Sony DVP-CX985V 400 Disc Progressive DVD / SACD Player

400-disc DVD/CD/SACD changer * plays DVD-Video, DVD-R & DVD-RW, DVD+R & DVD+RW, and Video CD * plays SACD, CD, CD-R & CD-RW, and MP3 CD-R & CD-RW * 108MHz/12-bit video D/A converter * selectable interlaced/progressive-scan component video output (progressive scan requires an HD-compatible TV) *

Store your collection of DVD movies and audio CDs in Sony's DVP-CX985V progressive-scan DVD/SACD player, and they'll just be ready for playback at a moment's notice. The DVP-CX985V multiformat mega-changer stores 400 discs and is compatible with DVD-RW/-R, DVD+RW/+R, SACD (Super Audio CD) multichannel discs, and CD-R/RW discs with CD and MP3 audio.

Other DVD players detect image changes at the scan line level--Sony's Precision Cinema Progressive (PCP) system detects them at the pixel level. The picture is more faithful to the source--whether film or video--because separate, optimized algorithms are used to handle the differing pixel behavior. Separate algorithms are also used to process the moving and still parts of an image, resulting in sharp backgrounds with moving objects that are free from motion artifacts.

The high-speed 108MHz/12-bit video D/A converter employs 4X oversampling for much more effective noise filtering.

In addition to standard 2-channel CD playback, the DVP-CX985V plays 2-channel and multichannel Super Audio CDs. It reads the disc information of all the discs and loads the information into memory so that disc type, titles, and other text information can be displayed on the TV screen.

It has the following video output options (with number of ports): component video (x1), S-Video (x1), composite video (x1), coaxial digital (x1), and optical digital (x1). It also has the following audio output options: analog audio (x1) and 5.1 channel (x1).

Other features include:

Included remote operates the DVP-CX985V as well as a number of functions on select brands of televisions and receivers; its keys glow in the dark.
Instant Replay feature enables you to go back 10 seconds to review a scene with a single press of a button.
TV Virtual Surround feature generates a convincing surround-sound effect using only 2 stereo speakers.
Dolby Digital and DTS output.

Tech Talk

SACD: Super Audio CD (SACD) is a high-resolution digital audio format that promises vast sonic improvements over the current audio CD format. SACD discs can be played back on dedicated SACD players or combination SACD/DVD-Video players. Certain SACD discs feature a conventional audio CD layer (hybrid SACDs) which can be played back by any CD player or computer with a CD-ROM drive.
Progressive scan: Also called sequential scanning, a progressive-scan system displays the entire image--providing all the horizontal lines per frame, rather than every other line--once every 60th of a second. This method reduces flicker and increases stability. Progressive-scan viewing requires a compatible digital TV.
Component video: Unlike a single video input, component video maintains the video signal as three separate signals through these three jacks. This connection provides optimum quality. To ensure maximum picture quality, use three video-grade cables for the Y, Pb, and Pr connections.

What's in the Box
Sony DVP-CX985V DVD/SACD player/changer, remote control (RM-DX500), 2 AA batteries, RCA cable (57 inches), and operating instructions.

1 Flawed, but mostly awesome.
I've seen so many negative reviews of this machine that I feel the need to comment myself. The user interface is definitely it's biggest flaw. I, too, have resorted to using secondary lists to know where my discs are. At first I used a paper list, and now I have a file on my laptop for my CDs and use my IMDB account for my DVDs. (Just type the slot number in the URL section of your movie notes) Anyhow, it is a big area Sony can improve on. What I would ultimately like to see is an ethernet connection to get the info off CDDB, etc. I was one of the folks who bought this for CD's, opting for the DVD version because of the small price gap between the two. What I absolutely LOVE about this machine is having all (or most) of my CDs able to be played though randomly. Granted, a few minutes are spent setting up with the akward menu system, but once set, this thing will play forever until I stop it. I have to wonder why I have to scroll though a menu for such a common function as shuffle, though? Here is the exact procedure for starting the process. Turn on machine. Default folder is "ALL". Hit folder button once to show the "ALL" folder, again to move to "DVD" folder, and once again to move to "CD" folder. Now, you cannot access the menu that contains the shuffle function unless a disc is playing, so hit play. After disc loads, hit "display" button twice to get to correct menu. Scroll down 6 items, then hit right arrow to enter shuffle menu, then down once for random disc, or down twice for random tracks across all discs [my preferred]. So yes, there is definitely truth in the poor menu design complaints. But, after doing this daily, I basically can do it with my eyes closed, and don't even need the TV on. As far as performance, I have had this nearly two years now and never had a single problem other. I often leave it playing CDs at random for hours, if not days at a time. Playback is flawless (I use the optical output). DVD,s too (via component)all play perfectly. I too wish more DVD manufacturers would include pictures and title info. One last thing that bothers me...I had dreams of burning comp discs of MP3's to load and play randomly, but after trying the few I already had, the machine really doesn't like them much. It pretty much ignores MP3 discs in random mode. Also, MP3 discs cannot be put into folders. Additionally, VCDs are auto grouped with CD's which can get annoying on random. I stopped storing VCDs in my machine for this reason. Well, I'm not sure my review will come across much better than the others. It is harder to expand upon the reasons I love this machine, and easy to draw out the negatives with detailed descriptions of the problems. All in all, I think most people with a sizeable collection would appreciate all that this unit has to offer, and like myself, overlook even it's glaring flaws.

2 Very satisfied
I have had this player for a few months now and have been very satisfied with it. The price through Amazon was the best that I found, even compared to military exchange shopping. From my perspective, the best thing was eliminating the DVD mess around the TV. I have four small kids (8,6,3,2). Discs were constantly getting scratched and ruined. Not now. And they are able to navigate their movie selections easily. I printed up a numerical title list based on categories, "animated, little kids, children, action, drama, comedy, etc" and left room inbetween to add more movies as they come.
I read a previous review about the complaint about not having a single slot for rentals, etc. I was slightly worried about this when buying, but it really isn't a problem. You open the carasol and put it in any empty slot. Dial in the slot and the movie plays. No big deal! I recommend leaving slot 1 open for this purpose. Granted there are some things that could use improvement, but for what is out there now, I am very happy with it. I give it a four just because I know that faster and easier electronic/remote searching will be available in the future. But I don't think that it is any slower than finding the DVD in a box, unloading it, putting it in the DVD player and waiting for it to load. If you have kids, then this is a buy in my book. One other thing... you can childlock certain movies or even specific scenes on movies. Another plus with kids.
jfw.

3 DVP-CX985V does a good job for the price.
I have been using this machine for about 2 months now. I have loaded about 210 dvds and 150 cds, all play quite nicely. I have not noticed any scratching of any of these disks. I recommend checking for this, in case your machine has a manufacturing defect, as has been (questionably) reported. Also, read the instructions of your equipment thoroughly, before hooking up all the connections to all of your equipment--this may help to ensure that quality signals are tranfered from your player. I have a nice home theater system set up with this player--it performs quite well, with very good picture and sound. I have backed up copies of some of my DVDs and CDs (not always easy to do with todays copy protection schemes), and these also play nicely in this player. I have even added jacket picture, and text information to my copies, which show up perfectly in this players folder system (you can find info on how to do this on the internet). If some of you are trying to play poorly copied disks, the player will have problems playing those disks. If you try to play disks that the player was not designed to play, it may not play them. This is a realitively inexpensive machine, and still could use some improvements: the speed of changing disks is somewhat slow (to be expected with a 400-disk changer?), the display and management of disk information, and searching abilities, could be vastly improved upon, although the present design does work in a very limited, and minimal, way. I do keep a list of my disks handy beside me when I am already playing something, and do not wish to stop the player, to access the folder mode. I have had no problems shuffling, randomly, in order, all disks, disks in a special folder, or only a certain set of disks. I think some reviewers did not read through the instruction manual before writing their reviews. I feel the player is a fine value for the money. 4 stars.

4 Perfect for me
I've had this player since August and have had nothing but pleasure from it. It comes close to being as essential as my Tivo for me, and it wasn't even my idea to get it -- it was my husband who wanted this gadget. One caveat -- I almost never use the Sony menu system. We have a Harmony 688 remote so we use the Media button there to store and select our titles. Love it!

5 Simple to use
I really have no idea why some people think this unit is difficult to use. I have not had any problems whatsoever with operating it and feel the menus are quite easy to follow and navigate. As far as the disc skipping and gauges.....haven't encountered a problem there either. My suggestion would be to purchase a CD cleaner/repair kit and use it on DVD's prior to loading them.
The picture quality is very good and the sound is crisp. I am using the optical digital output which IMO makes a huge difference.
For the price of this player and the ability to catalogue 400 DVD's, I say go for it.

6 Nice features, but POOR error tracking
Have had this unit for a couple of weeks now. It is loaded with some nice features, but it is REALLY pathetic when it comes to playing less than 100% perfect disks. I mean, C'mon, can't Sony get ANYTHING right??? For the money, it's a nice unit. Holds 400 disks, plays DVD and CD, has all the audio and video features you would want, but it's REALLY pathetic when half the disks you play, that have NO problem playing on any other machine, skip or don't play at all because of the slightest dust speck or fingerprint. How long has Sony been making CD players now??? There always seems to be problems with anything Sony. They just will never be anything more than a mid-grade manufacturer. Also not thrilled that most of the menus and screens are only visible on the TV, so you can't set many of the CD features without using your television. Also, unlike their 300 CD changer, the Text only displays the Disk Title, not the tracks.

7 -sob- my poor, poor DVDs
It's true. It's ALL true. Then menu is too slow like veryone says, but I decided to live with it do to the amount of discs it holds. But the unacceptable part is that this player has a defect that destroys discs! I have over 300 DVDs in mine and I've lost at least 1/3 of them to deep scratchs that occur INSIDE the player during use. When I say deep, I mean they came out with curled plastic hanging off the end of the grooved that was cut by the Sony demon. My advice is suffer with a changer that holds fewer discs. This one will only destroy your property!

8 These are great machines But.....
I will agree that the user interface leaves little to be desired, you will get very upset if you try and use this machine to catalog your collection. I would recomend that you get a software package to catalog your collection and print off an index, then use that index to find your movie, dial it in on the machine and enjoy. I use Movie collector and it not only keeps track of what slot the movie is in, it also tells me everything about that movie including front and back cover art. Now to the machine, the purpose to buy one of these is that it will hold 400 DVD's and you don't have to have racks and racks of boxes. I might add that the machine plays the movies great. JUST BUY IT, Use something else to catalog where the movies are and you will be happy. $310 you can not go wrong.

9 User Interface Sucks -- Now returned for repair!
Originally posted January 21,2005
I've had the product for about 10 months. Sound and picture quality are fine but using the damn thing distroys much of its value. The ease-of-use issues have been well documented by other disappointed users so I will only say the issues they raised are right on. Hard to use is an understatement. My review is to share my experience with a failure mode and Sony repair. I have a lot of CDs and DVDs but am not a heavy user. Maybe watch a move once a week and play a few CDs now and then. Noticed some of the DVDs were making noise and not playing properly. Discovered fairly deep circular gouges that made several disks unplayable. At first, though they were damaged at purchase but then realized perfect DVDs were being distroyed. Appeared to be only disks around 350 that were damaged and probably when I used the auto LOAD function to read disk titles. May not be the cause but it is always after this operation that damaged disks have been discovered. Would like to know if anyone else has had this problem. Now for Sony service. After making it through the voice recognition phone menu system and providing name address phone model etc I was finaly placed in Q for a live agent -- 45 minutes later I was connected to a very nice woman who arranged for an exchange, not new, but a refurbished product. That's OK with me, a refurbished product is probably just as good as new. The rub is that it cost me over $40 to return ship the product to Sony. They provide a work order that you take to a "UPS Store" but you pay for shipping and handling. And then wait for Sony to send the replacement. I just returned mine last week so don't know how long the process will take. I do know that good customer care will ship you a new or refurbished product and have you use that packaging to return the original product. The best companies even pay for shipping, all shipping. If I get the refurbished unit back within two weeks and if it looks and works like new, I probably will be satisfied but Sony could, and should, have done better both in the design of the product and in its customer care.
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I'm Back! It took about four weeks for repair. So far so good. Seems to work like new, but too soon to know if the disks are now safe. If the problem returns, I'll let you know!

10 It could be perfect
I purchased Sony DVP-CX985V 400 Disc Progressive DVD / SACD Player with only one thing in mind, ORGANIZATION. I have over 300 DVD movies and it has become a head ache to keep them all in their own boxes, more often than not I would have to go through my entire collection to find the DVD I was looking for. That was not only time consuming but bad for the DVDs themselves, since they get scratched more often that way. I know there are a lot of people out there who are taking much better care for their DVDs and would not have the same problem that I had but you would still have to handle your DVDs every time you want to watch it. That still increases your chances of scratching the disc. I also discovered an unexpected benefit of having the 400 DVD changer. How many times a close friend of yours asked you to borrow one of your DVDs with a promise to return it the very next day and never to see the movie again? It is not like they are trying to steal it from you but simply they forget about it ... including you. Now I do not let them borrow my DVDs without making myself looking like a jerk. I simply tell them that if I take out any of my DVDs from the machine I have to re-catalog all my DVDs and it takes hours to do that, so once a movie is in ... it stays in. :) It is not the case of course but gives me such a good excuse, they feel ashamed to insist on it knowing that borrowing a DVD would cause me a lot of work. If they don't care about it, you don't care in return. I have not lost a single DVD to "I will bring it back tomorrow" friends since I purchased the unit. That by itself paid for DVP-CX985V. The unit is easy to operate and has good picture and sound quality, it takes full advantage of the TV and sound system I have. It plays burned cds like mp3s, svcds. Mechanically it does everything I would like it to do. However DVP-CX985V is not perfect BUT I can be. The processor they used to display your DVDs on the screen is slow and out dated. It displays 5 titles at a time and scrolling up or down is pretty slow considering you can store up to 400 DVDs in there. It might take you 15-20 minutes to go through all the movies. It forces you to make a decision before going through them all, since you really do not want to repeat the process. You can separate your listing in to 4 different categories like comedy, action, drama, and else. This would narrow your options and speed up your search, but you have to enter each title manually into those categories, it is not automatic. It is not hard to do that but I long since forgot how to do it. The manual is somewhere in the house which I am usually too lazy to look for it. The folder can get the DVD information from the DVD and put the name and picture of the DVD automatically, BUT it happens only if you are lucky, I'd say 25% of the time I get the DVD information automatically, the rest of the time I plug the keyboard (you can do without the keyboard by using the remote but you have to have the patience of the god to do that)enter the title manually , then I have to start the movie sit through the legal announcements, find a good scene in the movie and pick that frame as the jacket so I would have something besides the name on the screen when I browse through the catalog. This is all too time consuming but you would do it anyways because it feels and looks cool when you show it to your friends :)
The title of my review is "It could be perfect" because I dream about a DVP-CX985V that has internet connection where it retrieves the movie information directly from the movie database. It catalogs movies to your preference "alphabetical or by genre or by year or by actor or by director" Displays more information besides the name of the movie (actors-director-year-awards even perhaps link to reviews) ability turn off the jackets so the screen would refresh faster or a faster processor which wouldn't lag. I wish for a search engine that can look up titles by actor or director or any relevant information using only your remote (a remote that has a mini keyboard built in)You might be a collector but you might not know all the facts about the movie you are collecting. I dream about a DVP-CX985V that would know all that and let you know if you want to know them as well.
I really enjoy having this unit and ready for more.

11 It's good, but it can be better
The Sony DVP-CX985V disk player is pretty darn good for the price. There are a couple of things that bug me. 1st is the user menu. It needs to be more user intuitive. 2nd is the changing speed, if it was slightly faster and quieter it would be nicer. 3rd and most importantly, is that I wished it can upscale DVD video to 1080i component video output like the Zenith DVB318 DVD player. This feature alone would make this DVD player one of the most awesome DVD jukebox ever built. Can you hear me Sony?

12 Very hopeful when I bought it!
I purchased this unit about 6 months ago. It was simple enough to hook up. I then filled the unit with 100+ DVD's and the rest with CD's. I allowed the unit to scan all the DVD's and CD's. I was not impressed that out of 100 DVD's it only recognized about 4, yes only 4.

I began programming the titles however was limited to just a few characters per title that could not handle most of the movie titles. After about 2 hours of painful work, I decided to go to my computer and type out an excel spreadsheet. I alphabetized the entire list. I now just have to pull out the spreadsheet to determine which CD or DVD I want to watch.

This brings me to the next issue. Let's say you are on the couch and just decided to play the DVD in position 102. On the remote there is no way to just type in position 102 and have the unit advance to that position. You have to hold a tiny button down and allow it to advance step by step.

Another issue is the remote has so many tiny buttons. The worst positioning is for the volume control and the disk change buttons which are set up one over the other. If you accidentally hit the + sign instead of lowering the volume in the dark, you have just ruined the entire viewing experience for the audience as you have just stopped your movie and went to the next DVD.

Another issue is although I have this feature turned off in the software, each time I turn the unit on or change to a new disk location the unit automatically begins to play the DVD or CD in that position.

It is nice that I get to store all my CD's and DVD's in a place where they are readily available. However, there is computer software out there that Sony should take a look at before it releases a new model.

I could not recommend purchasing this unit unless you are not interested in the software portion.

13 Cost effective, if nothing else.
I got caught up in the television series box sets, to the point of needing one of these. I need another one now. Although a bit slow and time consuming to finish typing in the titles that the dvd player didn't recognize, still a good deal. And a great deal for the amount of dvds it holds. Enough that I now turned of my satellite dish subscription. The tiny buttons on the remote seem neccessary for the amount of things it needs to do. The folder button could be more comfortably located. Would love to find a 1000 disc dvd player now.. :D

14 Good Option
I have been using this player for the last 6 months. I agree that the remote lag is noticable but eventually you get used to it. The pay off is accesing your entire collection without leaving your seat. The picture is incredible and the sound is the same. If you are in a hurry don't buy this unit. If you wan't to keep your DVD's in one place and veiw on demand then this is for you.

15 Sony botches yet another potential dream device...
OK, where to begin with this thing...
Many people have complained about the menu. Yes, it really is as bad as everyone says. It's more or less useless. I use a computer program called DVD Profiler to catalog my movies... it even allows a catalog number which I correspond to the disc number in my player, and then I print the list and voila, not only a convenient list of your movies but you can even make it into an attractive coffee table book, lol.

Now onto my biggest gripe of all. This thing, after 6 months of use, is skipping on MOST of my DVDs. Now I'll admit I have some copied DVDs thanks to my DVD burner, and they skip the worst, so I can't hold it against Sony if my copying skills are substandard. The fact that the player is beginning to skip on COMMERCIAL DVDs, though? Dust and scratch free DVDs? Unacceptable. It's always right around the 30-60 minute mark, too. It's definitely a problem with the player. I've always tried to be a big Sony fan, but their standards just keep sinking lower and lower. Even my new Sony laptop is already having problems with the touchpad mouse. If some other company offers a DVD player like this one, go for it. Sony really dropped the ball on this one.

16 So Many Stupid Mistakes
First the fundamentals: this unit works--it stores and plays 400 DVDs with very good picture and sound quality; but there are so many little things that make it hard to use that the only reason to recommend this over another mega-changer is the price.

The biggest problem is the amount of your time this unit wastes.

As other reviewers have noted, with the cover art installed, it takes over 1.5 seconds to display the next item when scrolling up or down. That really adds up in a 400-disc player. You can cut down on this by alpha-sorting the folders and scrolling rapidly without having the unit display the titles as you go, but even with this it still can take over a minute to find the disc you want. Definitely longer than when I had my DVDs on the shelf.

It is also very annoying that the player locks-out the stop button during the FBI warning, so if you start playing a disc unintentionally, you have to wait until the warning is done before you can go back. That can easily add a minute or two.

Which leads to another big frustration: an extremely bad remote control. There are lots of little buttons that are very difficult to tell apart. Some of the buttons can kill a viewing experience if hit by accident (eg., if you hit disc skip you need to sit through the entire FBI warning for the DVD you are moving to, and then again through the one you are watching, and then you have to find your place again. A potential 5-minute delay because your finger slipped in the dark).

There is also a strange bug that causes the unit to sometimes start playing the current disc when you hit the power button. (There is a feature to do this, but I have it turned off). To continue the ongoing theme of this review, when this happens, you need to sit through the entire FBI warning before you can go select the disc you want to view.

Two features that I've seen mentioned about this unit (though not by Sony) are not present at all. First, some places refer to this as a 400+1 disc changer. There is no 401st slot; you need to remove a disc to put the 401st in. Second, I saw one site say that this unit could play both sides of a DVD. This is not true.

I have ended up printing out a paper list of the installed DVDs and their slot numbers, and I navigate using the dial on the base unit. I control the unit during play using a universal remote that doesn't include any changer functions.

Not an ideal solution, but not bad for around $350 delivered.

17 Outstanding unit, usable menu
Expectations are everything. My experience with the incompetence of the consumer A/V industry must lower mine. I've heard the complaints about the speed and clumsiness of this unit but I have no major complaints about it. I must admit that I place a higher priority on picture and audio quality, and this unit is awesome on both counts. In addition, the transport is well designed, quiet and well balanced.

For those of you shopping for one of these, make sure you read the dimensions. This sucker is HUGE. It's much deeper than any of my other equipment, including my Sony ES receiver. I had to cut the back out of my A/V cabinet in order for it to fit. Again, no biggie. I'd have bought a new piece of furniture for it.

The time required to set up this unit is nothing when compared with the nightmare of displaying, storing, and handling 350 DVDs. My wife and I spent about three hours inserting the discs and entering the titles, using a keyboard and a spreadsheet of our movies. It took me another hour to divide the DVDs into the four included groups in the Disc Explorer. I divided them into Family, Action, CDM (Comedy Drama Musical) and Other (special features, yoga, documentaries). Seems to work so far for me.

Is the Disc Explorer the greatest thing in the world? Nope, but it works fine if you are too lazy to have a printout of your movies nearby. The best part is that it's not required in order to use the unit, which gives you lots of flexibility. If you are serious about your video system, use DVDlobby and you'll never use Disk Explorer again.

I've heard complaints about the speed of the transport on this unit. Again, expectations are everything. How long does it take to look through the movies in your media cabinet, decide which one you want, open the sometimes bizzarre packaging, load the disc into your player, take the old one out, and put it away?

With this unit, it takes 18 seconds to load and play a disk on the opposite side of the platter. It takes 9 seconds to go from viewing a movie to viewing the Disk Explorer. It takes about 4 minutes to navigate through all 400 disks with the Disk Explorer. It's faster if you don't add pictures to the disc names, and some of the names from the disk manufacturers are just wrong, so you might be better off not letting the unit detect your disks.

The only movie I had a real problem creating a title for was Confessions of a Dangerous Mind since there was only room for "Conf/Dangerous M". I settled for "Dangerous Mind". I know my movies well enough that I don't require an entire paragraph to remind me.

If you are interested in using this unit for SACD, remember that you must have a 5.1 channel input on your receiver. If you have more CDs than DVDs, don't expect this thing to be a good CD player. It isn't, but I've never seen a DVD player that was. Buy a megaCD changer and save yourself the trouble.

18 Fantastic Player
I liked this player so much I bought another one. This player plays DVDs that were unplayable on my other players (Panasonic, Sony, RCA). I have never tried the disc explorer because other reviewers complain about it and I lose power occasionally. I use a spreadsheet as my DVD guide so I can sort by Title and have a great custom "TV Guide" including episode names on the TV show DVDs. I bought my first CX985V 6 months ago and I have had no problems so far.

19 Great For DVD's, NOT CD's
I bought this unit to replace 2 Sony 200 cd only disc players. This model was only $125 more than the 400 cd player, so i went with it. The menu funtions are terrible!!!! They are way over complicated and irritating. And if you just wanna play cd's you have to enter th cd# and then wait for the player to recognize the cd before you can select a track. It is a time consuming annoyance. If you want to use the shuffle or program features you have to use the menu on you TV. You can't just push a button and go. This player is a huge disapointment, but i'm too lazy to remove all my cd's and take it back.

20 Full Tilt Glory
Excellent quality picture and sound..but as echoed in other reviews...do a list (paper)...loaded about 240 dvd's recognized 31..one of which, the store bought movie(not a copy) "Glory" showed up as "Full Tilt Boogie" and because no overwrite capabilities we forever be know as such...no offence to any civil war vets out there...

21 Works out of the box, but not for very long.
I bought one of these players, upgrading from a Sony 300+1 disk player that had been filled and because I also wanted the progressive scan my older unit had lacked. The slowness of the Disk Exployer has always been a problem that I was use to, so that was nothing new to me. A wireless keyboard makes a GREAT difference when putting in movie names, howerver it still took me about two weekends to program 320 DVD titles (about 5% of which had been pre-programmed with DVD-Text).
The first problem showed up as I was loading the movies from the old player. Slot number 141 would not load a disk into the drive, no matter what disk I put into the slot. This was a minor problem as I had 399 working slots.
The bigger problem showed up after I had put in about 380 DVD's (about seven months into ownership). The unit started acting up. Sometimes the power would turn itself off for no reason, sometimes programmed disks would be lost from Disk Exployer and more then once the player would simply lock up while playing a disk - the picture would freeze and no responce from either the remote or front-panel buttons. I would have to unplug the unit to reset it.
And on the 8th month, the power supply failed. I was on 383 DVD's, all programmed, with picture jackets ... I nearly cryed thinking of all the time it had taken to program the player. It has been in the shop now for two months. Luckly, I had not yet sold my old 300 disk changer, which is still working.
For those that don't like programming in all those DVD titles, I have recently purchased the Kenwood DV5900, it links to your home computer and gets titles off the internet. It is a much better, though much more expensive unit ... and still supports changer linking (up to three), which the newer Sony units seem to lack.

22 very good! great features
perfect for holding and repeated viewing of various dvds.. no more swapping in and out... what a pain it is!
great features... i love the search feature... fast forward and then release the button to continue playing....

23 Don't blame the machine ...
... blame the dvd/cd manufacturers who don't put any information on their products' menus so these machines can read them! I own a Kenwood 200-disc CD player, a Sony 400-disc CD player, an Onkyo 300+1 DVD/CD player, and recently acquired a Sony ES 400-disc DVD/SACD/CD player (the upgraded ES version -- in a silver cabinet w/a 5-year warranty), and am now researching a DVD megachanger (300 or more discs) which also plays DVD-Audio. The Kenwood 200 player holds my classical music CDs while the Sony 400 handles the rest. The Sony ES 400 player replaces a Sony single disc DVD/SACD player while a new DVD/DVD-Audio player will replace a JVC 7-disc player. By now, it must be clear that I'm hooked on megachangers--all have performed admirably thus far (the oldest is the Onkyo which I purchased more than four years ago). What I have discovered in my experience with these mahcines is that the disc manufacturers are not putting much menu material on their products. Of the almost 400 CDs in the Sony player, only about three or four have menus which are automatically recorded! As with each of the players I own (from various manufacturers) most of the DVDs and CDs have to be plugged in manually. I have noticed on rental DVD's the newer films always have their titles stored in their menu which all my machines read easily, while the older films which I buy rarely do. This further convinces me it's a disc thing, not the machine. The new Sony ES player has a nice feature whereby (if the disc manufacturer has put it there) will show a picture of the DVD, usually the title frame. If it's not there, one just has to go to any scene in the film, press the picture memory button, and, voila! that picture is now in your list where you may or may not need to plug in the title if you recognize the scene! In any event, maybe if enough of us complain to the manufacturers who put out the software, they will get their acts together. ADDITIONAL COMMENTS 8/20/04: After some use and reading customer reviews, I can honestly say this machine is NOT user-friendly ! It is so frustrating trying to find disks and unlike my Onkyo, if I do a major re-shuffling of disks, as I often do, to see which disks play better in which machine, and then program the machine to re-organize them all, then this machine can (and usually does) delete most of the info I have input manually. Also, I have not been able to shuffle more than one disk at a time. My other machines are capable of shuffling ALL DISKS, that is, they will play one track from one CD and then switch to another CD and one of its tracks, and so on. On the positive side, it will not be necessary for me, at this time, to purchase another megachanger to play DVD/DVD-Audio disks as does the JVC. Recently, I tried one of my DVD-Audio disks in the Sony DVD-SACD player, and lo and behold, it plays beautifully ! I then tried all other DVD-Audio disks (about 25) and all except two will play on the Sony! And the matter of manufacturers putting/or not putting a menu to eliminate manual input: some of the new ones now don't have it, while older ones do. My box set of Marx Brothers all have clear, intelligent titles. I had to buy a keyboard for input to these megachangers since inputting them manually is, quite frankly, a pain-in-the-head! But I truly love being able to switch from music to movies, different titles, different tracks w/o leaving my position beside my glass of Chardonnay ! UPDATE 9/8/04: Well, I have not yet thrown this piece of junk out yet since it does play all my SACD's and most of my DVD-Audio discs. The few films left in the machine are just stored there. I do try each time to watch some of them, but usually wind up removing a disc from the Sony (another laborious procedure) and playing it in another machine--usually the JVC single disc player which sits on the Sony. UPDATE 10/18/04: This machine really further sours me on Sony (my Sony 400 CD player is messed up-gets stuck on the first portion of any cd track until I just give up). This Sony DVD player generally has a very poor picture while the sound is good. Fortunately, all my new StarTrek original series DVD's look good on it (Miracle!)so I didn't have to use the precious space in my Onkyo 300+1 player. I regularly take DVD's I don't care to look at more than once or DVDs which don't have a particularly good picture and "store" them in the Sony. Again, the pluses for this machine are it plays beautifully the SACD's and most of my DVD-Audio disks, it is extremely quiet. But oh is it ever so slow! Takes forever turning on and then it still insists on playing any disk it likes-sometimes the disk in the first slot, sometime the last disk inserted or the last disk played. This takes so long and then I have to go to Folder an interminable task by this time, and then scroll ever so slowly through the more than 200 disks I have in there at this time. I swear off Sony DVD, CD players, VCRs, TVs (I have experienced them all and I'm sick of them). I'm sure Sony is only interested in their movie studio business, and I'm sure at least some of their engineers are sadistic people who delight in torturing those of us who are looking for some home entertainment!

24 The positives outweigh the negatives - with another remote.
After reading numerous reviews regarding the Sony DVP-CX985V, it became obvious that Sony's interface needed to be avoided altogether. Since I also happened to be looking for a way to avoid another remote in the living room (I'm embarrassed to say I've collected over a dozen somehow) I found the Harmony SST-659 universal remote can catalog all 400 slots and display them on the backlit LCD.

In short, you look at the remote to choose the movie, not the painfully slow and inaccurate Sony "Explorer" mode... which does a great job at making you feel as if you are truly exploring some vast, unknown and mostly empty wasteland.

You might not like the idea of buying a new DVD player and a fairly pricy remote just to make it all work. But if you're like me, and were ready to get rid of some remotes anyway... it's a winning combo.

What's the catch? The remote itself requires patience and an internet connection to program it... remember, it can control all of your systems.

The silver lining? I shopped around and bought both for a little more than the retail price of the DVD player alone.

So I actually love the DVD player now. The quality of the picture is superb. The sound decoding is faultless. It plays every rewritable disc I've thrown at it, and finally, it's just too cool. Watching the blue backlit carousel spin your library around gives my 3 year-old the giggles every time.

And I LOVE the door locking feature. We can keep his DVDs out of his hands and locked in the carousel. This has actually saved us money, since he's been able to find several of his discs in the past and frisbee them to death.

Bad kid. Good player.

25 Not kidding about the interface
Have to echo the other reviews. I had myself convinced this would be a great unit, only to find that Sony really missed the boat. User interface is terrible. Not enough characters to label disks without using somekind of shorthand. Got so disgusted I sent it back.

26 Okay when it works
While I agree with the other folks, the interface is a klunky and manually entering a large number of discs is a pain, the biggest beef with this unit is the customer service.

After having my unit for only 2 months, I turned it on, [CLICK], [BANG], [CLICK] ... not good sounds! After unloading all the discs, I find a part of the transport had physically broken. All I did was turn the unit on.

I sent the unit back to Sony to be repaired. After a month(!), they figure out that they can't repair it and have to replace it, fine....another month later and I'm still waiting for the replacement. How can it take 2+ months to replace a unit? So much for watching movies with the kids over the holidays.

I used to say Sony was the best ... now ... if it works, it's good. If not, you're in trouble.

27 Close, but could be better
I just purchased this unit yesterday, and have almost completed the loading of my media into the player.

First let me mention the things that I do like about it. I like that it holds 400 disks, and how the motor transport transitions from disk to disk. I am pleased with the audio quality from either the Digital Fiber connection or the 6-channel direct connection. I like that it plays so many media formats, and I'm glad it has a keyboard interface. It would take even longer to program without it.

This brings me to one of the worst designed menu systems, and disk recognition systems that I have seen. Only twenty of my sixty two DVD's were automatically recognized and populated in the menu, the rest I had to manually enter into the 16 character space, even though there is another blank line below, you cannot select it to edit the contents to have one line for the Artist and the other for the title. The ratio of recognized CD titles is even worse. It recognized five out of one hundred and seventy eight CD's, one of which was the SACD demo CD of Bob Dylan that comes with the player. It would be better if there were a couple of customizable genre categories as well.

Although the menu system stinks, I am still glad that I made the purchase. It eliminates the need for a media rack in my living room, and I have re-discovered some of my forgotten about CD's while loading them into the player.

28 Big Promise - No Deliver
I anxiously awaited the sweet promise of having all of my DVD's online (like a movie-TIVO), so I wouldn't even have to move to watch 8 hours of movies. Unfortunately, this like so many other dreams of mine, has been dashed on the rocks of despair. Now I can't find my movies, because the title's do not auto-load, nor do the pictures, and the title's won't sort correctly. And as an added bonus, in Progressive scan mode, the picture randomly blanks out for 3-10 seconds at the most interesting parts of movies. I am sending this back and settling for getting up off the couch.

29 Don't Bother
The user interface blows chunks. Finding a disc is difficult. There are no page up/down capabilities and only 5 titles are displayed at a time... try scrolling one at a time though hundreds of titles or typing the slot number to get around. The whole point of this player is to manage a large number of DVDs; they missed the boat. You cannot override the title of movies so if you want to sort them alphabetically, you are stuck with the title that was supplied on the disc (some are all upper case, some titles start with "The" so they sort to the T's, some are too long for the tiny space they provide). The software could never have been tested because some menu choices simply don't work at all, like the ability to turn off auto play when power is turned on. Finally, the thumbnail image capture is terrible. The thumbnails that are supplied on about 1 in 20 discs are good, but the ones you capture yourself are grainy and indistinguishable. I am sending mine back.