DVD players.(Buyers guide)

Excellent picture quality is a hallmark of DVD players. For typical use with a conventional (as in standard-definition) TV, most people can safely purchase by disc capacity, features, price, and brand reliability. The Ratings cover a representative sample of players from major brands, selected for value and a wide diversity of features and capabilities. We've listed models in the Ratings chart below not by overall performance but by price within types.

If you're buying a player for use with a high-definition or enhanced-definition TV, you should be choosier. You can use any DVD player with your HDTV. But as our Quick Picks reflect, some players are better than others at smoothing moving images on an HDTV. (On HD sets, DVD images appear in an enhanced-definition mode, known technically as "480p" for 480 lines using progressive-scan formatting. It looks better than conventional TV but falls a little short of true high-definition resolution.)

If you want to connect your DVD player to a digital receiver to get surround sound from a multispeaker setup, check that its outputs (as noted in the chart) match those of your audio receiver. Also, if you own an HDTV that has digital video input (HDMI or DVI), note that some models have a matching output. Our tests, however, found that a digital-video connection does not necessarily provide better picture quality than one between the component-video input of any HDTV and the matching output found on almost any DVD player or recorder.

Quick Picks

For use with a standard-definition TV:

You could simply start with the lowest-priced models at the top of the category that best meets your needs, and work down to find a player with the features you want.

For use with a high-definition TV: