For the past few weeks I’ve been planning to get a DVD player. This move was inspired in part by streaming market getting both more expensive and shittier (moving back to DVDs is making more and more sense) and also in part by the old TV I picked up by the side of the road.

Yes, someone threw out a 34″ Toshiba flat-screen TV. It’s not very good by today’s standards, but it runs, has the necessary ports, and is in good cosmetic condition. And it’s free, which is most of what you want in a 15-year-old TV. And while the screen resolution (1366 x 768) is not high enough for me to want to use it as a monitor, that is more than enough for playing DVDs.

So this morning I spent a few minutes browsing the Walmart website, where I found the Proscan Elite 10.1″ Android tablet. It’s a tablet which runs Android 11 and plays DVDs.

The retail price is $89 new, but you can also find it as a refurb for $60. The refurb could be the better deal because it comes with a BT headphones. (On the other hand, I seriously doubt the headphones are any good – they can’t be, if they’re being given away.)

I don’t expect I will get one of these tablets; I need a DVD player which can be plugged into a TV, and it’s not clear this one will work reliably in that mode. But if you are interested, here are the specs.

Specs

• Screen: 10.1″, 1280 x 800 resolution
• CPU: quad-core 2GHz  MT8167B
• RAM: 2GB
• OS: Android 11
• Storage: 32GB
• Camera: 2MP
• Ports: USB-C, microSD, USB SV/2A, 3.5mm headphone jack
• Connectivity: Wifi, Bluetooth
• Power: AC adapter, car charger, USB cable

If I had the money to spare, I would get one and post a review. But I don’t. In fact; I have decided to put off getting a DVD player in general for now.

UPDATE: I bought one

I am posting this in early March, about a month after I bought one of these tablets. While it was an interesting idea, I hesitate to recommend buying one.

The audio quality and battery life (7 to 8 hours) were decent, and it did actually work as a DVD player – just not very well. The thing is, the DVD player was not well integrated into Android. I tried 4 different apps (including VLC), and the only app which could play DVDs was the one that came with the tablet. The other apps couldn’t even see the DVD player.

And the problem with the built-in DVD player app was that the DVD menus themselves did not work with the touchscreen. You would expect to be able to navigate based on touching the screen, but that didn’t work. Instead, I had to open a pop-up d-pad and use that to navigate around the menu of the DVD I am watching.

Yes, I had to use the player app’s d-pad to navigate the menus because the DVD menus did not respond to touch. (I hope I am explaining that adequately.) This got old, fast.

I know that seems like a petty reason to recommend against getting a device, but honestly, now that I’ve had my hands on it I really think a regular portable DVD player would be the better option. They come with USB and media card slots now, and you can find models with a 15″ screen or larger. Some even come with remotes!

Just about the only thing the Proscan Elite has that those other gadgets don’t is Android, and that just doesn’t really add anything that I can’t already do with my Kindle Fire (which I carry with me anyway.)