Toshiba's SD-3980 single-disc DVD player packs a serious home-theater punch for an amazingly low price. Its progressive-scan ColorStream Pro component-video output produces seamless, flicker-free images for high-definition and HD-ready TVs. Built-in MP3 and WMA (Windows Media Audio) decoding let you compile music on your PC and listen to it on your stereo or TV, and you can even watch customized digital-photo slideshows using recordable CDs filled with standard JPEG image files. Whether your living room is currently home to an HDTV or you're merely thinking of "someday," the SD-3980 stands ready to deliver the full potential of your DVDs via 10-bit/54 MHz processing. Progressive scanning, referred to as 480p for the number of horizontal lines that compose the video image, creates a picture using twice the scan lines of a conventional DVD picture, giving you higher resolution and sharper images while eliminating nearly all motion artifacts.

The SD-3980 also performs 3:2 pulldown. DVD mastering introduces a common distortion when adjusting 24 frames-per-second movies to 30 fps video; 3:2 pulldown digitally corrects this distortion. Conventional composite- and S-video outputs bring compatibility with nearly any television. The "expanded" mode in the player's black-level setting produces richer, deeper black tones in every image. PLUGE (Picture Line Up Generation Equipment) delivers black as well as below-black signals to a television.

A set of left/right analog-audio outputs channel audio to Dolby Pro Logic receivers and stereo televisions. Both Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1-channel surround-sound signals can be routed through the player's digital-audio outputs (one each coaxial and optical) for direct connection to a full-featured audio/video receiver. The player's internal digital-to-analog converters work at 24-bit, 96 kHz resolution to ensure optimum sonic quality from a range of digital program material.

Enhanced Audio Mode (E.A.M.) offers three sound settings: normal (boosts regular digital audio signals), 3-D (virtual surround sound enhancement via Spatializer N-2-2), and dialogue expander (which enhances center-channel frequencies in the range of human voices during playback of Dolby Digital multichannel content). Other playback options include Power Picture Zoom (which lets you magnify a select area of an image), bookmarking (up to 9 marks), and parental lock.

What's in the Box DVD player, remote control, remote batteries, a user's manual, and a stereo analog audio interconnect/composite-video cable.

Toshiba SD-3980 Progressive-Scan DVD Player is the Electronics version. The full version can be purchased by clicking on the "CLICK HERE TO ORDER" button below for around  Too Low ToUSD.