Sony deliberately cripples their machines. They are so worried about piracy that they peddle defective players “just in case”. I have new from the store discs that won’t play on the Sony or Magnavox players. I have 7 DVD players and rest play them.
Its really hit and miss. They play some discs but not others and seem to have more problems halfway through movies also. Needless to say, I rarely use the Magnavox or Sony anymore. Magnavox is actually the worst of the bunch. It will play a movie once sometimes and then never again. Some movies will play fine. I quit trying to figure it out. And everyone I know with Magnavox has these issues.
My 5 DVD Magnavox would not play DVD’s unless the were perfect. It was so frustrating but I could tell it had a lot to do with the laser being dirty. I tried one of those CD’s with the cleaning brushes. Still would not work,finally I took the the stupid thing apart and reached way in there and cleaned it by hand. Just like that it started working again. Unfortunate I have to repeat it about every three mouths. It will be my last Magnavox!
I'm glad I'm not the only one having this problem. I bought "GoldenEye" from Walmart and it would freeze on the expensive DVD player, but my $90 portable and the computers play it fine. Go figure.