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Pat Germain
01-31-2009, 10:31 AM
I'm finally ready to buy a DVD recorder. My objective is to record shows from my DVR onto DVD. It seems I picked a bad time to buy.

Everywhere I look, I see high-end DVD/VHS combo units with digital tuners and not much else. The lower end models are out of stock. I'm thinking this month's transition to digital television has created this situation.

Also, some online research has revealed there are many dogs among DVD recorders. Going with a typically reliable brand, like Sony or Panasonic, isn't a guarantee of good hardware.

Do you guys have any advice?

Myk Rian
01-31-2009, 11:01 AM
I bought a Samsung DVD-VHS a couple years ago. Records from DVD to tape, tape to DVD, etc. Even came with a HDMI interface cable for free. The only manufacturer I found that included one.

Rod Torgeson
01-31-2009, 12:31 PM
Pat......I have the Panasonic DVD recorder. It is model DMR-ES15. Don't know if they still make that model or not. I have had it for a couple years now and have had no problems with it. I have recorded hundreds of movies from my Dish Network DVR onto DVDs. I use it for recording only. I have aother unit for playing a DVD, it is a combo DVD and VHS. The DVD recorder also has the super multi-format recording & playback(DVD-Ram, DVD-R, Dvd_R DL, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+R DL, DVD+RW). Anyway I am pleased with it. Hope this helps.

Rod<---in Appleton, WA

Matt Meiser
01-31-2009, 12:31 PM
My wife bought me a Toshiba for Christmas that was recommended to her by one of the local appliance stores. I've only recorded one DVD from our Tivo so far but it worked as I expected and the DVD played on our computer and on our friends' DVD player. Like you, I didn't want one that had one of those antique VHS things built in. Ours also upscales regular DVDs to 1080P and the result looks pretty darn good on our new TV.

Jim Becker
01-31-2009, 6:07 PM
Before you buy, make sure that your DVR will allow you to record off of it. Some media companies that provide DVRs disable that capability.

Ed Hazel
01-31-2009, 7:05 PM
I would think that you could download them to your computer and burn them.

Matt Meiser
01-31-2009, 7:17 PM
Before you buy, make sure that your DVR will allow you to record off of it. Some media companies that provide DVRs disable that capability.

Curious--how do they do that? Do they use something like the old Macrovision? Hope my new DirecTV HD DVR doesn't have that "feature"! :confused: :mad: Our Tivo actually helped you do it and gave you a nice start screen to record showing the pertinant info on the show.

Curt Harms
01-31-2009, 8:52 PM
Curious--how do they do that? Do they use something like the old Macrovision? Hope my new DirecTV HD DVR doesn't have that "feature"! :confused: :mad: Our Tivo actually helped you do it and gave you a nice start screen to record showing the pertinant info on the show.

We have a recent < 1 yr. old DirecTV DVR. We can record from it no problems-we use a Phillips DVD-RW. What we can't do (and I don't know of one that can) is to record High Definition. A show recorded in HD will be recorded as Standard Definition. Thank You MPAA or whomever:mad:. The irony is for me at least is that the Movie industry produces virtually nothing that I would waste my time pirating even if it were easy.

Curt

Jim Becker
01-31-2009, 9:40 PM
Matt, it's all about firmware. Every provider has their own firmware in the DVR (and STBs) and therefore can limit functionality including making certain ports unavailable all the time or when others are in use.

Matt Meiser
01-31-2009, 10:04 PM
A show recorded in HD will be recorded as Standard Definition.

But DVD isn't an HD format. You'd have to have a Blu-Ray recorder to record in HD.

Jim, with our Tivo, you were just recording the video/audio stream that went to the TV. I've assumed that's how we would record from the new one too. So unless they are putting some kind of copy protection data in that stream that tells the DVD recorder or VCR to not record, or mess up the recording the way Macrovision did, I still don't understand how they could stop you? I guess I'll have to...uh...read the manual. :D

Pat Germain
02-01-2009, 1:06 AM
I would think that you could download them to your computer and burn them.

Indeed, Ed. I would think so as well. Yet, I did some research on this many months ago. While it's possible to copy the files from the DVR hard disk to a computer, accessing them is a different story. The files are encrypted.

And, while it's possible to record to a computer in real time, it's apparently a very big hassle and not really worth the trouble. The consensus is almost unaminous. It's best to just buy a DVD recorder.

So I finally did buy a DVD recorder today. Thanks for your advice, everyone. I ended up with a Sony "direct line" DVD recorder. It has no tuner and no VHS, which is what I wanted. Wal-Mart had this DVD recorder for $120, which I think was pretty reasonable. If only that was the end to the cost. :rolleyes:

I needed a HDMI cable. Target was clearing out 6' HDMI cables for $14.00. Unfortunately, I have a convoluted, built-in entertainment center and the 6' cable came up short. Furthermore, while I was connecting the DVD recorder to my DVR, I went to disconnect the HDMI cable going to the TV and the cable broke away from the connector. NUTS! That's a 12' HDMI cable which I had to replace!

I looked around and $50 was the best price I could find for a 12' HDMI cable. I know you can get them online cheaper, but I wanted to get this together now. Mrs. Pat would not be pleased if the DVR was completely out of commission for days. And tomorrow is Superbowl Sunday, after all

I also found a 9' HDMI cable at Lowe's for about $35.00. They have the best prices on cables I've seen at a brick and mortar store. Too bad 9' is the longest they carry. They are made by RCA and appear to be of decent quality. (On a whim, I stopped by BestBuy. They now carry only Monster cable and it was over $100 for a 9' HDMI. No thanks.)

I bought a fish tape to install all the new cables. My entertainment center has a conduit between the TV and the shelving area. Luckily, that fish tape worked great. In the past, I've had to futz with those cables for hours trying to get them through the conduit. I should have bought a fish tape years ago.

I powered up the new DVD recorder and completed the initial setup. Apparently, it's capable of actually changing the channel on my DVR in order to record a show onto DVD. I didn't bother getting that working yet.

Surprisingly, the DVR sent a picture to the DVD recorder with no additional setup required. I was expecting major headaches with this. And, as Jim mentioned, I was also concerned the DVR may not even do it at all. The only input for the DVD recorder is RCA, so that's what I connected to on the DVR. I think it also has an S-Video OUT, but I'm not able to use that. It's a Hi-Def DVR, so the ond HDMI output goes to the TV.

I recorded two, 1/2-hour shows from DVR onto DVD using the "HQ" setting. This allows only 1 hour per DVD, but I prefer a good picture over more recording time. I paused the DVD recorder during commercials which worked great.

After both shows were recorded, I "finalized" the DVD which is supposed to allow it to play on any DVD player. Well, I know it works in a regular Sony DVD player, anyway. The picture quality is just as good as watching satellite TV.

I also tried playing a movie on the DVD recorder. It has up-converting and, sure enough, the picture does look better than my other DVD player. I guess that thing is now obsolete.

Thanks again, guys!

Curt Harms
02-01-2009, 8:51 AM
But DVD isn't an HD format. You'd have to have a Blu-Ray recorder to record in HD.



I wonder if DVD Dual layer would work. Similar capacity to Blue Ray but DVD DL seems to have a slower read speed.

Jim Becker
02-01-2009, 9:41 AM
Jim, with our Tivo, you were just recording the video/audio stream that went to the TV. I've assumed that's how we would record from the new one too. So unless they are putting some kind of copy protection data in that stream that tells the DVD recorder or VCR to not record, or mess up the recording the way Macrovision did, I still don't understand how they could stop you? I guess I'll have to...uh...read the manual. :D

Depends upon how that "stream" is getting to your TV. In the good old days, you could just daisy chain things since it was a one wire (or maybe three wires with composite + audio) connection. With component and HDMI, things are different sometimes with how you can or cannot insert things. The ideal setup would be the ability to record to a USB-attached drive directly from the DVR, but that's where many media firms put up the roadblocks.

Pat Germain
02-01-2009, 10:29 AM
The ideal setup would be the ability to record to a USB-attached drive directly from the DVR, but that's where many media firms put up the roadblocks.

FYI, the Dish Network DVR is capable of supporting a USB-attached drive. It requires a one-time setup fee. It will allow only one drive at a time (no daisy chaining) but you can swap out as many drives as you want. Apparently, the DVR will automatically format the drive when it's attached.

I had considered doing just this. However, many people reminded me how flakey disk drives can be. So I decided to go with a DVR.

Something I learned when researching the USB disk solution: Initially, Dish published that files on the USB disk could not be played directly. This isn't the case. The DVR can access the files and play them just like the local disk.

Dave Lehnert
02-01-2009, 11:10 AM
I would think that you could download them to your computer and burn them.

Vista Home premium is set up to operate like a DVR. Know nothing about it but see it can be done.

Dewey Torres
02-01-2009, 12:54 PM
Pat,
I will talk to you about this at work next week. I have been using TIVO to computer and then burn to DVD and yes it is a major hassle as you stated. So much so that I only did it a few times and then quit!

Jim Becker
02-01-2009, 5:30 PM
FYI, the Dish Network DVR is capable of supporting a USB-attached drive. It requires a one-time setup fee. It will allow only one drive at a time (no daisy chaining) but you can swap out as many drives as you want. Apparently, the DVR will automatically format the drive when it's attached.

I had considered doing just this. However, many people reminded me how flakey disk drives can be. So I decided to go with a DVR.

Something I learned when researching the USB disk solution: Initially, Dish published that files on the USB disk could not be played directly. This isn't the case. The DVR can access the files and play them just like the local disk.

I was referring to a USB DVD recorder drive off the DVR...sorry I was not clear on that.

Pat Germain
02-01-2009, 10:37 PM
I was referring to a USB DVD recorder drive off the DVR...sorry I was not clear on that.

Oh, no problem, Big Jim. Interesting. I didn't consider a USB DVD recorder drive. I know there are Linux drivers for such devices. But I'm sure the DVR manufacturer does indeed make sure it's not possible to get such a device up and running.

I guess the best solution would be to configure a PC as a DVR. One of my coworkers did this last year and he said it works great. I don't think he used Vista, but some kind of app with XP.

Curt Harms
02-02-2009, 2:26 PM
I guess the best solution would be to configure a PC as a DVR. One of my coworkers did this last year and he said it works great. I don't think he used Vista, but some kind of app with XP.
There are a few possibilities for that. If I were Linux literate I'd look at this.
http://www.mythtv.org/
another Windows possibility (http://www.snapstream.com/products/beyondtv/)

I have no first hand experience with either but there are a number of PC cases being marketed as DVR cases so there must be some activity going on.