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Original poster

DVD Player/Recorder with Hard Drive - Anyone got one ?

14 replies

Kayleigh · 30/04/2006 19:47

Have seen one in action today and was impressed. But my friends is linked to cable and we don't need that.
Has anyone bought one of these recently and if so what do I need to look out for ?

OP posts:
Original poster
Kayleigh · 01/05/2006 10:43

bump..

OP posts:
Original poster
Kayleigh · 02/05/2006 08:05

anyone ...

OP posts:
LeahE · 02/05/2006 08:12

We've got one -- I'd suggest checking out What Hi-Fi or something similar for recommendations. You'll want a nice big hard drive (ours is 80GB and TBH I wish we had one a bit bigger) but read reviews to see what the picture quality is like for the model you're considering.

I think the Toshibas are generally good.

Original poster
Kayleigh · 02/05/2006 14:53

LeahE, how many hours does an 80GB drive hold?

OP posts:
LeahE · 02/05/2006 15:14

You can record at different qualities. At Standard quality (the second one down from the top) it holds 33 hours which sounds like a lot but once you've recorded a few movies you really mean to get round to watching but somehow don't get round to it starts to fill up (obviously I could copy them off onto DVD, but somehow that never quite happens either Blush. If you record at lower qualities then you can fit quite a bit more on but, obviously, the quality isn't as good. 80GB is probably plenty if you are more together than me...

2Happy · 02/05/2006 15:17

dh has just bought one and has spent the last couple of days getting more and more frustrated with it trying to get it to work with freeview (which we have built into the tv not a separate box). My advice would be to get one with an understandable instruction manual, the sony hx510 is in gobbledegook!

Original poster
Kayleigh · 03/05/2006 18:41

thanks ladies, i need to do some investigating !

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marthamoo · 03/05/2006 19:03

We just bought \link{http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/5335237.htm\this one}. I'm not an expert - dh did the research - but I think it's great. More space on the hard drive than we'll ever use, it can ...I have no idea what I'm saying here so bear with me..do DIVX and JPegs so we can watch stuff dh has downloaded from the internet without reformatting and also pictures from the digital camera. And it's nice not to have to scramble for a disc with space on it when your programmes's about to start. Also can do that record same programme every week malarkey so as not to miss Lost!

And - so far - I've managed to record everything I've set it for with no disasters...

Though PDC seems flakey - but then it was with our old DVD recorder - I think that's a freeview thing.

marthamoo · 03/05/2006 19:05

Oh yes it does that thing where you can be watching something and the phone rings or whatever so you 'pause' TV and go back to it and watch it when you're ready. I find that a bit unnerving actually because I have no comprehension of how it works - I think it's voodoo.

Handy though Grin

Original poster
Kayleigh · 03/05/2006 20:36

ooh I like the sound of the pause thing Marthamoo. Very handy when that chocolate is calling me from the fridge.

Umm what's PDC ??

OP posts:
ixel · 03/05/2006 20:55

The only thing with that one is that it only does region 2, which is ok unless you have a friend who sends you cheap dvds from abroad, or you get some off ebay!
There was one in Dixons on offer at £130 which did most stuff you'd need and had a hard drive too.
You may have gathered that we're starting to look around, as our crappy old machine wont even play copies, and the VCR is in the bin thanks to ds1! Dh says we should wait 6 months, as they'll drop in price drastically. He's an AV tech by trade, so he kind of knows what he's on about..

marthamoo · 03/05/2006 22:20

PDC is when the programme is about to start it sends a little signal and if your recorder has a PDC function, when you set it to record something, you can choose the PDC option and if , say, your programme start is delayed because the previous thing goes over time it won't start recording 'til it picks up the little signal. There's another little signal at the end so it doesn't stop recording too soon. You usually use it with the pluscode numbers you get in listings magazines etc. but I think you can use it when you set the time manually too.

Which is all well and good in theory but we've had a lot of problems with it - I don't think it works at all if the programme you are recording is on freeview, and sometimes - even when it's not freeview - it's started recording and stopped after 10 seconds. So I tend not to use it at all now.

I think it stands for Programme Delivery Control - though I could be wrong!

Original poster
Kayleigh · 07/05/2006 18:53

ahhh yes, our VCR had the PDC thing but it never worked properly either - was always cutting the ends of programmes off.

Ixel, I'm sure they will go down in price but I want one NOW Smile

OP posts:
ixel · 07/05/2006 19:14

Hmmm... I feel like that every time I see a new buggy Grin Just got another one. I think its about the 10th.

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