Philips DVP3986 DVD Player Review And Region Hack!

I really did not purchase this product. I was in the market for a new DVD player that also played DivX files with USB support and when I went shopping for the same I ran into a deal at Reliance Digital where an Onkyo HT-S3100 Home Theater System was being sold and as part of the deal the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player, which played DivX among many other formats was being given free along with the Onkyo Home Theater. Reliance Digital of course further sweetened the deal by giving a digital coaxial cable worth Rs. 900 from Philips free too and hence I found myself the recipient of the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player along with a new Home Theater System from Onkyo. The only feature not fulfilled as part of this deal was that the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player does not have a USB option to play files/movies/music off of a USB stick, but I decided to let go of this feature since otherwise it was such a good deal and anyways I always have the option of picking up a local make DVD/DivX player with USB support for around 2K or even less. Things have become even better in this area with players like LG offering the same set of features in a DVD/DivX player for around Rs. 2800 in the model LG-DV 388 I am told.

Coming back to the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player it’s an excellent DVD/DivX player with HDMI support and upscaling to 1080p i.e. the highest per today’s High Definition (HD) standards. However, I reserve my comments on this feature since I am yet to get my Plasma TV and have been only watching Standard Definition (SD) content on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player. Where it scores for me personally is in playing DivX content and I have to admit that with a Component Video Cable the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player delivers absolutely stunning pictures on 4:3 Letterbox settings on my Panasonic 29” CRT. The sound too on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player rocks via the Onkyo Home Theater with a Digital Coaxial Cable supporting Dolby Digital and DTS output which is the norm with all Standard Definition DVDs.

The formats supported on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player are DVD, DivX, MP3, WMA, JPEG, and Audio CD meaning just about everything I need. All video content can be upscaled to High Definition 1080p with a HDMI cable, but as stated above I reserve my comments on this since I have not yet received my Plasma TV and am running it only on a 29” Panasonic CRT. The Philips DVP3986 DVD Player though delivers absolutely stunning images both in DVD and DivX formats in Standard Definition. I have even played Audio CDs and MP3 content on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player and they sound good, but the caveat here is a standard 2 channel standalone CD player without circuitry for pictures and images i.e. a non-DVD player would deliver better sound output for standard 2 channel audio content for Redbook CDs and MP3s. I did, however, play audio content in DTS and 5.1 surround sound, notably the Eagles – Hell Freezes Over album and it absolutely rocked. Ditto for Pink Floyd’s The Wall in DTS. Point to be noted, on a Home Theater System only DTS/Dolby in 5.1 will sound great and regular 2 channel audio content cannot be output via a 5.1 channel Home Theater System and sound great, however, 2 channel audio content played via a dedicated CD player with regular RCA cables will rock on the Home Theater, but they need to be played on 2 channel and 2 speakers settings i.e. front left and front right speakers. Unless the source material itself is in 5.1, outputting the same on a 5.1 system especially a Home Theater System will not sound great. PC speakers in 5.1 are a different matter and with a Creative Card will absolutely rock.

Getting back to the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player, it also supports a variety of media like CD, CD-R/CD-RW, Video CD/SVCD, DVD, DivX, DVD+R/+RW, DVD-R/-RW, and DVD-Video. Hmmm, the only things missing seem to be SACD and DVD-Audio, but once again not a requirement for me since I do not have any content on these 2 formats. Connectivity is a huge plus with the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player having Component Video out Progressive, Composite video output, Digital Coaxial out, HDMI output, and Analog audio Multi-channel out. Philips as a company does not support Digital Optical out so Digital Optical Cables are ruled out in all Philips devices and barring this and the HDMI output I have checked everything else out on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player and everything absolutely rocks. I will update about the upscaling features when I have my Plasma TV, but not sure I will be using the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player for its upscaling features though since I am planning on the excellent Oppo DV 983H for its excellent DVD and upscaling features along with excellent Audio CD output too.

Among other things, the Philips brand is also known for its chapati DVD players i.e. players that play just about anything. Why chapati, well remember the Philips DVD player advertisement where the harassed cook pops in a chapati into the DVD player and the advertisement goes Philips Plays Anything! It is the same case more or less with the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player with it playing just about every kind of media thrown at it and just about every available format with the exception of Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, and H.264, but either way most of this content is not really available just yet and only Blu Ray and the now extinct HD-DVD format players will play these formats. The big news at present is to use upscaling DVD players so that you can view your Standard Definition DVD content on High Definition Plasma and LCD TVs. The Philips DVP3986 DVD Player handles upscaling to 1080p the highest possible in today’s High Definition content/media and TVs.

In terms of audio output i.e. as a standalone CD player the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player performs adequately. The Philips DVP3986 DVD Player handles both Dolby Digital and DTS when the source material is available in both formats, but this is applicable only for standard DVD content. The Philips DVP3986 DVD Player does not handle SACD and DVD-Audio media so the only option I had was to check ripped DTS audio content from FLAC burned as an Audio CD since otherwise the AV Receiver would not recognize DTS content and only a hiss would emanate and not any sound. In handling Audio CDs the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player did an admirable job, but still since it was connected to a 5.1 Home Theater System, inputting 2 channel audio and outputting the same as 5.1 audio does not always sound good. To really test it out RCA cables connecting only to the front left and front right speakers of the Home Theater System need to be connected and in doing this the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player did a good job with Audio CD content. However, if you are a true music lover and have tons of 2 channel content that you want to use your Home Theater System to play on then a standalone CD player is recommended connected similar to what I did with the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player in outputting only 2 channels to the front left and front right speakers. Lots of additional wiring if you really want to use the same Amplifier/AV Receiver and Home Theater System speakers. I am quite sure a true audiophile would choose to have a dedicated Audio CD Player, an Amplifier/AV Receiver and speaker system outputting 2 channel audio for his CD collection. The budget Philips DVP3986 DVD Player is not really an option for a dedicated standalone CD player even though it does handle Audio CD content pretty well. The Philips DVP3986 DVD Player is a great choice for Standard Definition DVD content and DivX content from what I have seen so far of it. I will also check out its upscaling capabilities to 1080p once my Plasma TV comes in and post a review of the same, but looking at how the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player has performed till now I would say it should do a decent to a good job, but nothing in the range of the Oppo DVD players with their Anchor Bay video processing chips which will upscale Standard Definition content to look as good as High Definition content from what I have read in the reviews.

To sum it up, the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player does a good job and will deliver on what’s expected from a budget DVD player with great pictures and sound. The only con, but this is something generic to the company Philips itself in that it does not support optical fiber cable in digital audio output, only coaxial cable is supported, but with HDMI touted to be the future I guess it does not really matter. For me I had to personally settle with a coaxial cable since optic fiber was ruled out with the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player itself and my Home Theater System’s AV Receiver does not support HDMI. This means I will have to go with HDMI from the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player to the TV direct unless I upgrade the AV Receiver, and then run a coaxial cable from the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player to the AV Receiver since optic fiber cable is not supported by Philips at all. Anyways now I know better to look for HDMI support henceforth in all electronic gadgets/toys I will be purchasing and all the more to make sure they are HDMI 1.3 compliant. You might wonder if cables are such an issue and why not continue with default RCA cables like we have done for ages, but to tell you the truth yes cables do make a lot of difference in terms of picture quality (PQ) delivered and audio quality (AQ) delivered. In fact only digital cables like coaxial/optic fiber/HDMI will allow the Home Theater System to play movies in Dolby Digital/DTS formats. If you go with basic RCA cables then the Home Theater System will take 2 channel audio and output it into 5.1, which really is not true 5.1.

Now coming to the hack to make the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player region free. Once again let me reiterate here that it’s not to encourage piracy and it’s just for me to play content that I have a legal right to play. My online movie rental service Seventymm is in fact sourcing DVDs from other regions so the South Asia region code of 5 on my Philips DVP3986 DVD Player was not playing all DVDs from Seventymm. The simplest workaround to make the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player region free i.e. enabling it to play all region DVDs is to do the following.

1. Go to Setup.
2. Select Preference Page.
3. Press 1, 3, 8, 9, 3, 1 on the Philips DVP3986 DVD Player remote.
4. Press the up/down key to select "0" which makes it region free.
5. Press ok and exit setup.

That’s it! Your Philips DVP3986 DVD Player will now play all DVDs from all regions. Enjoy and have a blast.