Factory-Reconditioned Yamaha DVD-S550 DVD Player

I bought this on a closeout table at a local dealer after sending back a superbly disappointing Toshiba player. This unit matches my Yamaha HTR-5840 receiver in appearance, and (small consolation prize) the receiver's remote operates this player 100%. Play is good, 480p image is fine via component output to my 31" 16:9 HDTV, though you will want to set it up with a S-video cable, as the component output blinked annoyingly until I could put it in progressive mode.

A surprise dividend to this player is a setup setting for the digital audio output (in my case, via the TOSlink fibre optic cable). Digital out can be set for PCM-only for a non-decoder receiver, and "All" for receivers with decoders (like mine, and probably yours, too). In "All," my receiver identifies and presents discrete 5.1 channels! IOW, Dolby Digital 2.0 is shown as 2-channel input. Dolby Digital 5.1 is shown as 5 channels plus the LFE channel. DTS 96/24 is shown as 5.1 channels in the higher bitrate...Read more

Ever since I discovered this player in the summer of 2005, I have been highly impressed with how much it met both my normal and oddball demands. As a student of Musical Theatre, Opera, Classical vocal and choral literature, and Jazz and Classical piano, 192 KHZ, 24-bit digital-to-analog conversion is of great importance to me. One thing that sets this player apart from the other manufacturers' players is Yamaha's CD UpSampling feature. For those titles which are currently only available on CD and possibly will never be released on DVD-AUDIO and/or SACD, this option converts standard CDs to the quality of DVD-AUDIO. On the Musical Theatre, Opera, and choral side of things, this player is capable of playing both NTSC (North American) and PAL (European) DVDs on corresponding as well as opposite TVs. For certain titles in these genres, the North American editions are either four percent slower in tempo and picture movement and flatter in pitch than the European editions due to the...Read more