Hands-on with Philips' portable iPod video dock

Slide in your iPod and watch videos on the nine-inch screen, or spin up a DVD or some tunes. Not bad—as long as you're fine with the player's so-so display and battery life.

Available now for $199 (or $179 for the 8.5-inch version), the Philips DCP951 comes in a sleek, 2.4-pound package, complete with a kickstand in the back, a four-way navigational control and menu, play/pause and skip buttons up front, a slot for SD/MMC memory cards on the side, and 3.5mm AV input/output jacks.

What makes the Philips player stand out from the crowd is the slide-out dock for an iPod; once you've got your iPod plugged in, the dock slides back into the main player assembly, completely hidden from view. The player then connects to your iPod, allowing you to browse and play music and videos—including TV shows and movies from the iTunes store—from the (sometimes sluggish) Philips menu.

Had enough of your iPod? There's also a door in the back of the player for DVD playback (including support for DivX files, a nice bonus), while the media card reader on the side lets you turn the Philips into a digital photo frame.

The player also comes with a built-in battery (only good for about 2.5 hours of playback, according to the specs), along with a light, square-ish remote.

On paper, the DCP951 sounds like a good fit for jet-setters or road trippers looking for a screen that's bigger than a postage stamp—and indeed, the Philips' 16:9 screen is about as good as the back-seat displays you'll find in a new car.

But the DCP951's 640 by 220-pixel display suffers from the "screen-door" effect—that is, it's all too easy to see the gaps between the pixels—while the sharp edges around people and objects look distractingly jagged, especially if you're watching up close.

Now, that's pretty much par for the course when it comes to portable DVD players like this one—indeed, I've seen much worse—and if you're just trying to keep the kids busy during a (brief) road trip, the DCP951 might be just the ticket. But for a video fanatic like me, the Philips dock comes up short.

Also, keep in mind that while the player works with video iPods (including the new Nano) and the iPod Touch, it won't work with an iPhone—don't ask me why.

So, what do you think—does the DCP951 look like a worthy travel companion? Or would you be just as happy with the tiny screen on your iPod?