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1. Introduction

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Grundig is a well known manufacturer of Consumer Electronics equipment and has been producing players for many formats. Being at the forefront of technology, it was among the first manufactures to support the Nero Digital format. We test their first Nero Digital compatible player, the GDP-3550.

- Grundig GDP-3550

The Grundig GDP-3550 is a high level DVD player, supporting playback of Nero Digital and DivX coded discs. Its main features are:

• Digital DVD player, slim line cabinet 43 mm high.
• Playback of DVD video, S-VCD, DVD-ROM, JPEG-Pictures, Kodak Picture CDs, Audio CD's, MP3 -, WMA-, DivX- and Nero Digital-CDs.
• Picture Viewer: allows you to view your JPEG pictures directly on your display
• The digital audio formats, Dolby Digital AC-3, PCM, MP3, WMA and DTS are supported and can be output via Digital Audio out coaxial and optical
• Progressive scan. Especially for good picture quality on flat panel displays
• Economical and environmentally friendly, thanks to low-power standby operation with a power consumption of less than 3 Watts.
• System remote control TP 81 D including basic remote functions for Grundig TV's

The main chipset comes from ESS (ES6698 Vibrato II) and is quite powerful:

• Single-chip DVD processor
• Mpeg4 Advanced Simple Profile at full screen (D1)
• High quality progressive scan
• Integrated NTSC/PAL encoder with Pixel-adaptive de-interlacer and five video DACs.
• Supports DVD-Video, DVD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, SVCD, VCD, CD-ROM, CD-R/RW and CD-DA.
• DivX Home Theater quality video at full screen.
• Up to 7.1 channel audio DAC.
• Macrovision protected, NTSC/PAL interlaced video.
• JPEG digital photo support (Kodak Picture CD and FujiFilm FujiColor CD).
• MPE and Windows Media Audio (WMA).
• Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic, and Pro Logic II.
• DTS surround
• S/PDIF digital audio input and output.
• MPEG AAC and Multichannel.
• SRS TruSurround and TruSurround XT.
• Professional karaoke with full scoring scheme

- Full specifications

Looking at the specs and compared with the newer GDP-3560/3570, the only differences we can see are that GDP-3560 supports HDMI output and upscaling up to 1080p, while the GDP-3570 supports Card Reader/Edit function.

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2. A Closer Look

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The player is quite compact. The front pane includes the main operations screen, the load/eject tray and five basic button controls. The brushed aluminium adds to the players overall appearance:

At top left, there are several logos, illustrating the player's capabilities:

Removing the mounting screws, we can access the player's internal layout (not recommended, as it voids the warranty). The design is simple, with the power supply circuitry on the left as we look at the photo below, the optical drive at centre, the I/O circuit at top right and the main controller board at right.

The ESS chip is shown in the following image:

On the back, there are several connectors, which can be seen in the image below.

The remote is a little out of the ordinary, compared with other manufacturers remotes, following in Grundig's tradition. It is small and probably the biggest problem would be familiarity with the button functions, since there is no description provided.

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3. Operation

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After powering up the device and inserted a disc, you will see the navigation screen on your display device. Up to 20 characters can be displayed without any problem:

Pressing the "i" button, you enter the menu's five basic categories, each shown in the snapshots below:

There's also a "trick" to making your GDP-3550 region free:

1. press "i" (shows the menu)
2. press the "next track" button
3. press the "fast reverse" button
4. press the "fast forward" button

A line appears underneath the menu window prompting with: "please input region code ()". Press "0" for code free or any other number for a specific region (i.e. 1 for region 1 etc.) It then displays: "region control changed to ... (whatever code you entered)". Press "i" again.

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4. The Tests - Page 1

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The player has been tested with several test files and different formats. All tests were carried out with the DVD player connected to a Samsung 32R51B 32" HDTV, either with AV or Component cables.

Disc Compatibility: The player recognized DVD±R/±RW/±R DL discs without any problem.

Audio compatibility: The player recognizes the following formats: .AC3, .WAV, .MP2, .MP3, .MP4, .AAC and WMA files.

Video Tests:

The player supports .AVI, .DIVX, .MPG and .MP4 files. It also supports progressive scan but doesn't offer any HDTV upscale mode (720p/1080p). If you want this feature, you should opt for the newer GDP-3560. The player left us with a good overall impression regarding picture quality.

There is an function available to display some basic information about each folder/file, such as format and creation date.

During playback, some basic info is also available, like Audio channels, subs, format, resolution and time elapsed/remaining:

Looking at the tests results, we were satisfied with the performance of the ESS 6698 chipset, despite the fact that it doesn't support Qpel, like its older brother, the ESS 8380 Phoenix.

The player is being advertised as DivX Home Theater certified. We confirmed this claim, since we didn't have any problems playing back DivX encoded files, even up to 8Mbit rates. DivX format is supported, in terms of Audio tracks and Subtitles, but there is no menu support, while .DivX slideshow files, won't be displayed. DivX encoded tracks with two Audio tracks (VBR Mp3 and AC3) are also not a problem for the GDP-3550. Lastly, DivX HD files cannot be displayed, due to chipset limitations.

Xvid files are also not a problem for the player. 8Mbit, and GMC 3 way points are supported perfectly, QPel isn't.

When trying Mpeg files, we noticed some glitches, at least in what the "info" tab showed: wrong resolution and bitrate. With FF/RW, you have to rotate the function from 2X~8X, before being able to see the movie at normal speed again, whereas with other players, you just press play. The ESS 6698 chipset can handle up to 12Mbit encoded Mpeg2 files, which is typical for this category.

Subtitles are supported, both in SRT and IFO/Sub formats. However, there are some problems. SRT subtitle characters are way too small for someone to read at a distance, and there is no option available to change this. Moreover, with IFO/Sub formats, only English language was available.

Non-latin based character sets are not supported (e.g. Greek), either for filenames or subtitles. You can still play the files, but subtitles show up as garbage characters. Pictures can be displayed as long as they are Jpeg, at up to 2272x1704 pixels in size.

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5. The Tests - Page 2

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One of the major advantages of the player is its Nero Digital support. The player is advertised as Nero Digital Standard profile certified. Below we can view the major specs for each Nero Digital profile:

For our tests, we used several files, both encoded and downloaded from the www.nerodigital.com website. For our encoding, we used as source, the movie Gladiator, chapter 19. We used the latest Nero 7.2.0.3b package, that includes the latest Nero Recode version. Using all available ASP profiles, we created several test files, with default settings. That included files with two Audio tracks (Main and Commentary) and two subtitles (English/Greek). This is valid of course, only for the Standard profile.

All tested files were playable on the Grundig GDP-3550, the Audio tracks switchable and the Subtitles were displayed perfectly. Both English and Greek characters were recognized, so this might be the only way to view subtitles in case your language is not officially supported.

The downloaded trailers from www.nerodigital.com also played perfectly. Please note that only ASP profile files are supported, not AVC.

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6. Conclusion

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The Grundig GDP-3550 is a DVD player that is based on the ESS 6698chipset, providing good performance and many features. The player is advertised as DivX Home Theater and NeroDigital Standard format certified. We confirmed these claims, so you can be sure that your encoded files will play back without any problems. Unfortunately, an advanced feature of the Mpeg4 format (QPel) is not supported, so be careful when encoding your files. The Xvid format is supported too (GMC 3 WP) and of course Mpeg1/2 formats as well.out

What is missing and its obvious, is a digital output port (DVI/HDMI), but if you are looking for this, the next model up may interest you (GDP-3560). Lastly, we have a few complaints with the remote control: too small, hard to learn, especially after having tested many other devices with a more standard remote. The device is priced around €75, which isn't the lowest price on the market...

- The Good

• Its DivX and NeroDigital certified
• Nice external design
• ESS ES6698 chipset can "handle" many Video and Audio formats
• Can recognize all CD/ DVD writable/re-writable discs
• Supports progressive scan, via Component output
• Can recognize all CD/ DVD writable/re-writable discs
• Supports Subrip and IFO/Sub (.srt) subtitles, but only for Latin based alphabets
• Can upgrade its firmware
• Can become region free

- The Bad

• Medium priced (75Euro)
• Remote control needs major redesign
• QPel is not supported
• No upscale (720p/1080p) function
• Not a lot of information displayed during playback
• Doesn't support some character sets (e.g. Greek) for filenames and subtitles