RCA RC5240P DVD Player
Terrific value as a DVD player, a flop with CDs
I bought this player to replace both a defunct entry-level machine I had picked up three years ago and a much older, high-end CD player.  I was thrilled by its unaccustomed conveniences and solid handling of DVDs. The drawer opens and closes promptly and with reassuring smoothness, 2x-8x scanning makes navigating a snap even within a 2-hr film, controls on the box as well as the remote are ample and well-thought-out. More important, obviously, image and sound quality are spectacular. Finally, I was nostalgically delighted not just to pay such a low price for so much value, but to do so to a classically American company, even if, unsurprisingly at its price, the product itself came from China. I hadn't heard \\"His Master's Voice,\\" after all, since my 45-rpm singles' turntable from high-school, just before the last ice age set in.<br />It's with real sadness, then, that I must say I'll be returning this unit to Amazon. Despite its solid virtuosity as a movie projector, it's unacceptable as a spinner of CDs. At every volume level, there's a distinct buzz from the speakers of both my TV monitor and my stereo system that's roughly as annoying as that of a dentist's drill. I've checked and rechecked connections, replaced cables, etc.: everything, in short, and I can't fix it. The flaw is equally pronounced on commercial CDs straight out of the shrink-wrap and on home-made CD-Rs. <br />I notice that the player is \\"out of stock\\" at present with Amazon. I'm hoping that status reflects a decision to pull back on sales of this particular RCA model, and that others are without the show-stopping flaw described above.