BRAVIA Theater System DAV-HDX275

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nice too. It fills my living room with nice sound from my regular old dvds and the picture is damn near HD.

Overall, for this price, it is a great deal. Just dont expect to be plugging in too many peripherals. But for use with my PS3, cable television, and the upconvert dvd player on it, it works well. And oh ya, music CDs sound good in it too. It creates really nice surround sound from my old cds.

BRAVIA Theater System DAV-HDX275

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that to others to review in detail. I feel that you get the expected performance for a sub $300 unit that is very sufficient for home theater use though a bit underwhelming for listening to music at higher volumes.

I do want to mention that the unit has one unique feature that I especially appreciate. There is a night mode button on the remote that reduces the bass and boosts the center channel voices. In this mode the unit is easily used at low volumes that are less disruptive when watching after the kids are in bed yet still sound much better than what the TV speakers would alone and without surround sound.

The reason that I did not give 5 stars is partly because of some of some minor issues. The remote is not great though I use it infrequently. Its illumination is nearly useless since the labels are not illuminated and the labels are too small. It has a somewhat odd layout of features making finding what you are looking for difficult.

Lastly, I wish that the DMPort supported a computer USB connection. I would prefer a direct connection to my computer's music collection over plugging in an iPod. Hopefully Sony will introduce such an accessory in the future.

BRAVIA Theater System DAV-HDX275

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simple with color coded wires for all of the different speakers. Unfortunately the wires terminate to special connectors that plug into the back of the main unit. This would make extending/replacing the wires a pain. The unit includes a microphone and a nifty auto-calibration feature that sets all of the speaker levels correctly with a few taps on the remote control.

The remote control itself is handy, but on the cheap side.. it's pretty basic but gets the job done. It will control all of the unit functions and even allow for basic control of an iPod that is connected to the included iPod dock. The remote control can also be programmed to control most model TVs.

DVD output from this unit is very good and the HDMI output is great for quick and easy cabling to an HDMI equipped flat panel HDTV. DVD startup and controls were quite snappy and the unit can hold up to 5 CDs or DVD in the built in cartridge. The unit will up-convert DVD to 1080P resolution over the HDMI output. While not nearly as good looking as my Blu-Ray player, it will still look quite good on most small to medium sized TVs.

The best features of this unit are the HDMI output, extra inputs (one digital and one analog), iPod dock (which works with the remote control) and DVD up-conversion.

There are drawbacks, as there always are with these all-in-one deals. The iPod dock doesn't have any onscreen output or control, which is a bit of a drag since you can't see what's on the iPod screen from across the room. The main unit is physically quite deep (about 15 inches) which means it won't fit on smaller shelves. Also annoying is the lack of any bass or treble control.

The unit has two sound modes, "movie" and "music" and a bass enhancer (which I turned off as it made the bass sound boomy and obnoxious for music listening). There is no stereo 5.1 mode which would allow for output to all 5 speakers from regular stereo sources like an iPod. Instead the unit has a 4 channel matrix mode that uses the main, rear and subwoofer speakers for stereo. This is kind of a shame since the center channel speaker is the clearest sounding one of the bunch. The center channel does sound decent when watching or listening to TV and DVD sources.

Overall I can safely give this system 4 stars. The sound is quite good for a sub $300 system, the DVD player with up-conversion is great, and the unit has just enough flexibility through the extra inputs and wireless add-on options to be useable for quite some time. Certainly it fits the bill as a stereo/DVD-player for my workout room.