62
JUNE 2002
SOUND & VISION
PHOTOS BY TONY CORDOZA
W
hen you can buy a five-disc
changer with all the best fea-
tures of a fine CD player and
a top-shelf, progressive-scan
DVD player for less than
$600, why would you need
two separate components? You don’t. Har-
man Kardon’s new DVD 50 does it all — it
even plays CDs with MP3 files, making it
potentially a 60-hour music player.
The DVD 50 is laid out along classic
carousel-changer lines, with a single disc
drawer across most of its width. All of its
front-panel disc-selection and transport
controls are sensibly located above the
drawer so they remain accessible when it’s
open. (Don’t laugh: I’ve seen changers with
controls underneath the drawer.) The con-
trol labels, though tiny, are all illuminated,
which helps a lot. Another smart touch is
that each disc well inside the drawer has
number labels on both sides flanking the
disc cutout, eliminating confusion about
which well is which.
Around back, the DVD 50 has the ex-
pected composite/S-video plus stereo and
coaxial/optical digital audio jacks. There’s
also a trio of wideband component-video
outputs. If your TV has a progressive-scan
display, which usually (but not always)
means a high-definition set, these outputs
can be set up for progressive-scan rather
than interlaced video, yielding a smoother,
more filmlike picture.
The player’s setup menus are quite clear
and self-explanatory, and if you want more
information, the owner’s manual is excep-
tionally complete and detailed. Since sur-
round sound decoding is left for your re-
ceiver or processor to do, setup options are
mostly limited to the usual choices regard-
ing screen shape (standard or widescreen),
bitstream default (you can, for example,
restrict DTS output if your receiver can’t
decode it), parental lockout, and so on.
It’s unusual, but certainly not unheard of,
that you have to set the DVD 50’s video
output to either component- or composite/
S-video — and if the former, to progressive
on or off. (My everyday player provides a
progressive-scan component-video output
and both standard video formats simulta-
neously.) If you’re viewing the setup menu
from the S-video output, when you switch
to component output, the screen goes blank,
with no menu display to help diagnose and
fix the problem. You have to change your
TV’s input to progressive to reacquire a
picture. I learned that the hard way, muck-
ing about in the setup menu before reading
the manual.
On the video front, I have nothing but
praise for this Harman Kardon carousel.
Watching Denzel Washington’s Oscar-win-
ning performance as a bad cop in Training
KEY FEATURES
●
Component-video output switchable
between interlaced and progressive-scan
●
Plays CD-R/RW discs and CD-R/RWs or
CD-ROMs with MP3 files
●
Can replace up to four discs while one is
playing
●
Decodes HDCD-encoded CDs
OUTPUTS
composite-, component-, and
S-video; coaxial and optical digital audio;
stereo analog audio
DIMENSIONS
17
1
⁄
2
inches wide, 5 inches
high, 16 inches deep
WEIGHT
12
7
⁄
8
pounds
PRICE
$649
MANUFACTURER
Harman Kardon,
Dept. S&V, 250 Crossways Park Dr.,
Woodbury, NY 11797; www.harmankardon
.com; 800-422-8027
test report
BY DANIEL KUMIN
Harman Kardon
DVD 50 Five-Disc DVD Changer
fast facts
