Granted , i have only used this dvd player for about 2 hours setting it up for my mom for christmas , but that was long enough for me to find problems with this dvd player . First , the player did not allow me to access the menus of dvds . When i hit " menu " it told me , " playback only . " I actually had to re-open the drawer and close it to get back to the dvd menu . This is extemely lame . The remote is flimsy-feeling and awkward to use . In addition , it only seems to work if you 're about five feet away from the player , although that may have been just the batteries that came with it . The player does seem to play dvds adequately enough . It also has an optical out , which it should . I think for about $ 40 more , you can probably find a much better dvd player than this though .