Rating: 
Summary: Perfect Player ! Perfect Price !
Review: I've had this DVD player for over 2 weeks now. It works perfectly and has good sound and picture. With a simple hack it becomes an all region dvd player. It even converts PAL DVDs to NTSC ! This DVD player can't be beat !
Rating:
Summary: A great buy on a progressive scan DVD!
Review: I just opened my unit today and set it up. Having owned two other Philips DVD players for over a year and not having any problems with them I chose this progressive unit. After hooking it up to my 60" projection television I jumped onto Amazon to purchase a second unit! Picture quality is GREAT, sound quality
is excellent, and with a quick hack it becomes region free! A built in PAL to NTSC converter gives you a perfect picture when playing region 2 PAL DVDs, even when using the single composite video wire.
At the $69.99 Amazon price this is a hard player to beat! It is finished in silver and has a sleek "mirror" display panel.The remote is a universal type which can control TV volume and channel selection. The remote also has volume control for the DVD audio output, great for taping CD mixes to your tape deck.
All in all this DVD player is a winner at it's price point.
Rating:
Summary: Philips 727
Review: Excellent player, literally plays everything even unfinalized discs that have multiple burns.I reccomended this player over the equivalent apex or other players for its stability and 3:2 pulldown progressive scan. Have had it for 3 months now with no degrade in performance. Allows you to zoom in and out and pan left to right on the video image, great if you want a closer look at your wide screen format dvd. Bottom line, a +100 player for a -100 price.
Rating:
Summary: Looks good, low price, *fast* shipping, & It really works!
Review: It works! I got the cart before the horse, & had several UK PAL Reg. 2 DVD's delivered, with no DVD player to my name. I'd decided on a Philips DVD727, but they had disappeared from the only local source(Target) *and* from Amazon. :^P
The Philips DVD 727 finally appeared on Amazon again for a few days, US$70 delivered. Placed the order, it arrived days(4/8 instead of 4/13- kudos to Amazon) before the original delivery estimate. Finally hooked it up today, applied the "hack", put in Britcom disc,AND: got rolling picture. :^P Oh, yeah, I remembered. Went to System Menu, set TV output to NTSC. Bingo, all is well! 8^D For my purposes, these old UK programs that were originally stored on tape, the picture & sound is perfect. True DVD-o-philes may disagree, but I'm very happy with the player. It does exactly what I wanted it to do- plays the UK version of the Britcom DVD's('Allo 'Allo- my favorite), & I'm sure it'll play good ole NTSC Reg.1 discs just fine- as well as JPEG discs for Grandma! If you can't find one locally, check Amazon every few days- they get 'em but seem to sell out fast. Don't be fooled by I-net sellers selling "multi-region" DVD players with *claimed* hardware modifications. I almost went for that, but did a little more research before spending *lots* more $$. Want to play overseas DVD's? Get a Philips DVD727. Bang for the buck, ya can't beat it with a stick. You need one of these! I'll post an update in a few months.
Rating: 
Summary: Super Player (so far)
Review: A week ago, I purchased this DVD player with the idea of "re-zoning" it to allow it to play DVDs from all over the World. In addition to that requirement, my new DVD player should offer progressive-scanning, components outputs, etc, and last but not least, a beautiful design. Price was also a consideration. The Philips 727 met all my requirements, including the price at $70.00. I performed the "re-zoning" in about 15 seconds with no problems. Obviously, Multi-region DVD players advertised on the Web at inflated prices are just reap-offs. In Europe, all DVD players are "zone-free," or can be made so at the stores where you buy them. I am a rather "unsophisticated" user of a DVD player, as I only play commercial videos on it. So, I cannot judge its behavior with the other types of input materials: VCD, SVCD, DVD+R, DVD+RW, red book CD, CD-R, CD-RW, MP3 CD, JPEG picture CD. I did test a CD out of curiosity and no problems there (however, my surround-sound system is not up to par with my HF system dedicated exclusively to my music). Please note that, although the Philips manual says the player can play videos in NTSC & PAL, since all TVs in the US use the NTSC color system, you cannot play PAL DVDs (unless you "hack" the player) Obviously, I cannot speak about the reliability of the player, since I have only used it for one week. It does carry a manufacturer 90-day exchange, and a 1-year limited exchange warranty (one-way shipping at your own expense). But, everything else is great: beautiful picture (why not? the laser reading mechanism is made by one or two companies which supply all the DVD manufacturers); the sound is much better than the sound which eventually comes out of my Philips HD, 34 in. TV (its speaker system is lousy); the remote is easy to use, and offers many options to assist in the viewing of a video. In conclusion, the Philips 727 is a hell of a bang for the buck, with all the latest features found in much more expensive players. And its looks are very “sexyâ€Â.
Rating:
Summary: A diamond in the coal mine as far as I'm concerned
Review: I, too, just managed to snag one of these from Amazon for $69 plus tax ($76 total; I live in Seattle so I get dinged for sales tax) after they had been out of stock for a short while. I read all of the user reviews here and concluded the naysayers were just part of the unfortunate 5-10% of consumer electronics buyers who suffer a defective item. (QA does need improvement, but statistics show most defective items were damaged in shipping.) All other reviews were very positive so I took the plunge. Best $76 I've spent in a loooong time. One of my favorite films ever is "The 36th Chamber of Shaolin," which is a 1978 Hong Kong kung fu flick that is available to U.S. buyers only as an import (unless you want a crappy quality, dubbed version from an unauthorized U.S. distributor). I absolutely *had* to have the fully-restored-from-the-master, uncut, region 3 release in the original Mandarin and Cantonese. Picked it up from HKFlix.com, crossed my fingers and ordered the Philips DVD727 from Amazon and waited. The DVD arrived Wednesday and the player arrived from Amazon yesterday (Friday), five days before Amazon's estimated arrival date. Everything was in brand new condition. I excitedly unpacked everything and connected the player to my recently purchased Toshiba 30" widescreen HD-ready TV, turned on the Philips DVD727, applied the region-free hack, popped in the disc, and Hallelujah!... kung fu goodness! =) I tested another disc or two as well and the picture quality provided by this player is fantastic, in my opinion, and I'm currently using the composite video output, connected to the front of my TV until I can get my old player out of the cramped enclosure and use the component video connectors. So I expect the picture will only get even better. I also like the sleek design, and the fast forward and reverse searches are the best I've seen on any DVD player so far, although I don't review players for a living so maybe I'm just easily impressed. There are five different search speeds, and there is no annoying pause when going from play mode to search; it responds immediately. Another nice touch: you can adjust the volume output of the player itself. For those of us who don't have (nor care to have) surround sound setups, one of the most frustrating things about DVDs is that the dialogue is centered and therefore often reproduced at a lower level than the rest of the sound (especially compared to explosions and soundtracks) when presented in plain old stereo. My girlfriend and I constantly play with the TV volume when using other players, boosting it during quiet passages with dialogue and dropping it in other places to avoid going deaf. It's been hard to find a comfortable setting that can accommodate both, but the Philips DVD727 allows you to boost the audio output volume as it leaves the player. As a result, we've been able to leave the volume a bit lower on the TV, save our sanity, and still hear all the dialogue. Some people have expressed displeasure with the remote, whether in function or appearance. I disagree, and actually like the remote quite a lot. I have found it a bit easy to accidentally hit the previous/next chapter buttons when I meant to hit reverse or fast forward search, but I chalk that up to my still being used to my old player's remote, and that will pass with time. The only drawback I've found, if you can call it that, is that the zoom out feature could provide more options. It would be super nice to finely control zoom out to account for overscan, and reclaim the parts of the original picture that you normally don't get to see. (See http://www.hkflix.com/xq/asp/infoID.27/qx/info.htm for an explanation of this phenomenon.) But this is a very minor criticism; most players don't have this capability. In fact, most players don't offer a zoom out option at all. This one's a keeper.
Rating:
Summary: Good product for the value
Review: Not only does this bit of machinery look sleek, it also performs well. It's durable and simple to use, the instruction booklet it comes with is concise and easy to follow, and for the price, I'd well buy it again.
Rating:
Summary: A great buy on a progressive scan DVD!
Review: I just opened my unit today and set it up. Having owned two other Philips DVD players for over a year and not having any problems with them I chose this progressive unit. After hooking it up to my 60" projection television I jumped onto Amazon to purchase a second unit! Picture quality is GREAT, sound quality
is excellent, and with a quick hack it becomes region free! A built in PAL to NTSC converter gives you a perfect picture when playing region 2 PAL DVDs, even when using the single composite video wire.
At the $69.99 Amazon price this is a hard player to beat! It is finished in silver and has a sleek "mirror" display panel.The remote is a universal type which can control TV volume and channel selection. The remote also has volume control for the DVD audio output, great for taping CD mixes to your tape deck.
All in all this DVD player is a winner at it's price point.
Rating: 
Summary: Short-Lived
Review: Like the previous reviewer of this unit, I got my DVD player in December 2003 and it is now May 2004 and it's basically unplayable. In the last week, I've had several problems on several DVDs where the player will skip. One can handle the occasional skip of course, but when the skips basically freeze the disc, making them impossible to scan forward through, you know the player is basically finished. On several discs it started making a whining noise, particularly when it was having trouble playing a particular extra on a DVD. Not being a techie, I'm not at all sure what's wrong with it, but having had experience with Phillips before with an older tape deck model that has issues with the door of the tape compartment (leading to taking it in 3-4 times to a place that only temporarily fixed it each time), I have to wonder if the problem with this DVD player has to do with the tray. It's too bad really because I liked the player except for the fact it seemed unreasonably long in loading every DVD and you always had to wait a couple seconds after powering up before you could load and unload the DVD (which becomes irritating over time). I gave the player two stars rather than 1 because I liked the remote control a lot, but I can see I'm not the only one whose player didn't make it the entire year and I really didn't use it all that much. I won't be buying Phillips products again, that's for sure.
Rating: 
Summary: Great but not for long!
Review: I purchased this unit in December 2003 and have been quite happy with it - it plays everything! Now 5 months later, I get "NO DISC READ" when a disc is inserted. The warranty is limited to a 90-day free exchange - since mine has expired, there will be a $29.99 exchange fee should I decide to ship it back (at my cost). Is it fair to have to pay to exchange a supposedly good dvd player that breaks down after just 5 months? Philips' customer service comments were basically just a canned apology for the inconvenience.
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