A comparison of the Philips DVP-642 and DVP-5140

This is an ongoing comparison of the Philips DVP-642 and DVP-5140, the new U.S. model of Philips' 'Divx Ultra'-certified DVD player. Since there wasn't a lot of information about the U.S. version of this player when I bought mine in mid/late-May, I decided to take some pictures, compare the two units, and post my results here. I'll add things and revise this as I have the player longer.

This came about because my Philips DVP-642, which was over two years old, always had a pretty loud drive. However, it began getting worse lately and I began to look for an inexpensive replacement. The DVP-642 was only used on a bedroom television (a fairly inexpensive 27-inch TV), so spending a bunch of money on a MPEG4-capable DVD player didn't really appeal to me.

Around mid-May, the Philips DVP-5140 started appearing in some of the bigger retail chains in the U.S., and for about $55 US, it was the first 'Divx Ultra' player I've seen here. Since I needed a replacement player, I snagged one.

Since that time, Philips has now refreshed their product line in North America with a total of three new MPEG4-capable players (not counting any combo or recorder models):

• the DVP-3040, the new entry level MPEG-4 capable unit.
• the DVP-5140, which is the unit I purchased, and which the testing was done on
• the DVP-5960, which appears to be an upscaling version of the 5140, with additional connections in the form of a front USB port and an HDMI connector

If you have questions or feedback, besides email, you can also take a look at these forum threads:
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(Click the thumbnails above for larger images)

DVP-642: 435mm wide/43mm high/232mm deep
DVP-5140: 435mm wide/37mm high/222mm deep

Notes:

My DVP-642 was a fairly early U.S. unit, as you can see...

(Click either of the thumbnails above for a larger, side-by-side comparison.)

Notes:

The DVP-5140 lacks both the S-Video connector and the Optical connector found on the DVP-642.

(Click either of the thumbnails above for a side-by-side comparison shot)

Notes:

Neither one is anything to write home about, as is usually the case with included remote controls. (Clicking on either thumbnail will display a side-by-side comparison of the two remotes)

(Click the thumbnails above for larger images)

Notes:

Although you can't tell from the photo of the DVP-5140, it's a Mediatek 1389DE chipset inside the unit. I was going to remove the heatsink to take a picture of the chipset, but that heatsink is bonded on there very securely (in least in my unit). I didn't have much luck trying to get it off, even after removing the card from the unit.

My first-gen DVP-642 didn't even HAVE a heatsink on the chipset, as you can see above.

Notes:

I apologize for the somewhat poor quality of the screenshots. To do the screenshots, I hooked each player up to an older Leadtek TV card via Composite cables.

As you can see from the above screenshots, the DVP-5140 does display three more characters of long filenames. On the other hand, it displays fewer files per screen.

One change not shown in the screenshots, is that unlike the DVP-642, .SRT files are no longer shown in the menu screens. Rather than have to manually select the subtitle before playing the AVI file, as you did with the DVP-642, any subtitles get automatically loaded when you select a file.

The results of hitting the DISPLAY button while watching a DVD...

Playing an MP3...

Browsing a JPEG folder...

The tests on pages 2 and 3 go into a bit more depth, but a few quick things:

Owners of the DVP-642 are likely familiar with its inability to play files encoded using QPEL; that's no longer an issue with the DVP-5140.

The DVP-5140 also doesn't suffer from the 642's problems with playing files that use custom quantization matrices (the files that had smearing or 'rainbow' colors, although the 'press the SYSTEM MENU key twice' workaround usually allowed you to watch the file).

I also often had problems on the DVP-642 with widescreen files encoded with a width larger than 640 pixels; even if they were encoded with a proper ratio (for example, something like 720x416), they would be stretched vertically and be shown as fullscreen. So far, I've found that the DVP-5140 correctly displays those files in their intended ratio - no longer do the actors resemble old Saturday Morning cartoon hero PlasticMan.

• SOOOOOO much quieter when playing discs than my DVP-642.... AAAAAHHHH.
• Seems to load discs quicker than the DVP-642 does.
• While the 5140's video DAC (12-bit/108Mhz) has better specs than the 642 (10-bit/54Mhz), viewing on only a 27-inch TV probably makes that a non-issue. :)
• When hitting the DISPLAY key on the remote while watching a DVD, it brings up a lot more information than the DVP-642 ever did. On the flipside, when watching a DivX/Xvid file, the DVP-5140 doesn't seem to have the ability to jump to a certain time point, which the DVP-642 could do.
• A PDF version of the DVP-5140 user manual is available from the Philips website, and is about 2 MB.

The new entry-level DivX-capable unit from Philips is the DVP-3040.

The DVP-3040 ISN'T 'DivX Ultra' certified - it has the same 'DivX Home Theater' certification that the DVP-642 had. This model has a Mediatek chipset, like the 5140, although I've seen reports on various forums mention that the 3040 has some difficulty with packed bitstream.

The available connections are the same as on the DVP-5140 - in other words, no S-Video or Optical connectors.

It's a few bucks cheaper than the DVP-5140, and is physically smaller, but apart from that I don't know a whole lot about this unit yet, to be honest. For more information, the DVP-3040 manual is available online in PDF format from the Philips website.

(Thanks to ytsejam for the DVP-3040 and DVP-5960 photos he sent me)

Yet another new 'DivX Ultra'-certified unit from Philips is the DVP-5960. When I was shopping for a replacement for the DVP-642, the DVP-5960 was about $20-$25 more than the DVP-5140.

The three main differences from the DVP-5140 are a USB 1.1 port on the front panel, an HDMI connector, and the ability to upscale the resolution of DVDs if you have an HDTV. The other connectors are the same.

I wasn't looking for a player to connect to a HDTV, so the final two features are somewhat useless to me. The USB port wasn't that important to me, considering the price difference. However, if you have an HDTV or would use the USB port frequently, the DVP-5960 is certainly worth considering. The extra features just didn't matter to me for how I was intending to use the player.

Both the DVP-5140 and DVP-5960 use Mediatek 1389DE chips to handle video processing. The DVP-5960 also has a Mediatek 1392 chip to handle some of the 5960's additional features.

If you're interested in more information about the DVP-5960, you may wish to take a look at the DVP-5960 PDF manual from the Philips website.

(Thanks again to ytsejam for the DVP-5960 photos; I'll be redoing this section soon.)

On to the individual playback tests....