Toshiba SD-2006 and Panasonic DVD-A100 DVD Players.

Distributor: Toshiba America Consumer Products, Inc., 82 Totowa Road, Wayne, NJ 07470; 201/628-8000; Matsushita Consumer Electronics Co., One Panasonic Way, Secaucus, NJ 07094; 201/392-6415

Prices: Toshiba $599; Panasonic, $599

Source: Reviewer purchase

Reviewer: John J. Puccio

I admit it; I had to be the first kid on my block with a new toy. CD is dead. Long live DVD! Well, maybe not quite. Certainly, in the audio world CDs will be with us for a long time to come, with Digital Versatile Discs (or Digital Video Discs or whatever) at the moment just a faint glimmer on the horizon. In the computer world, however, the age of dominance for the DVD-ROM is fast approaching. And in the video world the DVD is already here and clearly the top draw. The two DVD audio-video players reviewed here represent the first of a new breed of equipment that in a few years will no doubt be familiar gear to all of us.

First, a few predictions about the future of DVD. I said that in the audio field the CD would be with us for many more years because I have yet to see how it will substantially enhance the audiophile's or music lover's musical experience. The biggest advantage of the DVD format is its increased memory capacity. With multiple layers of storage available on each side of a DVD, there is the potential for packing in 20,30 times or more the information on one DVD than currently can be handled on a single-sided CD. But of what gain is that to the music world, per se? True, manufacturers could easily store multiple discrete audio tracks with greater density, but who would care? Most of the buyers interested in surround sound, like users of Dolby Digital (AC-3), are involved because of the video component that goes along with it. Still worse for the purely audio CD is that today almost 90% of the music market is dominated by pop, rock, and jazz releases, most of which barely use up even half of a CD's storage room. And if a record producer did decide to publish a 10-hour music fest on a single DVD, how would the public react to paying a substantially increased price for a small silver platter they're used to paying 10 or 15 dollars for? On the other hand, the computer world is already accustomed to paying 50 or 100 dollars for a lone CD-ROM, so for them a higher price isn't so outrageous. Furthermore, there are already a slew of CD-ROM titles, from phone books to adventure games, that require three, four, six, even 10 CD-ROMs to accommodate. I am sure that both computer users and computer disc manufacturers are looking forward to whittling down that number of discs, for ease of use in the former case and for lower manufacturing costs in the latter. What's more, given a DVD-ROM player's (and a DVD player's) backward compatibility -- the ability to play regular CDs and CD-ROMs as well as DVDs -- and given the computer user's penchant for seemingly daily change anyway, computerists will have no trouble moving into the new medium.

All of which brings me to the point of this article. The first, most natural habitat for the DVD and its enormous storage potential is the area of movies, so it's no accident that that is where it has all started. For the prerecorded-film fan, DVD is the best thing since video tape, yet greatly superior. I have read that more people today buy prerecorded movies on video tape than tape movies for themselves. This may have something to do with the fact that after a decade and a half most people still can't figure out how to program their VCRs, but I also think it's because of the better quality they can get with prerecorded material at a reasonably low cost. Remember when tape first came out and a prerecorded VHS or Beta film cost $80-$200? When they got down under 20 bucks, people figured it was easier to buy them than to record them. Then along came LaserDiscs, but they really didn't catch on, did they? In spite of their obviously better picture clarity, LaserDiscs were big and awkward to handle, they usually required two discs to show one film, they were relatively hard to find, and they were costly. But they were a precursor of things to come, and DVD is it.

Both the Toshiba 2006 and the Panasonic A100 are entry-level machines, but neither player is any more expensive than a good, mid-line VCR. Like all DVD players, both machines play DVD video and audio discs, as well as all CDs. But, as with previous CD technology, they will not play DVD-ROMs. The audio-visual and computer worlds continue to remain separate and apart.

Both the Toshiba and Panasonic units do about the same things, and by now the reader will probably already know what they are. Entire films can be stored on a single DVD, usually in both pan-and-scan and letterbox formats, meaning, in effect, accommodating two complete films per disc. Pan-and-scan, for the uninformed, is the reformatting of a wide-screen theatrical release to fit the more square shape of an average television set, showing only a part of the screen image at a time. Letter-box allows one to view the entire wide-screen picture on a TV set, just as it was shown in a movie house, necessitating, of course, a blacked-out area above and below the image. Since most people have shown a preference for the picture being chopped up into tiny pieces to fill up their entire screen, the pan-and-scan versions of most movies have been the biggest sellers on prerecorded tape, but for many viewers wanting to see everything a director intended, and for those with a big enough screen, the letter-box format has been acquiring a steadily growing following. Now, with DVD, the controversy is over, the buyer gets both versions for the price of one, and video dealers no longer have to double stock their inventory. Best of all, the price of a DVD movie, even at this early date, is hardly more than the equivalent VHS tape, the first batch of titles selling in most stores in my area for under 20 dollars each. In another year I should imagine they will be even cheaper than that, although if CD is the analogy perhaps we'll see the 20-dollar figure an enduring standard.

Needless to say, both machines presented an image quality far beyond that of mortal tape; indeed, from everything I've heard, it equals the picture clarity of LaserDisc. I cannot go so far as to say it is better, however, because I was not able to get a hold of a Laser player to make a comparison myself. But those who have made the comparison have been impressed -- two friends, one a reviewer -- saying the DVD was superior. My own comparisons were patently unfair: DVD versus VHS prerecorded tape. Sorry, no comparison. In fact, my first reaction upon switching back and forth a few times between the same scenes on disc and tape was to wonder how in the world I had been enjoying the fuzzy images on tape all this time. Sound quality seemed only a little better with DVD, though, with perhaps a slight advantage in the DVD's ability to produce crisper transients and tauter bass. But this may have been more a difference between audio tape and digital disc, since a quick comparison between the DVD machine and a Philips CD machine playing the same audio disc provided no clear differences. Still, this bodes well for a DVD player being a good choice for regular CD playback. Now, add in the ability of a DVD player to bring up any scene or any timing on a video disc instantly; to produce a crystal-clear freeze frame and rock-solid slow motion; to change among multiple language tracks and to display multiple language subtitles; to play in both regular stereo or Dolby Digital; and, needless to say, to require no rewinding, and you see why this new medium has spoiled me very quickly.

So, how did I wind up buying two machines, and how did they compare? I went first for economy and appearance, initially buying the Toshiba unit because it was the cheapest thing on the market and because of its sleek good looks. However, it had a minor glitch in its inability to load a letter-boxed format properly. About 50 percent of the time, a wide-screen image would end up at the top of the TV screen rather than centered, and the picture would be jittery. Stopping and restarting the disc usually resulted in a successful loading, and from there on out everything would work fine. I called Toshiba and was assured that the defect was one-of-a-kind and that another product sample would be error-free, but I decided instead to exchange the Toshiba for the more expensive Panasonic, which ran Perfectly out of the box and has given me no trouble through its first 40 or 50 hours of use.

As far as picture quality and audio Performance are concerned, I noticed no differences between the two machines. But in the details of convenience, I prefer the Panasonic. First, let's take those sleek good looks of the Toshiba. They're nice, but those lovely, long, thin buttons on its front panel are actually more difficult to use than the larger, more conventional buttons on the Panasonic. Second, there are the remote controls, Again, the Toshiba remote wins hands-down for style. It is long, sleek, and graceful But it's also big and cumbersome, harder to handle than the stubby little spud of a unit Panasonic provides. The Toshiba remote is twice the size and weight of the Panasonic's, with Toshiba's numeric keypad hidden under a sliding plastic door. When the door is slid open, the unit is a third longer still, making it even more awkward to control; it's definitely a two-handed operation for doing anything more complicated than pushing the start button. By contrast, the homely, palm-sized Panasonic remote, with no hidden controls, can be manipulated by a single hand. Finally, I preferred the greater simplicity and intuitiveness of the layout of all the controls on the Panasonic compared to the Toshiba, whether the controls were on the front panel of the player, on the remote control unit, or written out on the television screen. I am never too pleased with a product when I have to reach for the instruction manual too often. I reached less with the Panasonic.

Finally, an aside about disc packaging. When DVDs were first announced I assumed they would come in CD-style jewel cases. When the first batch of DVD releases hit the stores I was mildly annoyed that they came in larger, cardboard sleeves inserted into plastic frames. In their favor, the boxes are big enough to hold a lot of written material without having to deal with a separate booklet, and they are the same height as VHS tape boxes, only thinner, so they fit in with the rest of one's film collection. But the boxes are slightly wider across their front than VHS tape boxes, and they have a protruding plastic lip for opening them up; consequently, if stored next to a VHS box, when taking one off the shelf the DVD box's lip catches on the back side of an adjacent VHS box, pulling out both boxes at the same time. Who designs these things, and why doesn't anyone ever ask me? Anyway, about the time I decided that every future DVD box would be the same, I spied a prominently displayed group of new DVD titles at Tower Records. They were all adult films, i.e., dirty movies (and, no, I didn't buy one, not even for the purposes of higher research). Anyway, you guessed it: They were all packaged in jewel boxes! Go figure.

As far as I can see, there are no downsides to DVD, unless maybe you count the initial cost of a player or my minor complaint about the disc packaging. It seems to me that with DVD's vastly increased storage capacity and backward compatibility with CD, it isn't a matter of whether or not DVD is going to replace CD, but when. All of which is moot because DVD is already here. Over the years I sidestepped DAT, MiniDisc, LaserDisc, and a host of other formats, convinced there was no future in them. I am equally persuaded that DVD is here to stay, probably coexisting with CD in the audio world for a while to come but quickly replacing prerecorded tape and CD-ROM as the format of choice in the video and computer worlds.

Update: ("If There's a Way to Screw Up a Good Thing, Somebody Will Find It"): I had no sooner wrapped up the above review of two DVD players a few weeks ago and sent it off with a concluding remark saying that I saw no downside to the product than along came a downside. So far, every early DVD film release I'd seen had come with both widescreen and pan-and-scan versions of the movie on the same disc. Being able to have both versions of a movie on one disc was one of the big implied promises of both the hardware and software manufacturers. With two layers of information on each side of a DVD, film companies could actually put out four versions of the same movie on a single piece of plastic. The DVD release of Golden Eye, for instance, has both the standard and widescreen versions of the film on the same side. More recently, however, Columbia Tri-Star released its own first few movies on DVD, and guess what? They gave us only the widescreen versions. This doesn't bother me so much personally because I much prefer a widescreen movie to its chopped up, pan-and-scam, sorry, scan, counterpart. But when there is the possibility for doing something right, why aren't the film companies doing it? By way of compounding the problem, Columbia Tri-Star heralds its product with a banner reading "Deluxe Widescreen Version" and charges five dollars more for it than any other company! Five bucks more for half the content!

More inauspiciously yet, the next week I returned to the film store and found that the worst had already happened: Warner Bros. had released its next three major titles in pan-and-scan only, this so-called "standard" format! What next, I thought, two DVDs for a 90-minute film? To get to the bottom of the problem, I called the publicity department at Warner Home Video, where they were happy to inform me of their logic. It was the answer I expected. They said their corporate division had conducted polls showing that a majority of home movie viewers preferred the standard version of a film to its widescreen rendering, and that in the interests of cost effectiveness, Warner was releasing select titles in pan-and-scan only. I asked who was polled, average video tape buyers or DVD consumers with wide-screen home theaters, but no one knew the answer. Translated, all of this means that in spite of the enormous storage potential of DVD; Warner is trying to give us the least it can possibly offer, while still hoping to sell its product. And unless buyers complain, they will get away with it. The culprit, of course, is greed. If studios can save money by pandering to the lowest common denominator, they will If consumers buy the product, the studios will be vindicated, and we will continue to get less. Let us hope that enough outraged viewers will convince them of the error of their ways, where it hurts -- in their pocketbooks! Here is the number of Warner's publicity department: 818/954-2732. Call them and tell them yourself. DVD is still the future of home film viewing, no matter what the film companies try to do to spoil the party. -- JJP