Denon DVD Players

I have a 2800 that I bought used from eBay 6 months ago for 200$.

Pros; very good picture, great blacks, blues, skin tone. Pretty good reds. Great detail.

Cons; can't dim or turn off the damned display: it's quite bright... when watching it through the tv's speakers (the only way I have it hooked up now.. remodeling..), the dynamic ratio is a bitch to deal with even with the compression turned on, hollywood movies are always too damned loud unless it's only dialogue. Menus hard to work with, too much work.

only composite and component outputs

Kira is correct - my bad. The DVD-2900 does do multi-channel SACD, I confused that with my previous Sony DVP-9000ES.

RLW

Why do older Denon DVD player (DVM-3700 or DVM-1800) do not play CD-R CD-RW.

I'm just curious because most of my older CD player (i got an old TEAC from 1992) that does read and play CD-R audio (not MP3 of course) and I can't undestand why a much recent DVD player would not.

thanks

The 2900 does SACD multichannel, not 2 channel only.

The original DVD-2800 did have aspect control but it was VERY inconvenient since it was only available from the setup menu which is not available once the disc is loading. I bet the MkII is the same way since it was basically a bug-fix of the original model. I had one of the original units for a couple days and it really had a nice smooth picture, very film-like. The CD performance was adequate but I returned the unit for a Panasonic RP-91 which had superior and much easier to use aspect control.

If you're looking for a recent-ish Denon with aspect control check out the DVD-2900. The picture is very, very good. The menuing system is lightening fast, layer transition is completely seamless and CD quality sound is exceedingly good, given it's dual nature. It does SACD two-channel only if you're interested (I couldn't care less). Pick them up used for around $600 tops.

RLW