Toshiba SD-3960 DVD Player
Good for what it is - a cheap progressive scan DVD player
I purchased this player because it scored well on the benchmark tests at hometheaterhifi.  They use objective technical standards for progressive scan players and rate them by traits (such as layer change time and pixel cropping).  They use the same scene on the same disc for each individual benchmark and I thought this was a pretty sound way to measure a piece of consumer electronics.  They were right.  My wife and I were early adopters of DVD technology and I got a dreadful Zenith way back in 1999.  It worked - sort of, but didn't have seamless branching, a feature which allows interweaving of extra film (i.e. T2, The Abyss) into the theatrical release.  The Zenith whirred, clanked and disturbingly clicked on occasion while rarely making it through a rental with even the faintest scuff.  It really hampered our Netflix enjoyment.  The new player works just fine after several movies my old player choked on.  These include The Abyss, Time and Tide (a fun Asian action flick with poor transfer to DVD) and several diverse rentals for comparison.  There was some pixilation on one rental, but it stopped my old player dead in its tracks and was fine after I cleaned the schmutz off the disc.  Two weeks of use and not a whiff of problem - just solid if unspectacular performance.   The player has component outputs which allow high quality progressive scan images for progressive scan enabled TVs with compatible jacks.  The image and sound are good and the layer transfer, although noticeable, is swift.  The remote isn't terribly responsive, but I suspect this will improve once I replace the batteries that came in the box.  The player is nice and quiet and the tray glides out silently (nice for when my 8 month old is sleeping) and only takes two seconds to open after pushing \\"open\\".  The display on the player is rather lame - you can only see the chapter number.  The on-screen display is quite nice with time elapsed and time remaining.  I never thought this would matter, but simply love it now that I have it.  The detailed on-screen display has everything and the kitchen sink, so I can deal with the lame player display.  I'm not a home theater owner, so this might not be great with a receiver, amp and surround sound - I simply wouldn't know.  But for my needs - to watch movies without hassle and without going into credit card debt - this was a very good purchase.