Reviews Written by Carl
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April 19, 2007
Excellent DVD Set, But WARNING - Mis-Labeled!
Pros: Full 16 epsides of third season
Cons: Mis-Labeled, seasons 1 & 2 not released
This is actually the third season of "The Scooby Doo Show" which ran from 1976-1978. This is NOT Season 3 of "Scooby Doo, Where Are You?", the original Scooby Doo series which initially aired for two seasons in 1969 and 1970. There never was a season 3 of "Scooby Doo, Where Are You".
NOTE, however, that according to animation expert Earl Kress, the 1978 episodes were the unofficial "third season" of "Scooby Doo, Where Are You!" as it had apparently used that show's opening titles. It supposedly ran until December 1978 as "Where Are You?" on the East Coast before being incorporated into the Scooby's All-Stars show. However, I can find no information/documentation anywhere which lists the original air date as anything earlier than 1978 "Scooby Doo Show" airings, so I have my doubts. ...
Additionally, the original "Where Are You?" series had the intro song which goes "Scooby-Dooby-Doo, Where Are You? We've got some work to do now.".
This Season 3 DVD uses the "Scooby Doo Show" intro which starts "He's got it all together for a brand new show, Scooby Doo is here and away we go". Tis is further evidence of the mis-labeling
There are 2 discs in the box.
Disc 1 is a single-sided dual-layer disc utilizing approximately 6gb space.
Disc 2 is a double-sided "flipper" design with side A being single-layer and utilizing about 3.5gb space, and side B being dual-layer utilizing 6.7gb space.
Episodes:
DISC 1 -
1. Watch Out! The Willawaw! 9/9/78
2. A Creepy Tangle in the Bermuda Triangle 9/16/78
3. A Scary Night With a Snow Beast Fright 9/23/78
4. To Switch a Witch 9/30/78
5. The Tar Monster 10/7/78
6. A Highland Fling With a Monstrous Thing 10/14/78
Disc 2 Side A -
7. The Creepy Case Of Old Iron Face 10/21/78
8. Jeepers, It's the Jaguaro 10/28/78
9. Who Was That Cat Creature I Saw You With Last Night? 11/4/78
aka
10. The Creepy Creature of Vulture's Claw 11/11/78
11. The Diabolical Disc Demon 11/18/78
Disc 2 Side B -
12. Scooby's Chinese Fortune Kooky Caper 11/25/78
13. A Menace in Venice 12/2/78
14. Don't Go Near the Fortress of Fear 12/9/78
15. The Warlock of Wimbledon 12/16/78
16. The Beast is Awake in Bottomless Lake 12/23/78
Picture and Audio quality were good. Features were Ok but nothing to get too excited about.
We already have Season 1 & 2 of "Scooby Doo, Where Are You?", so hopefully Season 1 and Season 2 of the "Scooby Doo Show" (1976/1977) will be released too. That will round out the offerings nicely! -
January 26, 2006
VERY nice, but with a few disappointments also
3 of 3 Yahoo! Users found this review helpfulPros: HDMI, plays NTSC and PAL video, memory card viewer, plays (S)VCD and DVD-Audio
Cons: DVD-Audio only stereo if using Digital-Optical out, no CD-Text support, audio issues on raw MPG playback, 8-character file names
I bought this DVD player 1/25/06 for the fact that it plays virtually EVERYTHING - especially for the DVD-Audio support (surround audio DVDs).
I hooked it up using the Digital-Optical out and played it through my trusty Sony amplifier. I immediately noticed all my DVDs were playing as PCM 2.0 instead of Dolby Digital or DTS surround despite being selected onto those audio tracks.
I found the Toshiba's Setup defaults the Digital-Optical out to PCM instead of Bitstream, and Dynamic Compression and PCM Downsampling on. This is very odd, but when I switched it to Bitstream and no Downsample/Compression, everything played BEAUTIFULLY. So far...
Now I wanted to test out the DVD-Audio which was my main reason for buying this player. I could not wait to hear the beautiful 5.1 lossless sound! So I break out my INXS DVD-Audio disc and play it. Again I am treated to downsampling of the disc to PCM 2-channel! I read further into the manual and find - UGH - YOU CANNOT PLAY DVD-AUDIO THROUGH DIGITAL OPTICAL OUT AT ANYTHING OTHER THAN PCM 2-CHANNEL DOWNSAMPLED! What a mess! You are instead required to use the 5.1 analog outputs to get the true DVD-Audio surround to your amp!
So now I have to add 5 more cables (yuk!) to the back of my DVD player and amp to enjoy true 5.1 DVD-Audio, and bye-bye lossless now? Dunno...
I was pleased to try out the Digital Card Reader with my Fuji's XD picture card and find it works VERY well with minimum flaws and great navigation/options. The only trouble was names are limited to 8 characters, and if a duplicate is found it will not display any of those files. Usually not a problem as the camera uses unique names, but my daughter went and renamed them all and inadvertantly made some dups within the first 8 characters.
The unit has great navigation for DVD-Audio and CD-Audio discs. It also played (S)VCD discs in PAL or NTSC with no problems. Also played my few PAL DVDs without a hitch. It also read my DVD+RW and DVD-R DVDs with no issues. I haven't yet tried my DVD+R DL Dual Layer DVD movies yet, but I expect no issues there either.
It did have trouble with straight mpg video files (on a recorded data DVD) though, not playing the audio for any of them but playing the video just fine.
My only other gripes come with the fact that there was no CD Text support, and everything in raw file navigation was displaying the file names with a max of 8 characters.
Otherwise, the picture quality is fantastic, as is the audio quality via the digital optical out. Even the downsampled DVD-Audio discs in stereo sounded great, just very disappointing that it was not not surround through the Digital-Optical out. That is the one and only issue keeping this unit from being 5 stars! ... -
May 5, 2003
CAUTION! May be a fluke, but may not be!
I had this drive installed for around 30 days without incident then - WHAM - one day it just refused to spin up. Nothing unusual had happened to justify it as an external cause (no jarring, power spikes, et al). I swapped my old drive back in and the system worked fine again thus eliminating any other system problems. Lets see how the warranty holds up - supposed to be 3 years so... ... -
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)
by Chris Columbus | VideoPrice: $21.95 to $39.99 Compare PricesMay 29, 2002
HP DVD: Brilliantly packaged & packed w/
This DVD was digitized in awesome quality, has fantastic menu navigation, an awesomely digitized soundtrack and has a SLEW of extras so large it takes an additional DVD.
It comes specially packaged in a fold-out book like form - not some cheap plastic run-of-the-mill container with a piece of checp paper for the scene table of contents.
They pulled out all the stops on creating this DVD SET! And the price is often $16 retail - well below the $20+ of the usual charge-top-dollar-and-deliver-less-than-normal hollywood DVD movie releases! ...
Love it - Love it- Love it! Go UK! -
May 8, 2002
Solid mid-level hard drive
1 of 1 Yahoo! Users found this review helpful Very easy setup. Quiet and cool running. Not the best performer, but very respectable stats just the same.
Probably not best suited for being the source drive when burning CD-Rs UNLESS you are at 12x or less and have your two devices on different IDE controllers. Sustained transfer speeds for this drive seem to be around the 40MBps (400Mbps) mark when using an ATA-100 controller. Given that, 16x or higher CD recording speeds would be cutting it close to the dreaded buffer underrun! ... -
May 21, 2001
The Movies and more!
Contains a "behind the scenes" look at the making of each individual film in the series. Worth it for those interviews, cut footage, etc alone! -
May 9, 2001
Blown away!
5 of 5 Yahoo! Users found this review helpful Hooked a pair of these to my Sony STR-DB940 and WOW! Superb bass response, crisp highs and mids. Definately living up to the standards set years ago when my dad bought a pair in his military days (he still uses them today!). Fuse protection helped me take the plunge into the high dollar cost. I expect mine will last as long as my dads - for life! The neighbors and local police are the only real threat to their existence! The included manuals and 5 year warranty get top marks too! ... -
May 7, 2001
Excellent Bargain and Features
I love these features:
1 - Play MP3s with On-Screen display
2 - 3 disc capacity
3 - Karaoke
4 - Can disable Region Codes & Macrovision (search the web and you'll find how)
5 - a plethora of output jacks of each variety
6 - RCA cables included
I was pleasantly surprised to find the Apex AD-703 for just $179 at several on-line and local retailers. I've had the player for a few months now and performance has been very good.
A few cons:
1 - When manually switching between MP3s you occasionally drop the first second or so of the next song.
2 - The player had minor and VERY INFREQUENT problems with DVD playback which lasted only a split second or so. (I've noticed this on my "name" brand DVD players too - it is not unique to Apex!!)
3 - Remote lacks a Power button (not an issue if you are plugging into an AMP or A/V Receiver)
4 - MP3 file names truncate to 8 characters
5 - Cannot shuffle across multiple Audio CDs
6 - Cannot seem to shuffle at all in MP3s
I can easily live with these minor issues - especially when I can disable Macrovision and Region codes. If you are an absolute perfectionist you will need to spend a whole lot more for improvements (and possibly still be disappointed)... ... -
May 7, 2001
Superb Experience
Matched this system to Cerwin Vega e-712 speakers and was blown away! Definately read the instruction manuals for proper operation of all the controls as they can be intimidating. The on-screen display makes adjusting much easier than relying on the unit itself. The only thing which I would improve would be to change from an IR remote to an RF device. Otherwise this unit is all I asked for and more! ...
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Great Features For A Great Price
1 of 1 Yahoo! Users found this review helpfulPros: Upconverts to 1080P, Plays nearly everything including Dual Layer Recordable DVDs
Cons: Doesn't properly play PAL DVDs
Overall, a VERY nice DVD Player. It plays dual layer recorded DVDs, which seemingly isn't often supported in DVD players anymore. The black finish goes nicely with my sound system. If it properly played PAL DVDs, it would be perfect. ...