Pioneer DV-F727 Multi-disc DVD Player

In my dedicated home theater this unit is not a very good fit. It takes a considerable amount of time to enter a small title for every DVD or CD in the machine; up to 300 static discs stored, and one changeable. What I dislike most are the short title capability, no upconverting capability, and the slow--have to verify every disc to get to the one you want--disc access. 300 discs takes a long time to go through. It is far easier to put the movies in a cabinet or on a shelf and visually identify the box and put it in a standard player.

The short title capability means you only have the ability to type in 12 characters to identify the movie or cd stored in the slot. There are very few titles that can logically fit in 12 spaces. What I have found, is that I use some sort of short abreviation when listing it, and then, I cannot remember what it was later on and wind up going disc-by-disc to find the movie or CD I want to watch or listen to--a miserable, time-consuming process. Also, I am more of a picture person--it is far easier for me to identify a certain movie by the by the picture on DVD case sitting on a shelf rather than a few small letters displayed low resolution on a screen.

To make this player work for me, I had to make a totally seperate Access data base storing a cover picture of the DVD or CD, the title, and what number slot the disc was located in player. I printed a copy and put it by the master remote control. It took me hours to make the database and print it--and I find that it is never used and some of the discs were changed destroying the integrity of the list.

Since I belong to Block-Buster mail order, I get 3 new DVDs at a time. I also have 4 satelites. I very seldom want to watch some old movie (there are some classics that I love to watch over and over)--mostly, old movies are viewed by family and friends when they come over--and 12 character line titles are totally useless to them--causing them to go to the "video cabinet" and read the titles and descriptions off the empty DVD containers--again starting the dreaded disc-by-disc search for the one they want to watch. In some of my friend's home theaters, they use binders containing 20 movies each and data base lists designating the binder each movie is in. (very efficient/economical)

So, for me, this system is a bust. It is fairly useless in my home theater. For buyers considering its purchase, I would ask yourself how often you watch each old movie you own. If you are in the habit of watching each one over and over again--maybe you could memorize which slot each movie is in--and this system might be right for you--if you don't want HD or upconversion.

If you are like me, most movies that come out I would never want to watch more than once--I certainly would not want to own them. There are probably about 12 movies a year that I would consider watching several times--and only about half of those I would ever consider buying. As far as storing music; this system is totally obsolete with all of the current digital media servers/mp3 players. For music only, and you are on a budget, get an adapter and use an Ipod instead.

I would advise, for just a little bit more money, buy a digital media server and put all of your movies, CDs, MP3s, and Pictures on it. Then, you could access anything you want, any way you want--and leave the originals in the cabinet. A digital server is far more user friendly than this hard-to-use, slow, and antiquated dinasaur.

Regardless of all the negative reviews I read on the web, I decide to buy the Pioneer DV-F727. It turned out to be a great choice. I found the unit easy to use and a great multi disc changer. I use this player nearly every night, and it performs flawlessly. I recommend this item.

I like the ideas of this machine. I wish they would come out with an upconverting machine as well. But having said that, I am not to happy witht he machine I bought. After loading about 100 discs and doing titles for most that player got jammed on one of the discs. The only way to get it out was remove the whole cover, manually turn the carousel and pry it out, bending the disc. Thought maybe it was just a one time problem. Played several more discs over a couple of days and BAM, happened again, Same problem only even more stuck this time. Not feeling too good about my discs, some of which are not replaceable I pulled them all out. FYI, loading and taking out 100+ discs take a LONG time! If I had made it to 300...OUCH.
Anyway it was under warranty so I figured I would run it down to the pioneer shop. Kind of funny...as I set my machine down on the counter, another customer looks at my machine and thinks it is his. Seems he had the same one and thought I was the tech. I asked him what the problem was and he described the same problem as mine. I talked to the shop people and they said it was a common problem for these machines, but an easy fix. Well easy for them. Not so easy for me pulling all my discs out then putting them back in.
So, after hearing this and seeing a potential on going problem, I returned my unit and got money back. Bummer! It seems like a great little machine and others seem to have had no problem. So, I would exercise caution before buying and be ready to set aside some time for loading, unloading and loading 300 discs. Maybe they will come out with a newer version that fixes the problem and offers upconverting?

After owning one of these units for 6 years, I recently just bought a second. Not to replace the first, but to link with the first to double their capacity! I've had no complaints or issues with this model. It plays all the formats I need, has digital and analog outputs and has been trouble free. If you can find one for $400 or less in good condition, buy it!!! Better yet, if you can get your hands on two, you can link them together and have online storage for 600+1 DVDs or CDs or a mixture.

The one thing I'm not happy about with this unit is the limited text for disc titles. You only get about 12 characters per disc. That calls for some creativity when it comes to long-titled movies. "Ocean's 11" is fine, but "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" becomes something like "HP:PrisAskbn". Other than that... the unit has been fantastic. Highly recommend.

I used it as a daisy chained DVD player. Allows you to play up to 600 disks. Very reliable, and a great overall product for the oldr style DVD players.

The only downfall I saw with this unit it is the limited amount of spaces for typing in the titles of DVD's, many times I had to abbreviate the title. Aside from that, this unit is remarkable, very good picture quality and sound and very user friendly.

they are one of the best dvd player i ever had works great i wish they would put out the same ones but new

i like the fact that we can now consolidate all our DVD's in one unit. The unit also allows you to program dvds which allows for easy navigation. This is turning out to be one of my best purchases in the last couple of years. Very good value.

WE HAD THE 400 BUT UNFORTURNATLY THEY ARE NOT AS RELIABLE AS THIS DISC LOVE DOING BUSNESS WITH THE SELLER VERY OPEN AND HUMBLE WILL LOOK FORWARD TO FURTHER PURCHASES WITH THEM IN THE FUTURE

I love my Pioneer DVD Disc Changer. It works great. It is so nice to have all of my DVD's in one place so I don't have to flip through stuff or find it throughout the house to watch a movie. It is all at the touch of a button. The only thing I don't like is the title can only have 12 letters and that when you are finding the DVD to play or imputting one in it is a dismal background nothing spunky or even graphic. But over all I love this machine so much I bought 2 and then I bought 2 of the Pioneer 1009 CD players for my CS collection. Love these machines.

Carousel changes kinda slow, but when you have 301 DVDs to search thru I guess I can understand. It is kinda bulky, almost as big as two standard sized components, but works great!