. The headphone jack is located on the side, right next to the volume control.

This unit does have two small speakers located on the bottom corners of the screen. They are adequate in reproducing the sound, but nothing special. While watching Shrek 2, the music sounded very tinny and there was absolutely no bass response. For the best sound, use headphones or maybe a car adapter to play through your vehicle's stereo. You could always invest another $10-20 in a small set of speakers to use along with this.

The screen puts off a surprisingly clear picture. One of the best ways to test the vibrancy and clarity of a digital screen is to pop in one of Pixar's computer animated cartoons. I used Shrek 2 and was very impressed with the way it rendered the video. I also tested The Matrix and it looked very clear and dark, like the movie was intended to be. When credits appear on screen, they have a slightly fuzzy outline, but this unit is made for watching movies and not reading, so it isn't much of a bother. For the price, I was very happy with the quality of the screen output. Sure, it could have been better, but this is not a $400 machine.

My only real complaint about this DVD player is the aspect ratio of the screen. Although the screen is wide and supposedly supports the 16:9 widescreen ratio, it isn't true widescreen. I put in two different movies that are encoded in the 16:9 widescreen format and it still put the black bars at the top and bottom of the screen. I went all through the different built-in menus and settings and there was no way to adjust this. I also tested a fullscreen DVD and it does display the movie using the entire screen, but you can tell that they are wider than supposed to be. You can adjust it back to where it has black bars on the left and right of the screen, then it will look correct. I expected to play a 16:9 ratio DVD and have it take up the entire screen, so I was disappointed when it didn't work.

This DVD player is one of the cheapest ones you can find for its size, and so you have to keep that in mind when considering a purchase. For what I paid for it, I am happy with the results. It will make a wonderful diversion for long road trips and I am looking forward to using it. The system is very lightweight and portable and its uses are plentiful. If you are looking into buying a portable DVD player, but are on a limited budget, you should consider this one.