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Apex PD-100 Portable DVD Player

Apex PD-100 Portable DVD Player

List Price: $499.99
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: You get what you pay for
Review: APEX PD 100 is an O.K. personal DVD player for what it's worth. The screen have both wide screen and standard switch. The image is so fuzzy I can't read the text on the DVD menu screen. During wide screen DVD playback, the image and sound pause often by itself while the dvd drive reads the disk. It does comes with a battery pack, but you have to use a jumper cable to connect the battery to the dvd player. If you lose the jumper cable, you are out of luck. One other thing that I don't like is that the player sqeeks like an old door whenever I flip open the screen or open the dvd drive's lid. The sound is great. It comes also with a remote control. This dvd player can also play MP3 CD, VCD (which I like),and music CD. I am giving it a three star because of its price, which is unheard of in the portable DVD players market.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Piece of junk
Review: Back in 1999, a friend of mine bought an Apex DVD player (not a portable). It offered a terrible picture, so he took it back and - on my recommendation - got a Panasonic, which has made him happy for the last three years.

Since I could buy the PD-100 for such a great price, I decided to give Apex another shot. After all, three years is a long time, so they may have improved. Nope. Initially, the player worked fine. The picture seemed somewhat fuzzy, but it played back accurately. However, after I tested two DVDs, the third showed a VERY distorted image. It looked like a camera negative! I shut off the player and tried again - same thing. I let it "rest" for a few hours and tried again - same thing.

The piece of junk broke after literally 10 minutes of use! It's going back to Amazon and I'll buy a Panasonic instead - I learned my lesson...

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Piece of junk
Review: Back in 1999, a friend of mine bought an Apex DVD player (not a portable). It offered a terrible picture, so he took it back and - on my recommendation - got a Panasonic, which has made him happy for the last three years.

Since I could buy the PD-100 for such a great price, I decided to give Apex another shot. After all, three years is a long time, so they may have improved. Nope. Initially, the player worked fine. The picture seemed somewhat fuzzy, but it played back accurately. However, after I tested two DVDs, the third showed a VERY distorted image. It looked like a camera negative! I shut off the player and tried again - same thing. I let it "rest" for a few hours and tried again - same thing.

The piece of junk broke after literally 10 minutes of use! It's going back to Amazon and I'll buy a Panasonic instead - I learned my lesson...

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Briefly Worked Great then Failed
Review: I bought the PD 100 new and without any prior knowledge of its quality history while on a road trip out of state. It came packaged from the factory in a blister pack with normal retail markings, but no box or protective coverings; much like how portable CD players are packaged. ... It worked great for the remainder of my trip and my wife and I enjoyed viewing DVD's in our automobile, and even inside hotel rooms. The picture quality was ok, not great, but acceptable. Unfortunately the sound from the speakers is inadequate and we immediately had to buy external powered speakers to hear it comfortably. Another problem soon emerged--the silver finish would easily rub off with normal use of the controls, leaving scratch-like marks, --not a huge problem, but still annoying. The battery never lasted more than about 60 minutes so I resorted to using the car cord or AC power pack. After returning home the machine was hardly used and was not abused or dropped. A couple of months later the picture began to periodically freeze up then resume spontaneously. Later the freezing-up worsened, often locking up and the machine had to be turned off/on to reset itself, which made watching a movie less fun. Finally the freezing up got so bad that is wasn't worth the bother of trying to watch a DVD (no improvement with switching DVDs). Presently the unit will no longer play any DVD and the "no disc" error appears. At this point the lens was visually inspected and appeared clean; no scratches or debris. The national electronics store no longer carries this unit so it can't be exchanged, but I am told I will receive store credit only because I purchased the extended warranty. My experience may have been an irregularity, but I would not recommend this model unless you are assured a no-hassle refund policy. If your budget allows it, I would recommend spending extra to buy a more popular brand with a good reputation for quality.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Briefly Worked Great then Failed
Review: I bought the PD 100 new and without any prior knowledge of its quality history while on a road trip out of state. It came packaged from the factory in a blister pack with normal retail markings, but no box or protective coverings; much like how portable CD players are packaged. ... It worked great for the remainder of my trip and my wife and I enjoyed viewing DVD's in our automobile, and even inside hotel rooms. The picture quality was ok, not great, but acceptable. Unfortunately the sound from the speakers is inadequate and we immediately had to buy external powered speakers to hear it comfortably. Another problem soon emerged--the silver finish would easily rub off with normal use of the controls, leaving scratch-like marks, --not a huge problem, but still annoying. The battery never lasted more than about 60 minutes so I resorted to using the car cord or AC power pack. After returning home the machine was hardly used and was not abused or dropped. A couple of months later the picture began to periodically freeze up then resume spontaneously. Later the freezing-up worsened, often locking up and the machine had to be turned off/on to reset itself, which made watching a movie less fun. Finally the freezing up got so bad that is wasn't worth the bother of trying to watch a DVD (no improvement with switching DVDs). Presently the unit will no longer play any DVD and the "no disc" error appears. At this point the lens was visually inspected and appeared clean; no scratches or debris. The national electronics store no longer carries this unit so it can't be exchanged, but I am told I will receive store credit only because I purchased the extended warranty. My experience may have been an irregularity, but I would not recommend this model unless you are assured a no-hassle refund policy. If your budget allows it, I would recommend spending extra to buy a more popular brand with a good reputation for quality.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Stay Away!
Review: I just want to warn you about this companies equipment. They don't stand behind it at all. So far I have owned 2 of their prodects and neither one has lasted 1 year. Unfortunately, their warentee is for 90 days. This Portable DVD players battery never worked (I brought 3 of them back before I got one that worked and that one stopped working after 40 days...and the batteries only warenteed for 30 days). This company does not stand behind their products and their customer service...well I guess they call it that...is useless. Trust me...don't buy anything from them. Save your money!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Apex PD 100 portable DVD player
Review: The Apex PD 100 portable DVD player plays great the sound and picture is awsome and it is really really CHEAP. When you plug headphones in to the DVD player it sounds like it is all around you. And it is very convenient size so you can bring it with you where ever you go.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Decent for the money
Review: The PD-100 is decent for the money, considering the price and features of what's out there. Couple of disadvantages is can't get burned VCD's to play, but OK w. SVCD burned with Nero with Lite-On CD burner. Also the heavy battery back has to be inserted/connected to charge, play via ac or dc.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: looks good, sounds not so good.
Review: the picture quality of this player was average to above average.a little bit grainy,but good enough to watch a movie on.
the sound,on the other hand,is something that i was not impressed with at all.now, i dont know if it was just this specific player or if all apex players are like this,but this one had terrible crackling when the volume was turned up just a little passed the halfway mark,and when the movie i was watching had some kind of explosion,i thought the left speaker was going to blow!another problem i experienced with this player was the playing of a music cd, i could not hear 1 entire song without a constant skip.over all, i would say that the price is good for this player, but the quality is not what it should be.i returned the player.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: looks good, sounds not so good.
Review: the picture quality of this player was average to above average.a little bit grainy,but good enough to watch a movie on.
the sound,on the other hand,is something that i was not impressed with at all.now, i dont know if it was just this specific player or if all apex players are like this,but this one had terrible crackling when the volume was turned up just a little passed the halfway mark,and when the movie i was watching had some kind of explosion,i thought the left speaker was going to blow!another problem i experienced with this player was the playing of a music cd, i could not hear 1 entire song without a constant skip.over all, i would say that the price is good for this player, but the quality is not what it should be.i returned the player.


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