Buying A Karaoke DVD
To perform all your favorite karaoke hits at home, you will need a microphone, a player and a song collection. One of the cheapest ways to accomplish this is to buy a karaoke DVD player for as little as $30. Although some would argue that setting yourself to perform on your computer is the least expensive way because you need only a $20 microphone and 79-cent karaoke downloads. If you are computer savvy and are willing to spend $49 for karaoke software, then you can create your own custom DVDs using your current mp3 collection.
Rather than buy a karaoke system, multi-functional karaoke DVD players range from $30 to $200 and play regular DVD movies too. The best karaoke DVD players will accept CD G (CD Graphic) format, which is the kind that plays songs and scrolls the lyrics on the bottom. Karaoke DVDs scroll lyrics too, but there are many more CD G karaoke songs available to buy. The VocoPro DVG399K ($110) has 5.1 Dolby Digital output to get the most from your speakers, two microphone inputs, digital key control to alter your voice and accepts CDs, CD-Rs/mp3s, DVDs and CD+Gs to give you maximum versatility.
According to online retailer Amazon, the kid karaoke DVD offerings tend to sell best. Disney’s “High School Musical” 1 & 2, “Hannah Montana,” “Disney Radio Hits” 1 & 2, as well as “Jump & Jive with Hi-5″ and Sesame Street’s “Sesame Sings Karaoke” are all karaoke hits. For older teens and adults, Billboard released a “Top 10 Karaoke Box Set” that includes 40 songs including John Lennon, Neil Diamond, Dolly Parton and Sting, to name a few artists. Also, Party Tyme offers a multitude of karaoke songs on DVD for $13.99, with themes including: Broadway, Country, Old Country, Greatest Hits, Oldies, Pop, Rock and Love Songs. Startrax offers fun genre DVDs too, including 80s movies, 80s pop, alternative anthems, another top 20 hits, at the movies, back to school, boogie nights, classic R&B, country classics, dancing in the streets, disco classics, girls night and kids, to name a few.
Of course not every genre is easy to find on DVD, although it can be done. For instance, fans of Hip Hop/R&B can check out R&B Classics by Startrax, which includes cover artists doing “In Da Club” (50-cent), “Hot In Here” (Nelly), “S.O.S” (Rihanna) and “Shut Up” (Black-Eyed Peas). Punk rockers will love the newly released Punk Rock Karaoke DVD that features stars from the bands NOFX, Bad Religion, Social Distortion and The Adolescents, as well as performances/sing-a-longs for “Gimme Gimme Gimme” (Black Flag), “California Über Allies” (Dead Kennedys), “Minor Threat” (Minor Threat) and “What Do I Get” (The Buzzcocks), to name a few.