Very nicely built and easy to use, but screen could be better

Author's Rating:

Pros: Very easy to use; reliable; quiet; great battery life; bright LCD screen; reads many formats

Cons: Screen resolution too low; expensive

The Bottom Line: 
The luxury of portable DVD players shows high reliabilty and good construction. LCD could be sharper and price could be lower.

Author's Review
The Panasonic DVD-LS90 portable DVD player is a very nicely made portable DVD player, unlike the other brands out there which you find at Best Buy, Circuit City, Walmart, etc: Initial, Mintek, Audiovox, Samsung, Shinco, ... which often look like they'll fall apart after you pick them up. The LS90 has a solid and confident build and nice styling, and is surprisingly lightweight for such a big-screen portable DVD player, even with the battery attached.

The LS90 is very easy to use, and it loads DVDs quickly compared to the other brands. (I've owned quite a few portable DVD players over the years. I was very glad to see Panasonic returning to this market after a couple years of hiatus.) The screen, in classic Panasonic manner, is "free style", meaning the clamshell that houses the screen is flexible and you can adjust the screen in a back-and-forth motion, kind of like tilting and telescoping at the same time. This proves great when I watch DVDs on the subway and hold the player in front of me, because I can move the screen closer without having to hold up the entire player.

The battery life seems pretty amazing. Panasonic claims "up to 6 hours." You know how it is, these companies always exaggerate a little (or a lot). The 6 hour batttery life can be achieved if you turn the backlight all the way down, use headphones and turn volume to low and turn off any virtual surround sound effects, and run a DVD continuously (i.e., not pausing, stopping, forwarding, rewinding, etc.). Nobody watches DVDs this way. In my abusive everyday use, I can get about 3.5 to 4 hours of battery life, which is still amazing compared to all the other portable DVD players I've owned or used. At the minimum, you should be able to finish a long movie like "Once Upon a Time in America" (director's cut version, of course!) on one charge with minimum compromises on settings.

The reason I can't give the LS90 five stars is its screen cold be better. Meaning two things: 1) it could be brigher. Even at the max brightness, it's not bright enough if viewed outdoors. 2) the resolution could be higher. While most high-quality DVD videos will look good most of the time, sometimes you feel the screen is a bit "low-def." To be honest, I laughed when I read someone else claiming his/her Mintek had a sharper screen. I've owned two Mintek players and their screens are no better (or worse) than the LS90's. I just feel a little let down given Panasonic makes some of the best HDTVs on the market. For this price (and given the fact this player is assembled in China by cheap labor), they should have put in a slightly better LCD screen.

Conveniently, the player has two headphone jacks, so two people can watch a movie or listen to music at the same time. The DVD drive is reasonably quiet.

Even though the LS90 costs more than other brands, it just feels so much more solid and reliable, and it's also quieter and more responsive. Is it worth the extra money? If you are the type who drives a Buick or Lexus or BMW or Acura, I bet you'd say yes. Other people such as myself who drive Corollas and Civics and Malibus and Neons, we can still enjoy the high quality and thoughtful convenience Panasonic has put together in this stylish portable DVD player.