Samsung DVD-M301 DVD Player
Not compatible with all DVDs!! Cannot recommend this one.
I have had great luck with a Samsung VCR and Samsung DVD-709 DVD Player in the past so I was loyal to my confidence in Samsung products by purchasing the Samsung DVD-M301 DVD Player. What I found out was that not all DVDs would play correctly in this machine. I had played 4 movies without any trouble and was impressed by the video display quality of this model. But when I tried to play Artisan Entertainment Studio release &quot;Bad Boys&quot; with actor Sean Penn it would not play the audio for this movie at all! This is not some high-tech movie either - it is a basic real-life film made in 1983 with no special effects like most of the newer movies have. It displayed the video portion just fine but there was absolutely no sound during the playing of this DVD. The movie had played fine on my older Samsung DVD-709 model so I know it was not a problem with the DVD itself.<br />I wanted to know if it was a defective player or a product design flaw in the M301 Player so I took it to a local store who had the same model Samsung DVD-M301 Player that I could try the &quot;Bad Boys&quot; DVD with. Well it was the same result with the store's player also - NO AUDIO! That made my mind up for me to return the Samsung DVD-M301 and I purchased a Panasonic DVD-RV31 player instead. The Panasonic plays the movie just fine - audio and all. I did not feel comfortable keeping the Samsung not knowing how many other DVDs I would buy or rent that would have similar trouble.<br />I am writing an email to Samsung about this player and my experience and hopefully soon they will address the problem and correct it on future models. Until then BEWARE!