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The Thrifty Nerd's Digital Digital Media Center
There is one piece of low end high tech toys that no one should be with out and that is a cheapo Apex DVD player. I know I have reviewed this before but I just wanted to talk about the non-typical multimedia functions. It is particularly cool to have a whole bunch of JPEGs and MP3 files burned to a CD-R or a CD-RW and then browse them on your TV. Your average TV watching peon will never mess with them but for those more digitally inclined it is pretty keen. Tonight I took a blank CD-R from a big spindle of a hundred discs and selected several hundred digital photos from my digital camera and 24X toasted it up for Kymberly with some MP3 albums that she might like to try. She can then check those out on her TV downstairs away from her computer under a big blanket on a comfy couch with loving kitties. Kymberly also has a similar Apex DVD player that she uses all the time. In fact I have yet to catch her actually on her computer.
The kicker is the the hard ware cost was a mere fifty bucks. That is a tiny fraction of a Windows XP Media Edition PC or a Sony PSX. The things are perfect for any nerd with a PC CD burner. Say your computer phobic older relatives want to see some pictures of you. Instead of printing out some dead tree edition had copies you can toast a CD if they have one of these bad boy DVD players. They also can play VCD discs if you are down with them. All real Hong Kong film buffs have a VCD or two hundred. I swear this is close to the early 90s idea of set top boxes that were going to be personal digital media centers.
Jake at December 4, 2003 
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Comments
sounds cool but the drawback for the Apex units is that serious home theatre nerds know full well that the units do not offer a progressive scan option for a kickass picture. Then again if you are not a home theatre nerd the unit is the perfect choice because of the variance of file formats. At this price you could have a DVD player in every room in your house!
Posted by: pete at December 4, 2003 11:17 AM
Apex does make a reasonably priced Progressive Scan DVD player
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00008N6X4/
Posted by: Jake at December 4, 2003 11:19 AM
Well I went and read the customer reviews and it is a mixed bag. I am always weary of "inexpensive" products like this one but I am also looking for a bargain and this seems to fit the bill.
The better business burea had this to say about the company...
"We rate this company as having an unsatisfactory business performance record based on a pattern of unanswered complaints.(from customers)"
Although a lot of people didn't have any problems at all with this product, I will stick to my Toshiba for now. I think I would give it a try though if mine burned out. I would purchase it with a credit card because you can dispute any and all purchases up to 60 days...after that, You are on your own. *shrug* I just don't know...
Posted by: pete at December 4, 2003 1:31 PM
well stick with what you got. I did not plan on non DVD featues when I got my cheap $50 DVD player but I was pleasently surprised with it's other features.
Posted by: Jake at December 4, 2003 1:50 PM
can we take the 6:40 ferry instead?????
Posted by: KYMBERLY at December 5, 2003 4:37 PM
Uh... Don't you have to have a progressive-scan TV to take advantange of the prog-scan feature on a DVD player? Since the target market for $45 DVD players is not those who bought a $2000 TV, isn't all the talk about progressive scan hype for most of us?
Posted by: Paul at December 8, 2003 1:46 PM
Paul, Peter has a damn impessive big ass TV.
Posted by: Jake at December 8, 2003 1:47 PM
