CLD-980 (and 990) LD players reviewed
William R. Cruce
A COMPARISON OF PIONEER ECONOMY LASERDISC PLAYERS CLD-980 (AND 990) TO
THE FULL FEATURED CLD-3070. Copyright 1991 William L.R. Cruce
SUMMARY: The Pioneer CLD-980, is being phased out for the newer CLD-990, and
is therefore available for under $300 locally (perhaps cheaper by mailorder).
It is a bare-bones player but offers all the basic features needed for playback
of movies on laser disc (and music on compact disc). The video image is almost
indistinguishable from that of the (still) highly rated CLD-3070 (a model which
was at the top of the standard Pioneer consumer line in 1989-90). I think the
CLD-980 is an incredible bargain! If you have been thinking of getting a laser
disc player you would not go wrong with this little beauty.
BACKGROUND:
While recently helping a friend select an economy laser disc player I had the
opportunity to take a brief look at a CLD-990 (on sale locally for $340) in a
store. Since he bought the CLD-980 ($290), I was able to make an extensive
comparison of it to my CLD-3070 at home (on a well-tweaked Pioneer 45 inch
rear projection monitor, SD-P453). For the home comparison I rented 3 laser
discs of which I also had copies so I could make A/B comparisons; I used the
same discs to look at the 980 and 990 in the stores, but since they were in
adjacent, but different, stores the comparisons depend on my visual memory.
The discs were: HAMLET (Warner #12200), which contains colors and textures
ranging from rich to simple; WILD AT HEART (Image #ID8084ME), a disc which is
on fire with red in all its variants; GOODFELLAS (Warner #12039), a disc which
pushes how much color, especially red, can be expressed in dim dark scenes.
RESULTS:
I could find no flaw in the picture presented by the 980 or the 990 in the
stores. On A/B comparisons at home the 980 had less intense color, more
intense blue and a slightly higher black level than my 3070, but these
differences were readily compensated for by controls on my monitor and were
far less than the differences between other sources. I do not consider these
differences to be significant. I did find the 980 was slightly less capable
of handling disc flaws than the 3070. Near the end of side 2 of the rental
copy of HAMLET there were some horizontal streaks which rolled across the
screen. These were readily obvious, though not disconcerting, on the 980;
they were much less visible on the 3070. Both copies of W.A.H. had a mild
"herringbone" ripple through the middle of the picture on side 1 at 17m.
This defect was visible, though not overbearing, on the 980 but not at all
visible on the 3070. It has been my experience with a variety of laser disc
players -especially within the Pioneer line- that differences in the picture
are subtle to non-existent but handling of flawed discs is the place where
differences in players become apparent. I should stress that the differences
I observed between the 980 and 3070 were relatively minor; the 980's handling
of the disc flaws would not interfere with enjoyment of the movie. The 980's
picture is so similar to that of the 3070 that I was hard pressed to come up
with these differences.
FEATURES:
The 980 has small front panel lights which indicate CX and DIGITAL and a small
panel which lights up the CHAPTER number (if present). There is no panel
read out of the TIME or FRAME. All the usual information is available in
on-screen displays, including the standard (with the 80+ series) TOTAL TIME
and TOTAL CHAPTERS (CLV) as well as ELAPSED TIME (CAV) on discs which have
Table of Contents (TOC) encoded in their digital tracks. The 990 has the
slightly improved feature of including TIME and the other information on the
front panel display (which info is displayed depending on which remote key is
depressed). Search functions are similar on all the players and seem to take
roughly the same time. All have the ability to turn on digital or analog
sound and left or right audio tracks. The 980 and 990 do not have the jog-
shuttle dial of the 3070, but I rarely use that. The 990 lacks the RF in/out
connectors found on all previous Pioneer players (an optional RF adapter can
be purchased which plugs into the composite video and audio out sockets).
While you don't get the best picture available from a laser disc player if
you use the RF connection, an inexpensive player like this might end up being
used on an older TV which has no composite video inputs. The picture would
still look better than anything else available; I think this is the only
major feature difference between the two. Neither has the S-Video output
of the 3070, but I've never seen any difference with that. When doing high
speed scanning, the picture on the 980 tends to jump and roll but is legible
enough to find your location in a movie; the picture on the 990 is stable but
"jumps" over several frames and briefly blanks the screen during the warp
maneuver -I found it slightly harder to use. Neither picture is as good as
a fast scan image on a VCR or on some Sony laser disc players; of
course none of these scans is as good as the digital field display during
fast scan on the 3070 (but you pay a lot for that major feature). Both the
980 and 990 play one side of a disc only (the 3070 flips the laser assembly
to the other side after playing side one). Both the 980 and 990 can be
programmed to play laser disc CHAPTERS or compact disc TRACKS in any order and
will do this with any number up to 20. I did not explore the programming
feature other than to check the description of it in the respective manuals.
CAVEATS:
CLD-3080 players have been reported to develop "jitters" with some discs.
Pioneer is supposed to have a "fix" available at all service centers. I do
not know if the 980 suffers this same problem. All "90" series players
have problems with certain discs (mostly pressed by TECHNIDISC); they
completely lock up on them. Pioneer and Image will replace offending discs.
There is no report of any fix for the players themselves.
FINALE:
Considering the known disc problems of the "90" series, the lack of RF output
on the 990, and the cheaper price of the 980, I consider the 980 to be the
economy player of choice.
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William L.R. (Bill) Cruce INTERNET: wl...@uhura.neoucom.edu
Neurobiology Department, N.E. Ohio U. College of Medicine
4209 State Route 44 Box 95 Rootstown, Ohio 44272
Steve Sekiguchi
>CAVEATS:
>CLD-3080 players have been reported to develop "jitters" with some discs.
>Pioneer is supposed to have a "fix" available at all service centers. I do
>not know if the 980 suffers this same problem. All "90" series players
>have problems with certain discs (mostly pressed by TECHNIDISC); they
>completely lock up on them. Pioneer and Image will replace offending discs.
>There is no report of any fix for the players themselves.
I had so many problems with my 3090 (wouldn't even play some of
my criterion titles) that I went out and bought a CLD-92. If you're
not familiar with it, it is a upgraded ("elite") version of the old
3070. In a word it is incredible. The picture quality is better than
either my old 3080 or the 3090. Plus it doesn't have any of the
"improved" tracking circuitry to screw up the tracking. If you're in the
market for a 3090, I'd heartily recommend taking a hard look at the CLD-92.
Steven Sekiguchi Wind River Systems
sun!wrs!steve, st...@wrs.com 1010 Atlantic Avenue
(415) 748-4100 Alameda, CA 94501
"...time to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet." -T.S. Elliot