I guess this is the problem with Malaysia. We have only 1 choice... and that is ahem DVDs. Non-ahem DVDs will only be sold in places like Speedy Videos or Ezy Videos. The price is OK but HECK!!!! They censored it.!!!! What the fun of it? Quality wise... it is still bad. Unless we buy overseas DVDs... real original DVDs. Again... Custom Malaysia will be eyeing on your product.

Anyway, so, you mean you got your Denon in Penang? OK... I will try and shop around in KL/PJ. Get some really lousy DVDs and ask them to play.

Hey... sunauto... wht is macro block?

Nope, not me, my friend bought his Denon in Penang, I accompanied him, the price he paid was RM1190 actually but selling is around RM1200, we nego for more than half an hour for the 10 bucks.

Well, not all original dvds are censored, the latest Berjaya HVN, Warner, Sony Pictures dvds sold in Speedy Videos are not censored, I can personally assure you that and even the folks from Speedy Videos said it out loud, if they're censored, they'll refund my money or allow me to choose another title. The government has relaxed the censorship thingy these days, you can even watch The Passion Of Christ without a scene cut from the movie. Even Date Movie Unrated Version, V For Vandetta, Supernatural Season 1, etc are all uncut. They're only RM29.90 to RM139.90 for all region 3 titles, they're imported from Asian countries and are as good as region 1 titles, minus the special packaging only. I'm still buying those original region 3 titles as they're of good quality and slightly cheaper too so if you're mostly buying those, then don't worry about which dvd player to get but if you're also interested to watch ahem dvds which I think all of us do too, be careful as the quality of our ahem dvds are becoming from bad to worst, most discs are warped and have fine scratches on them, our ahem dvds were much better 5 years ago and ever since they have reduced the prices, the quality takes a hit and some new movies including serials are even burnt on poor quality dvd-rs which have compatibility problems with most dvd players, it's not because of your player, it's because that these dvd-rs are inferior, probably the surface is not that reflective, causing the picture to freeze or skip because some players are unable to read and play them properly.

With prices of original region 3 titles dropping fast, I guess it will be pointless to buy ahem dvds anymore. I'm happy with most of the imported region 3 titles sold in Speedy Videos, so far, so good, just wished that they could bring in Narnia and King Kong Extended Editions asap, I'm waiting for them impatiently.

If you're buying the Denon, bring along a few dvds of your own personal collection to test it, my advice will be using RCE protected region 1 titles like The Patriot, Charlie Angels, etc to test it and a few ahem dvds, local ones or those China made ones for compatibility tests. Never rely on those demo discs from the shop, most of them are using reference quality discs to demo it, imagine those THX and DTS demo dvds, of course the picture will look good especially on those professional authored dvds, don't be fooled by them. Bring along your own movies, the ones that you usually watch and you'll know how good the picture is on the player itself.

So, the Denon DVD-1930 has the same problem with 1920. Fussy with discs esp Unc Ho DVD. Then, it wld be a problem as how many ppl cld really afford to buy Ori DVD and not a single Unc Ho ver?

Ha! Ha! .. Like this, I need to do Christmas shopping for the Denon already.

Anyway, at the same time, I will go Speedy to check it out as well. Never go in for many years. HA! Ha!

Just remember to bring along your own dvds to test drive the player, don't rely on those demo dvds from the shop. Must be smart lor, last time I kena con before so it won't happen again. Don't forget these hi-fi shops are using expensive interconnects so I always insist that they use those cheapo interconnects that came with the hardware itself unless you're buying the player plus the interconnects, it's best to use normal interconnects if you want to buy something that looks exactly like what you have seen from the shop. Just my 2 cents.

Sure, go and check at any Speedy outlets, I'm sure you'll find some movies that you like.

Happy Christmas Shopping to u guys.

Yeah, Merry Christmas to you too.

Arrgghhh... All AV shops are closed. Guess I got to go shopping during office hour.... Ha! Ha!...

Wah, relax lah Bro, you can go shopping anytime. I bet you have got your bonus, that's why you're so excited, eh?

Nope!!! 100% no bonus. My boss follows financial year to give out bonus and usually its not more than 1 month.

I wanna get the player because my house is so messy. Just leaving everything everywhere and unless I finish this project... I know my house gonna look like this... total messy.

LH Electrical Shop in Purchong offers me RM1530 for the Denon 1930. Arrgghhh... crazy.

Ehhh ...... why so expensive pulak? Got any free gifts or things given, ar? No bonus, ar? I guess you're based on 13 month salary thingy, izzit? No lah, just a wild guess but not everyone got their bonus this year, mine is only one month to be frank, if two months good lah, can buy PS3. Just joking, if I have the money also I won't buy that lah. Waste of money, no good games yet.

Anyway, try asking other shops and see, shouldn't be that expensive ler. So weird. How do they derive to this figure.

just wondering if 1080p is nice for CRT:
http://www.consumer.philips.com/consumer/c...RESHQVHKFSEKI5P

By the way, is Shinco DVD good? I saw its RM699.

I wonder what is the best up-convert dvd now. is Samsung ok? its around rm400 rite?

I got a samsung HD860 and it freeze randomly whenever i play audio, this happen when HDMI is connected. May be Pioneer 490 is a better option.

CRT tv cannot support 1080P signals leh, even most Plasma or LCD (about 80%) can't support native 1080P, if you happen to have a CRT tv that accepts HDTV signals, like 1080i and 720P respectively, the picture is slightly better but not to say better than a true HDTV panel lah.

Shinco is good but at RM699, you better buy Sony's 76H lah, only RM580 wor and it's a Sony. If Shinco is RM500 or less than can consider lah. Just my 2 cents.

Oh I see. I guess I better take Pioneer.

I also read a lot of website saying CRT cannot support 1080p. But please click the link I give you. It'll show:
Supported Display Resolution
Video formats : 480p, 60Hz, 720p, 50, 60Hz, 1080i, 60Hz, 1080p, 60Hz

You notice the 1080p there? If cannot, why they put there?

Is HDMI and Component will have same quality? I would assume HDMI is digital and thus better quality. But I do hope that its the same coz my TV dont have HDMI. It only have component that support 1080p.

I think the reason Philips can support 1080p because it is Pixel Plus. It has more pixel than normal CRT. Better than Sony/Panasonic I think.

Even if it accepts 1080P signals, the panel or CRT TV doesn't necessarily have native 1080P resolution, we're more interested in native resolution than supported resolution. A CRT tv that accepts 1080P, probably have only 720X480 resolution if compared to say, Sony Bravia X that accepts 1080P in its native resolution, 1920x1080 (true HD resolution), panels can upscale or downscale the incoming video signals so it's important to see how many pixels do you panels have.

Pixel Plus is just a video processing term used by Philips, same as Bravia engine from Sony. They don't really mean anything to be honest. As for component video vs HDMI, the difference is HDMI carries more than 10 times the bandwidth of a component video and it can support up to 36-bit colour or maybe more in the future, as for component video, it's restricted to 10-bit colour but most sources like dvds are only up to 8-bit colour, upscaled dvd players from Denon 2930, Pioneer 989 can upscale to HDTV resolution with 13-bit colour support, quite noticeable but then, not comparable with HD-DVD or Blu-Ray, when I compared my HD-DVD King Kong with my DVD version, the colour depth is pretty obvious, the HD-DVD wins in this aspect, colours are more lifelike and 3 dimensional as well. Of course, upscaled dvds look a tad better so it's best to get a proper dvd player with good upscaling capabilities if you have a lot of dvds in your collection which I think, most of us do.

i'm using the philips...

my opinion of the philips player:
plays anything...
plays anything...
plays anything...

more detail
plays DVDs (ahem stuff & ori)
plays DIVX/XVID burnt on DVDs/DVDrw/DVDr/CD/CDRW
plays DIVX/XVID from ANY USB device...(eg. thumbdrive/hd/card reader)
plays High res Photos bigger then 6mp
it also upconverts to 1080i on HDMI... (720p is the best IMHO)

my only problem with it is is a tad slow in booting up/starting discs... when its on... it runs swiftly...

i have a 200Gb hard disk (in FAT32) stuck to it... so it has become my media server...

in short... SUPER bang for BUCK!

did i mention... its only rm450!...

BANG FOR BUCK!

p/s:Sony cant play DIVX/XVID in its proper Wide Format...(go check AV forums)

Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation. I guess I'll need to change to LCD in the future.

When they do upscaling, are they doing it with HDMI or component video? I keep on hearing upscaling through HDMI