You guys were such an awesome help at christmas time I thought I would get your help with a wedding gift. My sister is getting married in two weeks and I would like to get them a portable DVD player as a gift. I am looking for recommendations for inexpensive players. I want to spend 150.00 or less on it. It doesn't have to do anything fancy, just play the dvds and possibly mp3s. Thanks for your help!
~Tricia

Go to Target, Walmart, Frys, you'll be able to find something good for that price, possibly with a 7-8 inch screen.

Both Sam's and Costco has several available.

the best buy brand insignia(made by lg) can be alright, and there are many choices out there at $150. Go to bb or walmart.

Insignia is not made by LG. It could be made by anyone. Insignia TVs tend to be made by Orion, who manufacturers for Toshiba, among others.

Check Bestbuy, if they still have their free battery offer. I just picked up a Zenith DVP615 in that price range, made by LG, with a free external battery. Excellent pq on a 7" screen. Construction seems sturdy (lighter plastic body) and it has a nice pivot feature so you can lay it flat as a tablet. 2 headphone jacks, convenient controls, sound is OK (no portabes have really good sound--headphones are needed). Best pq by far of the 7-8 models they had running side by side.

I'm in the same market, I'm currently using my PSP to watch movies while on the exercise bike, but I'd like a DVD player with a 7 or 8" screen.

My only advice is to read up on reviews and look at the players yourself. While it's hard to judge large TVs at places like Circuit City and Best Buy (due to display settings, wierd angles, etc), the small portable players should be quite easy to compare.

I definitely didn't like the look and feel of the sub-$100 units (like Coby and Polaroid), very plastic-y, bulky, washed out low-res (maybe 320x240?) LCD, very questionable reliability. Circuit City has a Philips 7" with an iPod video dock for $149 to $159 or so that I found impressive. I was leaning towards a Sony model initially, but read on a Amazon review that they cannot be played hanging vertically (most portable models allow you to hang them off the back of a car seat so kids can watch movies in the backseat). Toshiba also has models in the $100 to $150 price range that I want to view in person.

So what are the key features to look for?

Screen size?

Screen res?

What else?

I currently use an Insignia NS-PDVD9 as my "work" player, which is a 9" no-frills player that supports MP3. I payed about $120 for mine last year, but you can probably get them now for somewhere around $100.

Since you are watching so close to the screen I look for small pixels first. I don't like "blocky" images. That probably corresponds to resolution.

I've noticed Toshiba models have small pixels, but they're not inexpensive.

I just back from Best Buy. I didn't see any free battery offer, but this player was on sale for $89.99 (regular price is around $130). There was also a couple open box models for $74.99.

Another attractively priced player they had was the Magnavox MPD850 that had a 8.5" screen on sale for $109.99 (regular price $155). It also had a screen that could pivot around. I didn't get a chance to check out the picture quality though. The extra 1.5" made a big difference on how large the screen looked compared to the 7" models.

I did a lot of research on portable DVD players last year when I got one for my sister. The two best brands to get are Panasonic and Toshiba. It's still hit or miss depending on the model, though, so you might want to read some customer reviews first.

As far as deals go, the best one I found was at Costco. They sell a 9" Toshiba SDP-1850 with the car adapter kit, carrying case (with mounting straps for car attachment), remote control, 120v power adapter and 2 pair of headphones for something like $150. We've been using it for the past year and it has performed really well. It has dual headphone jacks which has come in real handy on the plane when two of us want to watch a movie at the same time, a full set of input/outputs which is cool for when you want to hook it up to a hotel TV and watch movies in your room, and it plays most every major disc format. The picture quality is pretty decent. I think a couple of the Panasonic and Sony units I looked at had richer colors, but the difference was fairly negligiable. For the price you really can't beat it.

Most important first is to check pq in person. Specs don't tell the story. For example, I expected the Panasonic 8.5" (8"?) to have an excellent picture (based on seeing other models) but the screen was washed out and ugly. The Zenith noted above (which I did buy) had the sharpest, clearest picture.

Although a bigger screen will always look bigger (duh!), the player will also be bigger and heavier (if portability is a concern) and tend to cut down on battery life (if that is an issue). If it's always being used in a car, battery life and size are not important. Size can be overrated. I had a 5" Panasonic LS5 (very clear picture and great battery life) and was totally engrossed in many movies, never even noticing the size. You tend to watch these players from a foot away or so, and if the pq is sharp then you really won't notice the size. And most screens will put out enough color/contrast (although a few screens are very washed out). Just be sure to adjust color and contrast to give a realistic picture (which looks like real-life surrounding objects) and not the oversaturated cartoony colors that many people tend to set on their screens.

Circuit City has one for $79.99 after 30.00 mail in rebate. Its a Polaroid, 7" widescreen LCD, Multi-format playblack, Built-in speakers, Eelectronic skip protection. WEB ID: PDM0732.

Order a backup battery too. That comes in real handy for long airplane trips when you can't find a power outlet to feed off of. I bought two extra lith-ion batteries for our Toshiba and that gives me about 12 hours of juice.