NATO said:
thismeintiel said:
Labels this the "budget model," yet the poster actually writes that he could have gone cheaper with the 330D model.
Yes, slightly cheaper, the only difference being DD/DTS sound support, a feature the PS2 has.
This actually looks like a mid-range model. However, the bigger point is, $599 AUD for this. And the price of the PS2 in AU at launch...$749 AUD. Ouch.
IT was a player being sold in a huge sale, $599 AUD was *AFTER* a $200 sales deduction, normal price would have been $799.99, converted to USD even after the $200 discount, it was still $365 USD on sale, and $487 USD prior. also See footnote 1
This price is also in AUD, which means it's actually an even better price than the PS2.
Exchange rate at the time made the $499 USD player, $304 USD. also See footnote 1
According to the manuals copyright, this actually came out in 1999. It also looks like a mid-range unit.
Copyrights in manuals are based on the September 1999 launch in Japan, no english reviews of the player exist prior to early 2000, so it's safe to say the player did not release in the US/AU/EU until early 2000. also review is here: http://www.michaeldvd.com/HardwareReviews/Pioneer525/Pioneer525.asp explicitly states entry level unit, exchange rate makes the $699 pricetag on the review site $426 USD, $1 over the RRP on Panasonics site, result = entry level dvd player of a decent brand, $126 over the price of a PS2 at launch in the US.
Not sure why we are even looking at premium models. But, again, it's AUD and the reviewer even says it is a poor value for the money.
For perspective, if you're going to look at the cheapest off-brand products and their black friday bargain basement prices to try and prove a point, it stands to reason that looking at premium players of the time for perspective makes sense, and a $1579 dvd player ticks that box nicely.
AUD. PS2 $749 AUD.
Budget off-brand player, $499 AUD, which was, as of 2000, still $304, the price of a PS2 stateside.
Again, why premium?
For perspective, again, and to show the varying priceranges for such products of the era.
$915 USD.
AUD. PS2 $749 AUD. Nuff said.
PS2: $300 USD, this player after date-appropriate currency conversion: $365
This one is closer to the PS2, but still not quite there. And there are cheaper models.
$426 USD after conversion, PS2 launched in US at $300
Again, much cheaper models available.
Still a $609 USD "Budget" dvd player released the same year as the PS2.
Ditto.
Still a $548 USD "Budget" dvd player released the same year as the PS2.
And now, for the best. Labeled this as a budget model. Actual review says "deluxe model in the Lenoxx DVD player range, supplementing the budget-priced and lowly-rated DVD-725B." The actual price of the budget model? $399 AUD. $350 less than the PS2.
It's the "Deluxe" model of a budget brand, and as the review also states, "Agressively priced at $499, and just like its cheaper version, a "sub standard performer", with such a glowing review as "The Lenoxx DVD-9000 is a DVD player that is significantly hampered by a poor quality image, one which is amongst the worst I have seen on any DVD player".
While it may be advertised as "deluxe", it's a shitty no-name brand and a poor, terribly manufactured POS that even when aggressively priced at $499 AUD, after currency conversion it's still $4 more expensive than a PS2.
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thismeintiel said:
Now, you're just making things up. GE, Samsung, and even Sony, had cheaper players available, as in $149-$199. They were even cheaper on Black Friday. They are far from shitty brands. The only no name brand player I linked was $18 in 2004. But, even the good brands had ones less than $50 the year prior.
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Soooo... you're saying AEP, Grundig, Palsonic, Orion and Lenoxx aren't shitty brands? and even if we use only the links you provided in the OP.. those cheap players they were looking at, what brands were they exactly?... Apex, GE, Zenith, and then a cheap low end Samsung which still cost more than the price of a PS2 outsode of the US anyway..
Footnotes:
1) Australian market is a captive one so products without immediate nationally available competition, end up subject to large markups, consoles have historically had a large markup in Australia on account of there never really being more than three manufacturers at any given time, where as the DVD market at the time was awash with players from a wide range of brands each with a wide range of models, and price reductions were rife to compete on the market, thus doesnt happen with consoles in Australia and never has, which is why Australian gamers specifically, get shafted.
2) Even if you factor in the above and apply it specifically to DVD players as if they suffered the same sort of markups, the USD, US launch price of PS2 was $299, the USD, AU launch price of PS2 was $456, a markup of $157 or roughly 32%, even if you take that metric and remove the markup from the player prices listed in USD converted, the result is still the same, none of the players would be under $200.
3) In some regions DVD player usage was still so much in it's infancy that only specialist stores carried them, take for example the UK, it's biggest and most popular catalog store, Argos, back in the late 90s, early 2000s was the primary method which most people in the UK would buy products, and yet in the spring/summer 1999 catalog, dvd players weren't even listed for sale. - Yet within 9 months customers in the UK could buy the PS2 with dvd playback.
Your entire premise for the thread is that the feature wasn't a big deal and that it wasn't a big selling point for the console, because at the time no-name budget brands, in heavilly discounted sales, were cheaper, that's a rediculously stupid argument, for a start, it would depend on waiting for such sales, availability etc, just to pay half the price of a Ps2 for some dodgy chinese off-brand unit, show me a good brand dvd player for under $250 in early 2000, that was a general in store retail price, go ahead, just try.
That's before you even venture into the "dual purpose, dual recipient" side of things, think of how many parents thought to themselves, "we can buy our son/daughter a games console AND a cheap dvd player, at the same time?, for much less than the $600-$2000 we spent on our livingrooms dvd player only a couple years ago?" - At the time dvd prices were still on the way down due to heavy stuffing from shitty brands pushing crap into the market to capitolize, often with terrible image quality or composite video out, making the image quality even worse.
Then suddenly, PS2, that supports not only DVD but component output, DTS sound, SPDIF and on top of all that, plays the latest and greatest games?
Whether you like it or not, DVD was a big deal for the PS2 launch, the fact that even the article you based this thread on mentions people specifically waiting for the PS2 to release, to use as a DVD player only further demonstrates that.
And in the end, your unwillingness to talk about standalone DVD players at anything other than their discounted/cheapest-brand prices, while at the same time being unwilling to talk about the PS2 by anything other than it's launch price, shows a heavy bias, hell you even go as far as mentioning a $18 dvd player black friday ad, for something released 4 years after the PS2, and what amazing brand unit was that?, Norcent.. who I'm sure everyone here has heard of and knows for their quality, reliable products..
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