2. Digital Audio Outputs These outputs enable you to connect the DVD player to an audio-video receiver with Digital Theater Systems (DTS) and Dolby Digital processors, which decode the DVD's digital-audio tracks--including discs encoded in 5.1-channel surround sound. Look for players with both optical (fiber-optic) and coaxial (75-ohm) digital outputs; this will give you more options for enjoying music and movies through your home entertainment system. If you're buying a DVD-audio player, make sure your receiver will accommodate 5.1-channel analog outputs, since most DVD-audio players don't pass the high-resolution DVD-audio signal digitally.

3. Surround Formats Virtually all DVD players are capable of outputting Dolby Digital 5.1-channel surround sound. Although nearly all of today's DVDs are encoded in Dolby Digital, there's an expanding list of DVD and CD titles available in 5.1-channel DTS (Digital Theater Systems), which uses less compression and is generally considered to be a superior-sounding format. If you're interested in enjoying DTS-encoded discs, you'll need a DTS receiver, or you'll need a DVD player with a built-in DTS processor that can be mated with a compatible receiver. If DTS is important to you, be aware that some budget DVD players have difficulty passing the 5.1-channel signal onto DTS-compatible receivers. If DTS is not important to you, most of today's Dolby Digital-only budget DVD players are reliable.

4. Disc Capacity Models range from single-disc machines to 2-disc, 3-disc, 5-disc, and 6-disc players to mega changers that can hold up to 301 DVDs. If you're planning to use the player for music listening and you like to play several hours' worth of music at a time, you might consider purchasing a multidisc machine. The 5-disc and 6-disc models use traditional carousel platters to load DVDs and CDs, while the 3-disc variety uses either a carousel or sliding-drawer mechanism.

5. Screen Dimmer and Video Bit-Rate Meter Neither of these features will enhance a DVD player's performance, but both are very cool. Players that allow you to dim or turn off the front-panel display are preferable, because bright LCDs are distracting in the dark. Bit-rate displays, which appear either on the TV screen or on the player's front panel, reveal how much MPEG-2 compression is being used from scene to scene, with higher numbers representing a larger bit-rate allocation and lower numbers indicating a lot of compression. Action sequences, for example, will typically measure 8 to 9.5, while highly compressed, static scenes often dip below 2.

You should also examine a player's searching features. Note how well it's able to rapidly fast-forward and reverse-scan while providing a glitch-free picture. Some players offer special visual effects such as zoom, which allows you to examine elements of a scene in greater detail.

All DVD players can play CDs as well. You won't be compromising much (if anything) if your DVD player is going to do double duty as a CD player. In fact, depending on the DVD player, you may find that your CDs have never sounded better. Some players also include a decoding chip for HDCD (High Definition Compatible Digital) discs. There are thousands of HDCD-encoded CDs, and you probably own many, perhaps without even knowing it (they all bear the HDCD emblem somewhere). HDCD-encoded discs sound great without HDCD decoding and can be played in any CD or DVD player. With the decoding, however, they offer substantial gains over standard CDs in dynamics and perceived depth. If you're an audiophile or just someone who appreciates good sound, HDCD decoding is a feature worth checking for in both DVD and CD players.

Many discs are now available with DTS (Digital Theater Sound) surround sound as well. DTS is another 5.1-channel format that uses lower compression rates than Dolby Digital (and thus tends to sound a little better), but uses more disc space for audio. If you're interested in exploring DTS surround sound, you'll need a player that passes the DTS bit stream, and most current models do.

For the very best in surround audio, you'll want a multichannel DVD-Audio player or a multichannel SACD-DVD player. While both DVD-Audio and SACD are music-oriented formats requiring special decoding found in compatible players, the chips used to decode both formats also deliver outstanding sound from standard DVD-Videos and CDs. For the most part, DVD-Audio and SACD are competing formats, though there are one or two obscure (and expensive) players that accommodate both.

DVD-Audio offers super-high-fidelity (192 kHz/24-bit) sound. DVD-Audio discs provide multichannel and stereo sound, incredible storage capacity, and unique bonus materials not available on regular audio CDs. Because the DVD-Audio signal is too high-resolution for the digital-to-analog converters in current surround receivers (and also as an antipiracy measure), these models perform their own decoding of DVD-Audio signals, passing high-resolution analog, not digital, audio to a surround receiver. This means you'll need an audio-video with multichannel analog-audio inputs.

SACD stands for Super Audio CD. It's a format developed by Sony with the intention of superseding the compact disc. Founded on Sony's Direct Stream Digital (DSD) encoding technology, SACD boasts a frequency response that's almost five times greater than that of standard CDs. The format offers a dynamic range of 120 dB, compared with 96 dB for CD. All DVD-Audio discs are mixed for surround sound, while SACDs are configured for a mix of stereo and surround sound (though all the multichannel discs also contain stereo mixes).