DVD Recorders

Laurie


Depending on the ratio of Time shifting to archiving of classic movies and whether you use digital terrestrial TV a hard disk recorder might be a good option.
This thread discussed some of the options.

As for the classic movies - these tend to be available relatively cheaply on DVD, and considering the hardware and media costs - it might be an interesting option to buy/rent the classic movies instead of do it your self recording of films.

YMMV

Completely agree with Derek given your requirements. The DVD recorder is only worth the while if you want to keep the DVDs as an archive. I use an Apple computer to record DVDs, but for simply recording from the TV then I'd go for a SkyBox + or Freeview Hard Disk recorder.

I have had a DVD recorder now for about 18 months, and a hard drive Sky+ box. Everyday recordings for progs while you are out is for the hard drive, and is so easy to do that it makes VHS recording like having to learn DOS. For keeping classic films, record the film onto the hard drive & then download onto the DVD, which has to be done in real time, so I generally set it going when I'm off to bed and grab it in the morning when it's cooked. Straight DVD recorders are so cheap now there is nothing to hang around for. I have a Panasonic and it's been totally reliable and easy to use once the initial hurdle of fear has been overcome, and I buy DVD discs on a spindle from a computer supplier at £7.50 for 50, so it's extremely cheap to do too.
Discs link
To be honest, once you've done it this way it would be impossible to go back.

Rasher - how long a program can you record on the DVDs and maintain quality. And also can you add programs to a DVD if it has sufficient space on it.

Discs start at 2 hours, but with the Panasonic it's variable by the minute up to 8 hours. We watched a recording of Live8 last night (The Who & Floyd) on a 52" projector screen, and it wasn't apparent that it wasn't live TV, and that was 4 hours on the disc. I would say that you will notice it going after that, but compared to a VHS tape it's still way way ahead. If a film is going to push it to say 3 and a half hours, I would be surprised if you could tell.
It uses DVD-RW discs, so there is that option too, and yes, you can fill up a disc in chunks if you want. I do that with home movies until the disc is full. It creates seperate chapters that appear in the top menu - just don't finalise the disc until it's full. You can watch it on the recorder in between, but it won't play on a DVD player until it's finalised. Then there is DVD-RAM, which is another tool entirely. You can chop bits out and swap them around and use it as a hard drive recorder. It'll delete and rewite sections of the disc exactly as a hard drive, but the disc is only playable on the recorder.
This is mine. And yes, the price is absolutely ridiculous

quote:

how long a program can you record on the DVDs and maintain quality

I agree on the quality thing. The only catch on my HDD recorder/DVD is that you have to record it to HDD at the "rate" that you want to copy it to DVD since you can't change that. I have mine set for at 2.5X which is 2.5hrs on a single sided DVD+R(W), this covers virtually all programs including films (except very occasional epics).
At this quality I can't tell the difference compared with the original transmission on my 42" plasma.

regards
geoff

Ive got the Panasonic EBS 10 (£120) and 55 (discontinued) and on 2 hour the quality is excellent. Through a Loewe 32" CRT, you do notice a drop in qiality on the 4 hour setting with particularly bad slurring of images on motion sports such as Grand Prix and the 8 hour setting is worse than VHS

Thanx folks

I`ll probably take the plunge after all the Xmas hullabaloo has died down

Been hearing good things about the Panasonic range. Don`t really want to spend more than £300

As you can probably guess, on this forum, picture and sound quality are pretty important

Reliability is also high on the list too

The sound output will go through my 52/135s, so I`m prepared to go the extra mile on sound

regards

laurie

Seems to be two threads on this subject - the other one is here in the Music Room.

See my discussion of the Panasonic DMRES20 Freeview DVDR on Derek's linked thread.

Recording off Freeview, I would say that PQ is traded for recording time. Options are XP/SP/LP/EP6/EP8 (1/2/4/6 hour & 8 hour with audio which might not play on other players).

Apparently, better chipsets are on the way for transcoding from Freeview to DVD, but these would be irrelevant if not using Freeview.

One thing I do like is the ability to edit programs on DVD-RAM, to remove adverts & any leading and trailing stuff, ie turn a film-with-adverts into quite a presentable "keeper". I think similar may be possible with DVD-RW, which are a lot cheaper than £2 each if you want to record-and-keep (and don't mind manually switching to widescreen when required).

cheers, Martin