The Panasonic DVD-S55S adds the ability to play DVD-Audio and decode Dolby Digital and DTS sound to the features of the S35. The S55S is silver and features slim design and a zoom knob on the front panel.

Aspect Ratio Control

The most exciting feature of this player is not its progressive scan performance or DVD-Audio playback, but its comprehensive aspect ratio control and zoom modes. The setup menu allows you select if you have a 16:9 (widescreen) or a standard aspect ratio television.

Nothing new here – the previous DVD players from Panasonic as well as other manufacturers’ let you do this all along. But in this model, it actually works to scale the image to the appropriate aspect ratio when you select “Auto” from the onscreen menu (you can also select 16:9 or standard there).

For example, I have a 16:9 TV with no comprehensive zoom and, while watching non-widescreen programming (DirecTV, cable, etc.) had to either watch the horizontally stretched picture or have two black bars at left and right of the picture.

Selecting "16:9" in the setup menu and "Auto" while playing the movie (the player remembers this setting and re-uses it for other discs as well), produces the picture with proper aspect ratio. If it is widescreen, it fills the screen of my TV. If not, there are black bars at left and right of the picture. And in either case I can zoom in to make the image either fill the screen completely, or almost completely.

The zoom can be fine-tuned up to 1% (in 0.01 increments) from 1x upward. It can be achieved either by using the dial on the player’s front panel or by using the remote and onscreen menus. There are also several zoom presets, which let you zoom in quickly (accessed by the “Zoom” button on the remote).

Some TVs have a tendency to lock into full-screen mode when fed progressive scan signal. The aspect control feature of this player lets you override this behavior.

However, the player defaults zoom to 1x every time you stop the playback, which is a bit annoying.

More on the Dial

This dial on the front panel serves mostly cosmetic purpose, in the same way the Sony DVD players’ dials do, because in both cases it could have been replaced by a couple of buttons – there is no correlation between the angle at which the dial is rotated and the speed of the zoom change (Panasonic) or playback speed change (Sony).

Also, the Panasonic dial no longer serves to control the playback speed. I don’t really care, because who sits next to his/her DVD player just to be able to change speed conveniently? I certainly don’t. The same functionality has always been available from the remote by the means of buttons. Too bad there is no way to decrease the fast/slow scan speed – push the FF button five times and you are at full 200x scan speed and to get back to slower scan speed, you have to hit “Play” (to get to 1x) and then FF again for the desired speed.

Ease of Use

The player is easier to use than the previous models. Previously, I had problems recognizing which icon does what (onscreen menu) – the icons are small and non-too different from each other. Now, when you select an icon, the description pops up below it, which makes it much easier to recognize which function you are about to use.

Remote Control

The remote control is also improved over the previous one. The buttons have better tactile response, the playback control buttons are larger now and the “Open/Close” button is finally far from the “FF” (on the previous remote I hit “Open/Close” many times while intending to push “FF”).

Connectivity

The player has a component video out (interlaced/progressive scan), a component video out, an S-Video out, 5.1 analog audio out (Dolby Digital, DTS, DVD-Audio), a separate stereo analog audio out and a digital optical audio out (Dolby Digital, DTS, PCM).

Picture Quality

The player is very inexpensive for what it features and low price is not only the consequence of the technological advances made by Panasonic. It is a result of the use the Panasonic’s own progressive scan chip set as well. Previous Panasonic models used highly acclaimed Sage/Faroudja solution.

This, the picture quality is somewhat worse that that of the previous models (RP62, RP82, etc.), but this is only visible if you sit close to the TV and pay close attention. And this only applies to the progressive scan mode (and if you have an HDTV or EDTV).

In “standard” (interlaced) mode, in which, I am sure, the majority of S55 will be operated due to the lack of progressive-scan capable TVs, the player excels. In this mode, the picture is crisp and noise-free with vivid colors and well-defined object edges. The detail level is high, even in dark areas. Progressive scan produces more stable picture with less flicker.

Progressive Scan

You can use progressive scan feature only if your TV is a High-Definition (HDTV) or EDTV. Only in that case will you be able to use progressive scan, if you connect the player to your TV using component video out.

The progressive scan mode must first be enabled in the setup menu and then engaged using the player’s onscreen menu/icons (change 480i to 480p). If your TV does not support 480p (progressive scan), you will see two smaller pictures instead of the one, with distorted colors.

Playback Speeds

You can use slow and fast (up to 200x) speed scan, but there are 2 slow and 2 fast speeds which allow you hear the soundtrack of the disc legibly. They are not accessible immediately, but by accessing the disc progress indicator and then using “left” and “right” remote buttons.

These speeds are 0.8x, 0.9x, 1.2x and 1.4x. The difference in speed is not significant, but it is a nice feature nonetheless. In addition, the 2x speed is also available with sound, but it is difficult to understand what people say at that speed.

Formats

Along with its ability to play DVD-Video and Audio CD, the S55S can also play MP3 and WMA compressed audio files as well as display JPEG images (somewhat slow) on your TV, play burned CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-RAM (including DVD-RAM recorded on Panasonic DVD Video Recorders).

It also plays some DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW and DVD+RW discs. Make sure you use quality media – the player may start freezing if using low quality CD-R discs.

The VCD and XVCD playback are also available, and you can choose to see the bit rate on the screen while the VCD/XVCD is running, which allows you to determine if the XVCD is constant or variable bit rate and if the poor picture quality is caused by the low bit rate usage.

MP3

The S55 can play MP3 as well. I normally rip my CDs to MP3 at 225 kbps, which lets me fit more than 10 albums on one 700Mb CD-R. More albums fit on a CD-R using 128 or 160 kbps, although the sound suffers (at least I can hear the difference).

The MP3 playback interface is easy to use and shows entire file names and directory tree structure. WMA can also be played.

JPEG

The player can display JPEG files from CD-R or CD-RW. It loaded my CD with several sessions and 450 photos (mostly 4"x6" photos) in about 1-1.5 minute. The thumbnail display was quite slow (about 1 second per image), but the display quality of pictures themselves was very good.

You can also switch to the "Tree" mode, where you can see the directory tree and select the directory to display pictures from. The zoom is also present for JPEG.

DVD-Audio

The DVD-Audio can be played in either stereo or multi-channel sound and in either of them they sound amazing (provided you have good receiver and speakers). You have to use the player’s analog 5.1 out for DVD-Audio, since there is no way to use digital optical (or coaxial for this matter) connection to transfer DVD-Audio signal (applies to other DVD-Audio and SACD players as well).

Other Features

The player also features playback at multiple high and low speeds, variable zoom, angle select, soundtrack select and subtitle select, parental control, bookmarks, etc. you can even control the brightness of the subtitles and their location. The built-in Dolby Digital and DTS decoders let you adjust the parameters of the playback – delay, etc.

Bottom Line

The S55 is a very good inexpensive DVD player with progressive scan, DVD-Audio playback and lots of useful features. The robust aspect ratio control makes it even more attractive.

Other Panasonic DVD Players

Below you can find the current lineup of Panasonic DVD players:

Panasonic DVD-F85
Panasonic DVD-F65
Panasonic DVD-S55
Panasonic DVD-S35
Panasonic DVD-S25



Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 115