Yamaha DVD-S1500 Reviews

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Good Points: Good picture from component video output on progressive scan, handset hack for multi-region, plays SACD and DVD Audio through the analogue outputs, can be controlled via any Yamaha universal remote, very slim, cheap!

Bad Points: Major lip synch issues with almost all DVDs, picture not as brilliant as expected, remote is a bit cheap and nasty, SACD and DVD Audio don't sound that great, flaky build quality and strange issues with loading DVD's.

General comments: I was very excited to buy this DVD player 2nd hand as it was supposed to be a major improvement on my 3-4 year old Marantz. It was supposed to provide a much better picture quality with its Progressive Scan Component output compared to the RGB from the Marantz SCART output and to a point, it did, but there are too many qualifications to be able to recommend it.

The biggest one for for me was lip sync. For those who have not encountered this, it means that on modern displays (Plasma and LCD) and DVD players there is so much processing going on that the picture is slightly slower being presented to the audience than the sound, so everything looks like it has been badly dubbed! The only way round it is to use a "Lip sync Delay" on an AV amp, if your AV amp has that feature (stangely a lot of Yamaha amps now do, ummm!), change your DVD player or buy a specialist box. None of which is ideal if you bought this player new at £400!

Remote is not a nice one, my Marantz had a nicer feeling and easier to use remote and in common with the rest of player it all felt, well, just a bit flimsy! It also had issues with turning the player off if a DVD was loaded and/or playing in it. If you didn't stop the DVD and unload it, it would crash the player and you would have spend 3-4 minutes getting it back up and running next time you used it!

As a cheap player for the latest surround formats (DVD Audio and SACD) it does work and I am not able to do a comparison review, but its not that great compared to a dedicated CD player.

I have used two Yamaha AV amps, in fact I still have one, and have never had any issues with them. My father installs them professionally for industrial and educational purposes and they are generally brilliant, so I certainly don't have a problem with the brand, I just have a problem with this DVD player. Yes the pictures it displays are very natural and detailed, especially with high quality sources such as "The Lord of the Rings", but its no good if you are so distracted by hearing the words of the characters half a second before you see it on screen!

So, to sum up:
Pictures IS very good
Sound is poor as it has lip sync issues
SACD and DVD Audio are OK'ish!
Flimsy build

I sold mine on recently and, although I always wanted the Yamaha DVD-S2500, I went for a 2nd hand pioneer AV 868I instead. Its in a completely separate league to my old Yamaha and only cost twice the price of the 2nd hand Yammy (which cost me £100!). If I was to buy again, I'm afraid it wouldn't be this player, too much goes wrong.