Pioneer DV-588A-S DVD Player

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Media formats: (Based on user reports)	CDR CDRW DVD-RAM DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL BD-R BD-RE BD-R DL
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Audio formats:	MP3 WMA
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DVD Player	CDR CDRW	DVD-R DVD-RW	DVD+R DVD+RW	BD-R BD-RE	DivX JPG	MP3 WMA	Price	Rating Info	Reports Comments
Pioneer DV-588A-S Chipset: MediaTek MT1389EE	CDR CDRW	DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL	BD-R BD-RE BD-R DL	DivX JPG	MP3 WMA	$70	8.5/10 11 votes	View 13 reports (36060 views) Post report
	More Features:
	Video formats: VCD SVCD DivX XviD JPG, DVD-JPG MPEGISO DVD-MPEGISO Audio formats: MP3 DVD-MP3 MP3 long filename MP3 ID3 TAG WMA DVD-WMA				Other features: Progressive Scanning Visit manufacturer's site Region code free hack here Google this player.
	DVD Media comments for this DVD Player (click on the link to read the comments)
	1 Dynex 2.4xDVD+R (RITEK...D01) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Panasonic 2xBD-R (MEI...T01) comments, 0 plays 1 dont play. 1 Sony 8xDVD+R (SONY....D11) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Taiyo Yuden 8xDVD-R (TYG02.......) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Unifino 4xDVD-R (UTJR001001..) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Verbatim 16xDVD-R (MCC 03RG20) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Verbatim 16xDVD+R (MCC.....004) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Verbatim (DataLifePlus) 4xDVD-RW (MCC 01RW4X) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Verbatim (DataLifePlus) 2.4xDVD+R (MKM.....001) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. 1 Windata 8xDVD-R (TYG02.......) comments, 1 plays 0 dont play. Post your DVD Media comments here
	Comments
	13 comments, Showing 1 to 13 comments  -
	MrPorterhouse from United States reported April 19, 2006: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 512kbit/s WMA 512kbit/s CVD? $125 over 1 year 10 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-JPG DVD-WMA DVD-MP3 MP3 long filename MP3 ID3 TAG DivX XviD MPEGISO DVD-MPEGISO Chipset: MediaTek MT1389EE Comments: This player gets a 10/10. Why? Well, its not because its the best DVD player around. Its because at its price, it sure is. You'd have to spend 3 times the cost to get a DVD player thats comparable and probably have to spend 5 times as much to get one thats better. What does that mean? That means that the Pioneer DV-588 is a giant killer. Its a budget bargin with great performance. It does all the DVD fundamentals well, with the exception of not passing Blacker than Black Pluge test. However, the shadow detail is still very good and the BTB Pluge is not a big deal at all. What the 588 excells at is its ability to replicate color. Everything is very rich. The resolution is also pretty good. Overall, this player is highly recommended.
	D.Gove from United States reported April 12, 2006: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW? DVD-R DVD-RW? DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW? DVD+R DL BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3? WMA? CVD? $100 120 days 8 of 10 Comments: I bought this player after my Panasonic DVD-RV31 player died w/an H02 error. I was bummed at first because I'd had the Panasonic for a while and it always played everything I fed it and the picture quality was great. But when I got the DV-588A I was very surprised at how much better the picture was and I don't have a progressive scan TV. The sound was better on the DV-588A too. I haven’t played many different formats on it but so far it's handled all DVDs, CDs, VCDs, DVD-Rs and DVD+R DLs with no problem. The DVD+DL was Dynex brand. I like that it can handle DVDA & SACD. The only problem I have with this player is the tray not quite opening all the way and it takes a few seconds to boot up. The remote lacks backlighting and feels cheap but I use a universal remote so that’s not an issue.
	Roman Savel from United States reported March 28, 2006: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA CVD? $100 30 days 10 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-JPG DVD-WMA DVD-MP3 DivX XviD Comments: You will enjoy this player as I do! Just great! Good Luck!
	BR7 from United States reported January 30, 2006: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $100 7 days 9 of 10 JPG/JPEG DivX Comments: Great player it played everything I have some people make a big deal out of the tray IMO it's not that big of issue unless your real nit picky it give a great picture and sound
	AlexB from Canada reported January 20, 2006: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $125 21 days 8 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-JPG DVD-MP3 MP3 long filename DivX XviD Chipset: MediaTek MT1389?? Comments: Great DVD Player for DivX, as well as regular DVDs. I replaced a Philips DV642 and I am much happier. It plays both GMC and QPEL DivX videos I tried and played all the DivX and Xvid videos I tried. The picture quality from Component is much better than Philips, and progressive scan is amazing, again much better than Philips. The menus are much more intuitive, easier to browse, faster, and it also shows "long" filenames, where Philips only showed 8 characters. The audio quality is also better, remote is nice with most functions supported. Menus for setup also have much more options and overall a much better player in all respects. I use it with my LCD Projection HDTV and I cannot be happier! Two thumbs up!
	monkeypox from United States reported November 03, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW? DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $125 60 days 9 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-MP3 MP3 long filename MP3 ID3 TAG DivX XviD DVD-MPEGISO Comments: PROS: This player has taken pretty much anything I can throw at it: DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-/+RW, DivX, MPG, MP3, it plays them all; and unlike the Philips 642 I tested out, the picture quality is great. Most of the time, though, it's flawlessly playing PAL DVD+Rs burned on an NEC-3520 (using firmware 1.U8 for bitsetting) which was a huge win, considering I didn't want to re-encode PAL DVDs that my previous DVD players (pioneer 343) and friends' players choked on. CONS: as others have noted, the drive tray doesn't quite come all the way out, which is slightly annoying, but not a bad tradeoff for being able to handle so many file formats. the file navigation works well for videos, but it feels a little bit cumbersome for MP3s. lastly, (this may just be a fluke) the player shut down on its own, mid-movie, for no apparent reason. this happened to me a couple of times the day I purchased it, but hasn't happened in the 2 months since, and I can't seem to reproduce the effect using the same disc.
	vatsay from Canada reported October 24, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR? CDRW? DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL? DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $70 14 days No rating DivX Comments: Pros: Sturdy disc tray with flip open dust cover; Nice design front panel with useful controls; Great picture and sound; On-screen display of dynamically changing bit-rate / remaining time etc. Cons: No Black Level extension option; Choppy playback of DivX/Xvid with frame rate other than 29.97.
	o770 from Brazil reported August 22, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW? DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL? DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $250 7 days 7 of 10 JPG/JPEG MP3 long filename DivX XviD Comments: The opinion of max_cliff is the one I agree mostly with. I just couldn't say this player does less than an entry-level LG player and the control sucks so badly. Actually I like the remote. I've only had one DVD player before this one. That's the Philips 615. And the Pioneer lacks a few features (to my surprise) that I think are very useful and the Philips features those. As for instance: - the delay between the JPEG exhibits in a slideshow can be changed to 1, 2, 5, 20 seconds with the Philips and the DV-588A-s has the delay fixed at the default. - it is possible to browse Data CD contents by the index numbers with the Philips, as if they were tracks on Audio CDs. The DV-588A-s doesn't index files at all. Therefore it isn't possible to jump to any file by entering its index number. - despite the fact that I think the Disc Navigator is excellent, it is too slow in comparison to the version of the Philips. Though Pioneer's is far more advanced. Actually the DV-588A-s is far more advanced as a DVD player than the Philips 615. That's precisely the reason why I beleive it should feature facilities like the ones I just mentioned. So I'm rating it 7. P.S.: is anyone really certain about what version of the Mediatek chipset this player has inside? Is it the 1389EE or the 1389FE? Or maybe another? Because I've researched that a lot and found out that nobody actually knows that for sure. Has anybody ever seen inside?
	Doug from Canada reported August 07, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW? DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL? DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $100 21 days 8 of 10 JPG/JPEG DivX Comments: I haven't pushed this unit as much as I have others, but my impressions are good. Looking at some of the other comments here, I won't contest what other people appear to have researched much more in depth. However, I do want to add a few comments in areas not already talked about. The major reason for my purchase of this machine was the fact that it is the only reasonably priced unit out there that can play SA-CD's. Now I know that there isn't a huge market there yet for this type of Audio CD, but I think it's coming. (Trust me, the difference between listening to Pink Floyd's Dark side of the Moon in 5.1 - mastered at 96KHz and the 'regular' 16-bit stereo CD is mind-blowing). So... I bought this unit not for it's video capabilities (which it actually handles better than any of my previous units), but instead to compliment my entire Home Entertainment system and provide me with a superior audio player. For me, the audio experience is as big a part of watching movies as the video... and in that regard every cheap 'small brand' DVD player I've owned has failed miserably when it comes to audio quality. Even my bigger name brand players (Toshiba notably) suffer audio 'drop-out' (especially when changing layers, or migrating across chapters). However, this machine performs beautifully. The only audio related beef I have with this machine is that I own a few DVD-A discs that use a "Dual-Disc" format. This machine supports DVD-Audio discs, however it's not until you go through the documentation that you discover that it won't play the DVD-Audio content if the disc is also "Dual-Disc" format.
	max_clif from Canada reported July 09, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW? DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL? DVD+R DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $125 2 days 7 of 10 DVD-MP3 DivX XviD Chipset: MediaTek MT1389?? Comments: This player does less than an entry-level LG player that costs 30-40 dollars less. I am truly shocked. The packed bitstream issue for xvid is there for this player (bios 1.04). How long has Pioneer known about this issue? Over a year. Starting at, or before the DV-575. Still no fix huh. Hey, I like to recommend this player, but if Pioneer doesnt give a shit about even trying to give firmware periodically, with real fixes, such as the bitstream then why not buy a lower priced player from say LG or another company? Why do I keep mentioning LG? Because LG just started making Divx/xvid players and they already got firmware that resolves most of the packed bitstream problems. Pioneer started their divx line long ago. Even rjtech got their own fix. Pioneer has zilch. Nada. New model after the 575, and no real improvements. Still no updates for the 575 either since 2004. Oh ya, they really love their customers. And then there is the issue of WHY-THE-HELL they hardcoded the movie region to region 1. I guess they're in bed with the movie companies. There is no bypass for this problem, and I wouldnt even say it's a small problem. Fast forward and reverse for xvid is set at one speed, unlike the LG LDA-530 which has 2-4 different speeds settings. So what's the advantage of buying this player vs another brand? Not much - besides saying you own a Pioneer. The control also sucks badly. No buttons to control volume, no button for changing to video 1 or 2. Did they contract this design over to kmart or something? Well, at least the feature to jump to a time-frame is still there. Moving down files in a directory in menu mode is slower than a pig-in-heat. I have never seen anything move so slowly downwards. Playback on this machine with dvd+r is very loud. Hell, it's even louder than my VCR which is a sony that has almost no soundproofing built in. Go elsewhere if you want to get the best value for your buck. Support only companies that are truly committed to giving you firmware updates and giving you the best multimedia experience on the market. That will not be pioneer with their dv-series divx players.
	PJ from Canada reported June 19, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW? DVD-R DL DVD+R DVD+RW? DVD+R DL BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $125 5 days 9 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-JPG DivX XviD MPEGISO DVD-MPEGISO DVD-RAM Comments: This is a very good DVD player currently in the market~ It is quite small in size, but easily to get hot after playing for a while. It plays almost everything I feed into it~ =) I got it from Futureshop for $149 CND. However, probably my bad, the DVD player burned out after 4 days~ But, I do wnat to get the replacement for a same new one tho~=) Just kinda disappoint that it Burned out so fast, after watching God father and Star war series~ =(
	Jim from United States reported May 30, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL? DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL? BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 WMA? CVD? $? 2 days No rating MP3 long filename Comments: Had a hard time finding this player. Purchased in Houston, TX at the only B&M dealer I could find, for $129+tax. I'm withholding my rating until I have more experience with the player. So far, I have not challenged it very much, but I have still found two annoyances: 1) I used to use my old Cyberhome 500 as an MP3 jukebox, before the power supply died. Burn a CD with a few hundred songs, hit random play, and sit back and enjoy. This Pioneer DV-588A-S does NOT allow random MP3 play. The menu option to select that is grayed out, and it reports "feature not available" (or similar) when you try to select it. As soon as it detects that you've inserted a data disc, this feature is lost. I am stunned at the absence of this capability! 2) MiniDVD playback is sporadic. I have a homemade THX/DTS/DD demo disc with a collection of the various demos that have been shown at the intro to feature films over the years. Playback occurs, but the audio that should accompany the main menu is absent, and the actual demos themselves can be very jerky, especially when there is a lot of motion. If the image is still, the audio is fine. If the image has a lot of motion, both the audio and video stutter during playback. With DVD burners becoming more common, the miniDVD format is becoming less useful, so the miniDVD playback problem is a very minor issue. For me, the lack of random playback on an MP3 disc is a very big deal, and it never occurred to me that a $100+ DVD player might not be able to support that.
	Cameron from United States reported May 04, 2005: Read features: Price: Time used: Rating: CDR CDRW DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL BD-R? BD-RE? BD-R DL? MP3 VBR WMA CVD? $125 2 days 9 of 10 JPG/JPEG DVD-JPG DVD-MP3 MP3 long filename MP3 ID3 TAG DivX XviD DVD-RAM Comments: DivX compatibility is the reason I purchased this player. I have a Philips DV642, which (in the US at least) has been the most compatible DVD/DivX player on the market. So I'll use the Philips as a benchmark against Pioneer's new player regarding DivX. DivX5 video encoded under the 'Home Theatre' profile will play fine on this player and any other DVD/DivX player out there that is 'DivX Certified', so I'm going to focus on XviD compatibility, which is a far more common codec used on video file that you'll find on the Internet. The Philips did not support GMC and QPEL on XviD videos, the Mediatek chipset claims to support both QPEL and GMC. But in tests only QPEL worked flawlessly, GMC had slow playback issues. QPEL & GMC are not too common on videos you'll find out on the Internet (I have encountered none), so unless videos that you have encoded use these features, this shouldn't be a big problem. QPEL & GMC aside, XviD videos played excellently on this player, except for one problem, Packed Bitstreams when 2 Consecutive B-Frames are used. Videos with packed bitstreams and 2 consecutive b-frames get b-frames dropped, resulting in jerky playback. Thankfuly this can be cured easily by unpacking the bitstream. Just run the video through Moitah's MPEG4 Modifier and check 'Unpack' if Packed Bitstream is enabled, save your video as a new file and you'll have perfect playback. I've found Packed Bitstreams with 2 consecutive b-frames to be pretty common on XviDs traded on Bittorrent so you'll definately need Moitah's MPEG4 Modifier to check and fix your videos before burning them. The Philips DV642 (with the latest firmware) was able to play Packed Bitstreams with 2 consecutive b-frames without unpacking however. The Philips did have lipsync issues with certain XviDs (I haven't been able to pin down what causes these issues in some videos), but the Pioneer was able to play these videos with no issues. The Philips features far superior DivX subtitle support compared to the Pioneer thanks to a community of firmware hackers that have tweaked subtitle support for the Philips. The Pioneer's support of subtitles felt a bit more clunky and the text was harder to read. This shouldn't be a big problem for the US market since subtitled movies aren't too popular. Disc compatibility is impressive with this player. CDs, CD-Rs and CD-RWs played fine. DVD-R and DVD-RW are listed as supported on the box but I was unable to test this since I have neither type of discs available. DVD+R, DVD+RW and DVD+R DL all worked on this player, even though they are not listed as compatible. Also, multisession DVD+RWs filled with MP3s or DivX files worked. This I love, because I can burn a multisession DVD+RW with XviDs of tv shows, adding a new show to the disc as it airs. Very nice. Image quality on the Pioneer is excellent. MPEG2 and MPEG4 decoding quality were both excellent. I connected the player via component cables to my 32" TV and the image quality was always excellent. I was unable to test progressive scan output however. Some other noteworthy features of this player include the excellent user friendly interface. Everything is clearly labled, easy to find, and astheticly pleasing. The player also has analog 6 channel output, the player does the DD5.1 and DTS decoding internally allowing you to connect a cheap (or expensive) pair of 5.1 speakers with analog inputs and enjoy real surround sound. This player is definately an improvement over the DVP642. It's MPEG4 decoding has less artifacts than the DVP642 and less little bugs (like lip sync issues). The packeted bitstream issue is definately annoying, but certainly not a deal-killer. There is also the off-chance that Pioneer could release a firmware update to fix this (another manufacturer of a European MTK1389 player has done this). I wouldn't throw out the Philips for the Pioneer however. If I were in the market for a new DivX player (which I was), this is definately the best player out right now.
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