Yay, it another new forum, and more hi fi, i love it. But the question I am going to ask is does everyone think like me that it's just to early to buy a DVR? The biggest issue is the format wars, as well as recording formats that just aren't up to scratch up. dvd-rw is just awful for DVR with finalising time too long (amongst other probs) dvd+RW is a little better, but still cumbersome. DVD-vr (different format on dvd-rw discs)is definitly an improvement on both with is varible bit rate recording but finalisation is a mess. but the overidding prob. with both formats is lack of space, if you go over 2 hrs of recording , the quality generally just sucks(especially on big, high res tellys) Overall dvd-ram is the best choice of the moment, but is dying a slow death as format, the DVR recording is the only thing keeping it afloat. What do you think, is it better waiting till HD-dvd or blu ray DVR hit the market, or will a new standard on the old formats win out? if we could just have something like dvd-ram that was compatible in most players and was alot cheaper we'd be right.
I think we all better wait until the formats war is over. btw devil60, I think DVR means Digital Video Recorder.
zoolu just thint Id ask as this is the frist time I heard or seen it Have you seen the prise on them====NO WAY=== Build your own DVR for Less http://www.video-insight.com/ http://www.cadsoft.de/vdr/ http://dvr.sourceforge.net/ http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/Stories/0,1413,206~11848~1945576,00.html _ _ _ _ _X_X_X_X_X_[small]Here's health to you and to our Corps= If the Army and the Navy Ever look on Heaven's scenes;=They will find the streets are guarded BY =UNITED STATES MARINES.= =Once A Marine Always A Marine:=[/small]
I bought a +r recorder at Christmas for £220 .An extra 2 years warranty cost me £30. Expensive? I don't think so!!! Secondly, how many films do you watch over 2 hrs in length? (at this setting you get a perfect visual recording - at the mo' no dvdr will do other than 2 channel dolby, which is the only drawback as far as I am concerned .) Also I regularly put two 90 min films on a -dvd with my Pioneer 106 and the quality is still good. Last point , blank -dvdrs were 30p each recently, with blank +r's costing a whopping 50p ......... making the " format wars " a little bit o.t.t. if you ask me .....p.s. , bought any video tapes lately, at 3 times the price of dvds???? Nearly forgot , finalising takes less than 1 minute .....
The problem with DVRs as of today is that they don't accept component inputs at 720p or 1080i. In other words they don't accept HD input. Even though you might not be subscribing to HD channels (which I'm not), you can still configure your satelite receiver to output regular satelite chanels at 1080i format. It will interpolate the signal and up its quality (just a bit). Regular stelite channels actually look better when viewed at 1080i. Colors are sharper and edges come out cleaner. I want to be able to record in this format coming straight out of my satelite receiver and I can't with any of today's current DVRs.
i bought a panasonic 40 gig harddrive dvd-r recorder for 400 us on sale and it is great for converting old vhs tapes recording tv or direct from my dv camcorder on firewire it would seam to be the best dvd burner i have seen in tearms of not makeing bad disks the bad is that it burns at realtime speed no high speed dubing and edting is limited compared to a pc based device but with defect free results that play well on everything i can live with slow burns that work perfectly as for hdtv current 4.3 gig disks are to small to record more than 30 minutes of hdtv so until they get 20 gig disks you arent going to get much on a dvd anyway tommays
The current DVD storage issue isn't even the half of it. Of course with a DVR unit that has its own 80-120GB HD you can just store right on the HD and not worry about running out of space, and if the unit has an Ethernet connection, then viola! you suck it off the unit onto your PC and muck with it there. No, the bigger issue with the HD DVRs coming soon to the market is the digital rights management (DRM) crap that's going to be introduced right alongside it. The content you'll be able to record will be ONLY viewable by the recorder and you couldn't edit it. Unless of course the hackers come out with a crack for that stuff, which I'm sure they will eventually. This is why I'd considered a Home Theatre PC as a complete alternative to DVRs. With a HTPC you've got a DVR, time-shifter software, DVD-burner, editing software, the works! Of course, an HD 1080i signal capture card is gonna run you nearly $800, but if you wanna capture pure 1080i signal withouth having to deal with DRMs and such, it's the way to go. I found a really good looking HTPC here: http://www.cellarcinemas.com/cgi-bin/store/HTPC-465.html Man o man... too many toys... not enough $$$.
i think the point of this forum is talk about what is currently on the market and if it works. my comments are based on owning and useing a current dvd recorder and telling the good and bad points of real world use. as broadcast flags have allready made there way into law we wont be able to record any hd single at some point in the near future tommays
well I've just entered into the DVD recorder world by purchasing a Panasonic DMR E50 recorder for £250... (even though a E55 model is on it's way shortly) No problems so far and the DVD-RAM format is perfect for me to edit my DVD recordings on my home PC before burning off to DVD-R, using my internal DVD writer (LG GSA-4040B)
