Toshiba SD-4990 Upconverting Progressive Scan DVD Player
Pure Junk,  Avoid At All Costs.
I was looking for a budget upconvert DVD player to get me by, while I wait for HD-DVD players to come down to a more reasonable level. I've always respected and had good luck with Toshiba electronics in the past and I have always recommended the company for their quality, until now. <br /> <br />The SD 4990 is a sexy looking player, but the hardware inside must have been assembled with leftover and unmatched spare parts from obsolete models. For starters there is a long delay for the machine to power up after hitting the power button. It took so long that I thought I forgot to plug it in. It takes a good 5 - 10 seconds to get a reaction from it. Then you're greeted with an obnoxiously loud disc tray when you decide to put a disc in. <br /> <br />Oh wait, before I get too far ahead of myself, let me tell you the funnest part. This player does not have an automatic detect for the HDMI cable. I thought the player was simply broken as all that was on-screen was varying degrees of green static, and after 30 minutes of fiddling around the internet I found out that you have to attach standard composite cables from the player to your TV first so you can read the DVD players menu, and THEN set the HDMI output that way. Next, hook up your HDMI cable and it finally worked.  <br /> <br />On operation this machine is just awful! It freezes very often, and you'll get digital pixelazation on the screen. I played about 10 DVD's with this machine and every single disc froze at random spots.  <br /> <br />I returned my player within a week and bought a better Sony machine, albiet for about $30 more cost, but it's worth it. I'm really disappointed in Toshiba here, as they've always been high quality in the past. This player was an impulse buy more or less, and my trust in Toshiba quality led me to buy it since it was so cheap, and I figured it just HAD to be a good player. Wrong!  <br /> <br />Please don't buy this player. It's so buggy with firmware issues that it should actually beillegal for Toshiba to sell it to consumers.