Rating: 
Summary: Samsung DVD-P401
Review: I was looking for an inexpensive DVD player with Progressive Scan and MP3 support. I found it in the Samsung P401 PRO's
1. The unit is the good looking, and has execllent video & audio output.
2. I have played 5 DVDs and had no issue at all.
3. The Video, SVideo, and Component Video outputs all performed as advertised.
4. The zoom (2X & 4X) functioned properly and responsively.
5. I had zero issues with the load times (unlike others experience)
6. MP3's play well, but Samsung needs to improve its funtionality and documentation (see CON's).
7. Added Bonus Feature - N-2-2 Spatializer 3D sound option adds dimension to two speaker stereo set ups and functioned well. CON's
1. The manual is very short, and doesn't provide a lot of detail about the advanced features (doesn't explain the features well enough).
2. The manual doesn't mention the MP3 capability of the player, with one very small exception (a brief "Note" on p.6 General Features It states that to make sure that your MP3's are recorded at a bit rate of 128Kbps or greater, and that if your MP3's are recorded with Varible Bite Rate (VBR) that your sound may come and go. (My VBR MP3's ran fine))
Other than that the manual doesn't mention MP3 capability at all.
One last note on MP3 capability there doesn't seem to be a way to randomize MP3 playback (hopefully Samsung will add this when they do a firmware update), and song titles are limited to 8 characters.
3. Remote control is smallish, and is not backlit. Otherwise this is a great player, and in my opinion a great value for a Progressive Scan player. J. Murphy
Rating:
Summary: mp3
Review: i went to the samsung website to check mp3 capability , the 701 which i have since purchased , is supposed to support mp3"s , although on the box + manual it is not mentioned . the 401 is not mentioned on the samsung website to have mp3 capability, my only complaint is it doesnt display time left to play , it looks great on my hitachi digital bigscreen!!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Quit 2 weeks after the warranty expired
Review: I've had my Samsung P401 for just a little over a year and in general I was pleased with it. It played most DVDs with no problems. The only disk it wouldn't play was a badly scratched DVD from the library. I bought it because of the Progressive Scan and component out features, thinking that I would still have it in a few years when high definition TVs became reasonably priced. Looks like that won't happen since just 2 weeks after the 1 year warranty expired it quit working. No signal at all.
Rating: 
Summary: OK for the money but... pretty slow loading time
Review: I've used this player for about 2 weeks. I compare it with other DVD players that I have and give it a 3-star rating. The reason is that it has a pretty slow loading time. And if you place a CDR into this player, the loading time will be even slower than that of the original DVD. Besides I have a problem with its progressive scan mode. When I switch to this mode my Toshiba HDTV projector produces a long horizontal green line across the screen just below the 16:9 picture frame. I'm not sure the Samsung DVD player is the culprit or this is just an incompatible problem by the Toshiba??? Other than that this player works fine in both audio and video.
Rating:
Summary: Bang for the Buck - Some Issues
Review: This is my first DVD player - looked long and hard for progressive because I have recently purchased Sony XBR-400 - 36" (WOW) and wanted to take full advantage of its capabilities. I agree that the load time seems slow, but what's 30 seconds when you're getting ready to watch a movie! Otherwise, the unit delivers, I've played many DVD's so far and none have had issues, Gladiator looks spectacular. For the money, I would highly recommend this unit. I have not used nor care for any of the other features. When I purchased (2 months ago) this was the only sub-200 true progressive player out there. (3:2 pull down and all). Worth the money considering the cheapest of the cheapest are only 80 dollars less! *****
*****Update, I now have had many issues with load time, It seems to take an increaingly long time to load a disk and sometimes even errors out saying that there is no disk loaded!!! All my DVD's are brand new out of the box and clean, I've had many problems with new Disney DVD's in particular. I'm debating wether to send it back.
Rating:
Summary: A mediocre player.
Review: Very, very mediocre player: slow loading time, noisy drive, clumsy menus. As a progressive scan player, is well down below the standard set by the Panasonic RP-56.
Rating:
Summary: Was great at first but after 3 years...
Review: We bought this as our first DVD player. We thought Samsung was a reliable brand plus it had good reviews on a few sites.
At first it was great then slowly we started to have problems. Last year we started noticing pixelation on some scenes but we blew it off as just something on the disc (dust, dog hair, etc...). Then it started doing it on brand new DVDs & everything went down hill from there.
Now it skips scenes, freezes up and continues to pixel on scenes. Very frustrating! Sometimes it works perfect, other times you have to restart three or four times just to get the movie going.
Of course the warrenty is expired & there isn't anything we can do except take it to "an authorized dealer". (Yeah, right!)
We got 3 years worth of viewing out of it, but I was hoping for quite a few more.
Rating:
Summary: Was great at first but after 3 years...
Review: We bought this as our first DVD player. We thought Samsung was a reliable brand plus it had good reviews on a few sites.
At first it was great then slowly we started to have problems. Last year we started noticing pixelation on some scenes but we blew it off as just something on the disc (dust, dog hair, etc...). Then it started doing it on brand new DVDs & everything went down hill from there.
Now it skips scenes, freezes up and continues to pixel on scenes. Very frustrating! Sometimes it works perfect, other times you have to restart three or four times just to get the movie going.
Of course the warrenty is expired & there isn't anything we can do except take it to "an authorized dealer". (Yeah, right!)
We got 3 years worth of viewing out of it, but I was hoping for quite a few more.
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