Schneider DVD 856 Review

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3 stars
Average rating for this product is: 3 out of 5

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Foln.'s Review of Schneider DVD 856

31st Mar 2002

Overall Rating

1 stars
  • Value for money
    2.5 stars
Good Points

Cheap (£99)
Good picture and sound
Lots of socekts on the back


Bad Points

Didn't appear to handle fast forwarding/reversing too well
Would 'lock-up' during play (after 4-10 mins) and revert to standby


General Comments

A new DVD player at Asda for £99, the schneider dvd856 looked well spec'd, with plenty of outputs and MP3 support (and DTS support too).
Picture was rock solid and showed no artifacts or pixelation etc. Sound was nice too (the 3D effect only works for audio CDs) and it even played the Creed VCD no problem. But...
Playing Die Hard 1 and 2 and the Die Hard 2 extras disc all resulted in the player locking up and reverting to standby (after around 4 to 10 minutes). Would also lock up at the menu stages sometimes...seemed to be different places each time and as tried across 3 discs I assume it was the player.
Took it back and got a refund (was thinking of trying another but even the stock had only come in that day it had all sold by the evening anyway).
So I'd have to give this a low score. There is a multi-region hack (apparently) at:
http://www.laserdiscarchive.co.uk/schneider_dvd/schneider_dvd-856/schneider_dvd-856.htm

I didn't try it. This is my second cheap DVD player in 2 weeks (first was a Dansai 852(?) - see seperate review on this site). Am seriously considering only going for a big name from now on (Toshiba SD110?).
Hope these comments help and that you are luckier if buying one.
(For the record, when I took it back I asked Customer Services if they'd had others back...they didn't know, but were less than complimentary about Schneider products!!)

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Members' Comments onFoln.'s Review

  • Armengar. on 12th Nov 2002

    I have a Schneider DVD856 and I have found that it prefers decent quality CDRs if you are playing your own stuff. VCDs work fine (originals and CDRs are ok) I don't have any SVCD originals but when I have encoded my own the quality is very choppy - even on high bitrates (2k+ are still jumpy and choppy) MP3 quality is average but the 8.3 file format is horrid. The region hack doesn't work on mine so I may have a different software revision. I think the review was a bit harsh as it is a cheap player and does what it says it does. The major gripes are SVCD quality is poor and the remote control layout is poor. But on the positive side it plays VCD and will accept reasonable quality CDRs