Samsung DVD-HD860

CNET editors' take

• Reviewed by:
  Matthew Moskovciak
• Reviewed on: 02/27/2007

The Samsung DVD-HD860 is an upscaling DVD player, capable of upscaling DVDs over its HDMI output to 720p and 1080i. Despite some of the marketing hype espousing that they'll make your DVDs appear in HD picture quality, the increase in picture quality from upscaling will never come close to matching that of HDTV, and the increase is completely dependent on how good the upscaling technology in your TV already is. Every HDTV is already capable of upscaling; the only benefit an upscaling DVD player can bring to the table is to do it better. In some cases the difference is easily discernable, while in others it's much more subtle. The bottom line for every upscaling DVD player is that it might be able to make your DVDs look better, but the difference will probably be worth it only to image-quality enthusiasts.

We haven't tested the DVD-HD860, but we have tested the step-up model, the Samsung DVD-HD960. The two models are very similar, the major differences being that the DVD-HD960 adds the ability to upscale to 1080p and has Faroudja video processing. If you don't have a 1080p HDTV, you won't be able to gain any benefit from this feature, and even if you do, the difference between 1080i and 1080p upscaling is often very slight. In fact, we found it very difficult to tell the difference between the 1080i and 1080p upscaling when we looked at the DVD-HD960. Again, we haven't tested the DVD-HD860, but if its performance is similar to the DVD-HD960, it seems to be a better value because we've seen it going for almost half the price online. On the other hand, it's possible that the Faroudja processing has a large effect on performance, so we don't know if the DVD-HD860 will deliver similar performance.

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Recent user reviews

• Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 22 reviews
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• Showing 3 of 22 user reviews

• 4.0 stars

  "Great way to extend the life of your sd-DVD collection!"

  by cybertiger90 on August 27, 2008

• 5.0 stars

  "Excellent quality picture for the money"

  by Sniper X on December 13, 2007

• 3.5 stars

  "Not bad, Not great"

  by adammarth on July 24, 2007

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Reviews from around the WebPowered by alaTest

• alaTest.com

  Editors' rating: 83

  Summary: alaTest has collected and analyzed 481 reviews of Samsung DVD-HD860 from international magazines and websites. Experts rate this product 81/100 and users 72/100. Comparing these reviews to 108013 other DVD Players reviews gives this product an overall alaScore™ 83/100 = Very Good.

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• stuff.tv

  Editors' rating: 100

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• whathomecinemamag.com

  Editors' rating: 80

  Summary: A great-looking DVD player that's a solid picture performer, but if you want 1080p upscaling, avert your eyes now

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• techradar.com

  Editors' rating: 80

  Summary: The HD870 combines a distinctive physical styling with a strong feature count and above-average subjective performance. Oh, and it's easily coerced into RCE-proof multiregion playback, searchable on the 'net. File, then, under 'likeable'

  Read full review

• whathifi.com

  Editors' rating: 100

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