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| Value for Money | 8.3/10  |
|---|---|
| Overall rating | 7.5/10 |
Full review by
downsouth
on 22nd Sep 2004
User Rating : 10
Respect :
0
Good Points: Great playback. Cheap for its time ($100 when the average player was about $250!). Can play back almost anything. Versatility like you won't believe!
Bad Points: LCD display burnt out rather quickly. You need to burn MP3s as specifically as possible for playback.
General comments: Back in the day, I bought this beauty as my first DVD player. First off, my brother had an Apex 600, and it was a great player with many secrets to allow the bypass of certain limitations of DVD players. (OK. You can outright disable Macrovision which lets you make video copies of DVDs. This was before DVD recorders started to make an appearance.)
I had used this as a DVD player for a while. Unfortunately, whenever I would try to play MP3s burnt onto CD, what I got was bizarre noises. I then found out that I had to burn the mp3s in a very specific way to get it to work. Oh well. Then, in about a mere month, the LCD display burnt out. While it didn't stop playback, I would sometimes go nuts trying to figure out if it was on or on standby.
Then, I found out that I could disable Macrovision and do all kinds of cool stuff. And I then downloaded and installed the infamous Sampo firmware, which let me not only playback MP3s a lot better, but I could look at JPG pictures and watch MPG videos burnt onto CD! And a couple of months ago, I found out that the hardware is ripped from PC hardware. This means that I could install a bios chip from a PC and solder in IDE slots and connect harddrives to my DVD player! This will let me watch files saved onto harddrives. Hell. I'm sure you could do anything with this thing.
Basically, if you find one of these, get it. The sheer power of this thing blows away everything else on the market. And its a pretty good DVD player while its at it.
downsouth's review and ratings | 332 words
Review by
rar2k.
on 24th Nov 2001
User Rating : 8
Respect :
+3
Very good value DVD player. Quality in my opinion is very good. I wish the audio volume were somewhat higher.
I bought the Apex Ad-660 DVD player in the USA and used it on NTSC TVs at 110VAC, then shipped it to Italy and I'm currently using it on PAL TVs with a straight 220VAC plugged in.
This DVD player could use a second set of RCA jacks in the back (limited to 2 video and 1 set of l-r audio + SVHS) for more demanding users.
rar2k.'s full review | 168 words
Review by
George.
on 23rd Sep 2001
User Rating : 8
Respect :
+1
It works as advertsied. I hooked it up, tested it with DVD, CD, MP3. Simple straight foreward.
The only thing I didn't like was the shadow and not the highlight is the select.
George.'s full review | 37 words
Review by
mike d.
on 26th Aug 2001
User Rating : 9
Respect :
+1
Few players on the market do such a good job playing vcd and svcd. This player smoked a $275 JVC.
mike d.'s full review | 31 words
Review by
dc.
expert review 
on 21st Aug 2001
User Rating : 10
Respect :
+7
It's hard to believe that this DVD player is receiving bad reviews! perhaps, it's cuz you need a bit more brains to use it... yes, it will play mp3's (go check the apex website on how to burn them properly, lazy lot!!!)... so far it has played all my AUDIO, MP3, VCD, SVCD, DVD, CDR, CDRW in both NTSC and PAL formats flawlessly! this IS the hacker's choice for DVD players... furthermore, it is firmware upgradeable... and you can make it region-free and macrovision-free... what more could you want ...
dc.'s full review | 108 words
Review by
Joe.
on 25th Jun 2001
User Rating : 0
Respect :
-3
This DVD player was horrible!!!!
Joe.'s full review | 12 words | 4 comments added.
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