Full Review

4 June 2008 - Portable DVD players come in all shapes and sizes but this Philips player has to be one of the more funky designs. Instead of a laptop-style design, this is more like a tablet that you hold in your hands. The high-gloss finish means it's quickly covered in fingerprints, so you'll constantly be cleaning it but overall it looks and feels great.

If that sounds like hard work, there is a flip-out stand on the back of the device and the asking price also includes a mounting kit for your car.

What we liked about the player is the screen, which at 8.5 inches is big and bright enough that you don't need to sit on top of it to get a good image. It's not bright enough to use outside, but it's more than usable on a train or in the back of a car.

Weighing 970g, it's not the lightest of players and when it came to testing we only managed to get 3 hours from the battery. To be fair, this is what Philips claims, which makes it fine for shorter journeys, such as the commute, but not for placating the kids on a long journey.

DVD playback is good but one little niggle was the lack of Last Scene support. So, if you stop the player mid-movie, it won't remember where you paused and start from there.

VERDICT
The Philips PET830 Portable DVD player can handle a wide variety of formats, either from disc of USB memory stick and while the battery life isn't as good as we'd like, it's more than usable, making this an enjoyable device to use.