After my five year old Panasonic 20 inch TV started dying, I knew it was time for something new. As I had re-gifted a few cheap DVD players, I decided to get a combo TV/DVD player unit, and after some searching, this turned out to be about the best available in this price range. I am overall very happy with it, but there ARE some problems.
First, the good news. This was very quick to set up, and the instruction manual is clear and very understandable. That is, it is not written in broken-English translated doublespeak. There are built in, sturdy, inset handles on top of the unit, which made getting it out of the box and onto a good TV stand very easy. The handles also make it not too much of a heavy duty to move in any near future, should that be a need later on. I had it connected to cable and up and running in just a few minutes.
Though I have severe visual disabilities, the picture quality is excellent. I actually had to turn down brightness and contrast and color levels to suit me, so I doubt anyone wondering about this would have any problem with this aspect. With a few picture quality settings adjustments, again very easily done and very straightforward, I imagine that most people will be able to get whatever picture quality they desire without much trouble.
The sound is excellent with good stereo output, even when used with headphones, and is especially good when playing DVD's. There is also an output jack in the rear to enable connecting to a digital sound amplification system (and/or stereo system), for further sound enhancement and enjoyment.
The DVD player, built in, is extremely solid and full-featured for the most part, and on-screen menu's make for easy operations. For the TV and DVD, there are three picture "modes," STANDARD, SPORTS, and MOVIES, but simply tinkering with the basic settings will get you a more customized result.
There is a nice front headphones jack, and front A/V inputs, which makes private listening (and better stereo separation) a joy, and enabling easy hookup to an additional VCR and/or video game system a snap. Setup with cable, digital cable, or otherwise is also easy and very on-screen menu intuitive. Again, with all of this, the instruction manual is very well written. Finally, this plays audio-CD's and burned audio-CD's (of every type tried so far), and has a super-cool JPEG picture viewer with a neat slideshow feature. The latter comes in handly for those who take a lot of digital pictures or who do or have done a lot of Photoshop/Paint Shop Pro digital art (like me) and have or can burn them to conventional CDR's on a computer. I guess this feature could also work great for power-point presentations, if the PP slides are first converted to JPEG (.jpg file extension) pictures.
Now for the "bad" news, sort of, or caveats at least.
Be sure to carefully check out the specifications for this unit before buying, because it may have something(s) you want, which this combo might not offer. My biggest disappointment with this is that the front of the combo is silver-colored. And the flat screen CRT is inset from the cabinet about a half an inch or so. This creates a mild reflection of light in the surrounding frame in brightly lit scenes and/or pictures. Which for all intent and purposes, kind of defeats the whole "flat screen" perspective. In other words, even while viewing the screen straight on, there is a bothersome reflection of light in the TV's front screen, and in many instances, creates a frame within a frame view. One gets used to this very quickly but why the front wasn't just created with a dull black, non-reflective frame, is beyond me. Looking at the TV from an angle of any sort, makes this flaw in design very apparent, and discomforting. Perhaps future models will correct this, but it soon becomes obvious that this unit is really NOT intended as any main component in any "home-theater" set-up.
There are other problems. The front AV inputs are fine, but another set of such inputs in the back of the unit, would be most welcome. Also, this plays only DVD-R burned discs, and NOT DVD+R burned discs. It would've been nice for this combo to have just played both formats. Also, have no illusions that this will play burned CD's with MP3's. It only plays audio or burned audio CD's. For most if not all audio CD's or burned CD's, I've found no problems.
Still, the biggest problem I've found with this seemingly solid and well-constructed unit, is the silver frame indentation, and the light reflections which result. While this is not really a big downer, I'd suggest all potential buyers to consider this idiosyncrasy before purchasing. I wouldn't recommend this as a main, family TV/DVD unit, but I think it would work well for a student in a dorm, an elderly person for whom easy and simple operation is a plus, or anyone desiring a quality, name-brand TV/DVD combo at an extremely affordable price.
As far as the "glow" remote, I have no idea what anyone's talking about, because while the remote control is rather simple and easy to use, I could see no "glow" feature at all on the remote.
Overall, this is a very good buy for the price, and Amazon shipped it extremely fast. If you are looking for a TV/DVD player combo unit, on a budget, go for it. If you already have a good DVD player, and only need a new, decent TV, I'd look elsewhere, and even spend a few extra bucks in getting something which does not feature the limitations this particular unit has. see more best hdtv 1080p
- 20-inch combo TV/DVD player; measures 19.76 x 20.2 x 19.25 inches (W x H x D)
- Compatibility with DVD movie, CD audio,CD-R/CD-RW, DVD-R, and VCD discs
- JPEG Viewer enables you to create slideshows with digital photos stored on disc
- Digital coaxial audio output connects to your multi-channel audio/video receiver for surround sound content
- Glow-key remote control, icon-based on-screen displays, V-chip, and an auto-clock
See more Toshiba MD20Q42 20-Inch CRT TV with DVD Player Review
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