Apex Digital 600A DVD Player

For Christmas this year my boyfriend and I got an APEX AD-703. You can imagine our excitement, after all, who wouldn't love to get a DVD player if you didn't already have one? Not I!

Our Apex is a 3 disk player, so you can play 3 DVDs continuously or use some of the other functions (plays CDs and MP3s as well). It's got 2 Karaoke jacks--woohooo! And comes with a remote-- complete WITH batteries!!!! Since when do remotes actually come with those?!?! It's
also got a few other features such as zoom, slow-motion, and multi-angle views-- I must say, I really love using the zoom and slow-motion together, who ever can read those tiny credits before the scroll by? The tightly- packed tiny buttons on the remote are less than desirable, however. Oh yeah, it's also got a screen saver.

As much as we love it, there are of course, problems we've encountered. First of all, many televisions aren't compatible with this (perhaps other DVD players as well? I'm not really sure). The player came with 3, count 'em.....1.....2.....3 tv/dvd connection jacks/cables-- S-video,
COAXIAL, and Audio/Video outputs (not one of which was compatible with our Sayno TV-- of course, obviously that's not the fault of the player, but none the less, a problem).

The other problem we had with the player is actually playing the DVDs. It seems to be rather choosy about what and when to play. Eventually we can get the thing to work, but it's after much frustration and lots of cursing. It plays MP3s and CDs fine, with no problem, just chose which
disk number and play...then presto, it's playing, not the same with the DVDs. It's almost as if we have to trick it to play the DVD we want WHEN we want it. It's not just when it's fully loaded (a disk in each of the 3 trays) when only the DVD we want to play is in the player, we encounter the same problem. I don't know about you, but I don't want to have to rely on "luck of the draw" when watching DVDs, it's okay when you're in Vegas, but not in your living room.

Of course, when the player is doing what we tell it to, it's great. We love it. Also, it's nice to have a 3 disk changer, but I think it'd be much simpler to have a single. If you purchase this remember to keep that receipt-- just in case.

In any case, a DVD player is so much better than a VCR-- the picture is so much crisper as is the sound (even this one). It's an OK DVD player for the average user for the price of 200$. I think you're really paying for the MP3 play ability and 3 disk changer. While it'd be okay for YOU to buy this DVD player for YOURSELF, I'd not buy it for someone else, as in our case, we would rather have just waited until we caught the Sony Model DVD player we wanted on SALE than getting the APEX for a gift.

*added on 4 Jan 01*
As I become more aquatinted with this player I find more fault. I'm not sure if this is because the DVD's we've rented are in poor condition or what. But, several times the DVD we are playing has gotten stuck in the inside of the carousel. We have to remove the top off to get that bad boy outta there. The first time I thought perhaps I just didn't secure the disk in it's holder properly, but after it happening several times ( I think the count is up to 5) I figured out it wasn't me. We now have to leave the screws out of the top so that we can take the disk out, because it happens so frequently. As I said, I'm not sure what's causing this, but it only seems to happen with rented DVDs.