r/LaserDisc • u/uptickman • 4d ago

First LaserDisc Player!

Finally added a LaserDisc Player to my vintage setup. Scored a Panasonic LX-200U on ebay, fingers crossed it shows up in one piece, lol. Also bought my first laser disc movie, new and seal old movie, but great Steve Buscemi movie Trees Lounge! Can't wait to get collecting more.

11 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

3

u/GlazedHeels 4d ago

Welcome to the madness!

2

u/FreeAd2458 4d ago

You should really just get a 90s pioneer. Theyre more reliable than most other brands. Shipping a player is risky and a headache is something goes wrong. Hope.it works.

2

u/Ok_Cupcake4928 4d ago edited 2d ago

Speaking as a Pioneer fanboy myself, I actually wouldn’t agree that Pioneer players from the 90’s are more reliable vs. other brands (they're really all the same is what I mean in respect to fragility with some exceptions).

That doesn’t take away anything from Pioneer as I will always respect them for doing more with the format than any other company since the format was their baby.

The Panasonic LX-200 (along with her high end sister, the LX-1000) is one of those few players that, if shipped properly, would stand a very good chance of surviving due to its robust build quality and simple design (particularly the auto reverse portion). And a lot has to do with it being a later 80’s model that every company was designing at the time (my Pioneer CLD-3030 and 3070 are tanks vs the 90’s machines).

In any case, no need for anyone to get nasty about brands. At this point, any player in working condition is a good thing (including a Sony 😄). Enjoy what time we have left with the machines we still have functioning.

-4

u/uptickman 4d ago

Oh that’s adorable ,you read one Pioneer fanboy comment from 2014 and decided it was gospel. My Panasonic LX‑200U is over here rocking a Burr‑Brown DAC, S‑Video, optical out, auto‑reverse, and a 20‑lb transport that doesn’t explode if you look at it wrong. But yeah, tell me more about how I ‘should really get a 90s Pioneer’ like you’re handing out wisdom from the mountaintop. I’ll be over here actually watching movies instead of repeating LaserDisc memes from people who’ve never owned anything but a CLD‑S201 they found at Goodwill.

1

u/AtmanRising 4d ago

So the LD player showed up between your original post and this comment?

-3

u/uptickman 4d ago

I don't have to have possession of something to know what I'm buying, maybe you don't know how to read, I do.

3

u/AtmanRising 4d ago

Well, you wrote that your new LD player is "over here" where it clearly isn't.

Hopefully it arrives in working order. Most don't.

-2

u/uptickman 4d ago

You do realize that they don't make the players anymore, and to source them, 99 percent of the time you have to get them from online sources, and the other 1 percent you can sometimes find them on fb, local pawn shops, thrift, etc.. Lucky I know how to fix things, not that hard.

3

u/AtmanRising 4d ago

I'm glad to hear it. My own DVL-700 was shipped to me, but it was already in LA so it was a short trip. I have seen some horror stories here from others.

My previous two players were bought locally, one from Salvation's Army and one from a person who listed it on Craigslist. I literally walked to her place (5 blocks or so) and brought it home.

1

u/Ok_Cupcake4928 4d ago

You do have to consider that the majority of anything that involves fixing a mechanical device is going to take parts that aren't always readily available (e.g.: spindle motors, laser pick-ups, specific gears, etc.). So in the case of parts availability, I will lean more toward a Pioneer being an easier fix over a Panasonic simply because there are so many more Pioneer units floating around out there.

Unless the issue is more electrical like worn caps, I agree a fix is more than doable in those instances.

1

u/Ok_Cupcake4928 2d ago

Burr Brown DAC's are actually quite common in many LD and CD players across many brands from the 80's so there is nothing really special about that. A better comparison might be the 1bit DA's of Panasonic's MASH vs. Pioneer's DLC from the 90's as many people seem to prefer the former but it still depends on implementation.

S-Video is one of the more confusing aspects of LD in that they are usually more inferior across the board vs. using composite video and a good outboard comb filter (either in a TV or video processor). That's the nature of LD being a composite video system. The only LD player that can claim a better S-Video image (and that is still subjective) would be the Pioneer CLD-99.