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Posted by def456 on 08/21/07 19:48
"Walter Traprock" <wetraprock@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:wetraprock-317DF9.00214021082007@newsgroups.comcast.net...
> "def456" <def456@none.none> wrote:
>
>> I decided to try a Coby DVD-755 home theater system from Kmart for $60 on
>> sale. It's hooked up and works OK. The speakers are small but the audio
>> is a
>> significant improvement over my old TV's sound. I researched it first,
>> and
>> it seemed the best deal for under $100. I particularly like that the DVD
>> player has a built-in Dolby D 5.1 decoder (but no DTS decoder), and
>> full-featured outputs including digital optical and coaxial audio output
>> connectors, as well as all of the video output options such as S-video,
>> component, and composite. The DVD's remote control has a volume+-
>> control,
>> which is essential, and I like the remote control's features in general.
>> There's plenty of wattage output for my purposes. I would never listen to
>> it
>> at the maximum volume, which is too loud for my ears, but not extremely
>> so.
>> It's probably a keeper unless I can find something better under $100.
>
> How did the weak dialog problem resolve? I find that DVD volumes are
> really all over the place, but most annoying is combining weak
> dialog volume with loud music.
It did not fix the very weak, clipped speech in my DVD copy of Duel in the
Sun (1946) Gregory Peck, which has 2 channel sound, but I'm becoming
convinced that is a faulty disc or release. However by turning the volume up
to maximum, it was possible to generally understand what some of the actors
were saying in that movie, those who knew how to project their speech such
as John Barrymore. Some of the other actors were practically unintelligible
even at max volume, such as the soft-spoken Joseph Cotten. So it's necessary
to play that DVD movie with the subtitles turned on. I also have a VHS copy
of that movie which doesn't have those severe sound quality problems.
I've watched a few other movies with the new Coby DVD-755, and speech
quality/recognition is good in general, although a bit "tinny-sounding" -
like they're talking out of a tin can. It sounds like the treble is turned
up too high, but there's no way to adjust that with this system. All 5
speakers use the same treble setting, not adjustable. There's no separate
tweeter. It's possible to adjust the mix of bass with treble, the bass
coming from the sub-woofer, but that doesn't help. I imagine that is a
speaker size/quality or amplifier quality problem.
The range of sound volume in movies is still a problem, in general. At the
max volume setting, like when the actors are shouting or the background
music is mixed to the max, it blasts your ears off, so you scramble to find
the remote control to turn it down. However it is necessary to set it near
max in order to hear some of their feeble mumbles and whispers. Yes, actors
now talk in whispers and mumbles, and don't know how to emote and project
their voice anymore. I doubt there is any cure for this. It's also partly by
design. Whoever mixes the music and other sound effects into many current
movies gets carried away and overdoes it. Music and sound effects override
speech, and is generally a lot louder than speech. There should be some kind
of electronic solution to this, to narrow the range of volume in a movie,
but the Coby DVD-755 doesn't have it.
I was surprised that the 5 speaker wires don't have jacks on the end.
They're just bare wires which plug into clips on the back of the subwoofer.
That doesn't make a very secure connection, and I wasn't getting sound out
of my center speaker at first, so had to reseat the wires into the clips.
For me the most serious problem with this system is that I can't leave a DVD
in the drive with the unit turned on. If I do, it automatically resets the
system (including resetting sound to max volume!), and replays the movie
from the beginning after a 30 minute delay. That happens whether I have
paused the movie, pressed stop, or double-pressed stop. I have been in the
habit of pausing a movie and resuming it the next day, or even several days
later, without losing my place, but that apparently isn't possible with the
Coby DVD-755. I've emailed their tech support to see if there's any cure for
this, no reply yet.
In conclusion: I have no other experience with home theater systems, so have
nothing to compare it to. It is definitely an audio improvement over my old
TV, so it's maybe a keeper at $60 if I can't find something better. But I
really need to try a couple more home theater systems for comparison, which
I may do. One tricky thing is that many of these cheap systems apparently
don't actually have a Dolby D 5.1 decoder, although the wording in their ads
and specs makes that difficult to determine. These retail stores all have a
liberal return policy so I can take them all back, and just keep the best
one.
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