Best DVD Recorder / VCR Combo under $300

[Louis Cyphre]

It's about time for me to back up those bulky VHS tapes. As for Picture/sound quality, I don't know what I can expect with this kind of money, but I heard about Philips and Panasonic models. Anyway, if you can help me with the decision, I'd appreciate it very much.

[lordsmurf]

Combos are no good. Prone to errors, and the VCRs inside them are often junk.

Philips and Panasonic are the worst two machines you could possibly get.
- Philips is plagued by various mechanical and funtionality errors, and then it has grainy quality.
- Panasonic is worthless at anything other than 2-hour mode, as it gets blocky past that, and the XP 1-hour can overdo bitrate and confuses players.

I you want a good machine, look into JVC and Pioneer.

For VHS tape work, JVC is the clear winner, as it cleans up grain and chroma noise on VHS. LiteOn or LG would be a good second choice for VHS work too. The LSI chipsets in these machines do an amazing job on VHS and S-VHS sources.

Also remember to use a good VCR to play back your tapes, not some mono $50 Walmart special.

[Marvingj]

Lordsmurf is right, combos are no good. But because of Money Woos. This best I've seen is Sansui 4005. No Hacks or firmware upgrade. Overall, Its probably the best combo unit on the market its more stable than Sanyo, JVC, Panasonic. Has a great picture. BUT ITS A COMBO>>>>>>>>

[LCSHG]

[Louis Cyphre]

In basic I agree with lordsmurf as to recorders, but I have a Go Vedio combo VHS play/record-- DVD play only. I use this as a player only in combination with a ilo RHD04 and it works very well.
When you say " back up those bulky VHS tapes" are they commercial tapes?

What kind of money are we talking about? This combination cost

ilo DVDRHD04 $212.00
Go vedio DV2150 $ 78.00
-------------
$290.00

Depending how, the cost could be lower or up to about $350.00

[trhouse]

The main difference between Philips and Panasonic combos is that Philips write only to dvd+rw/dvd+r media whereas Panasonic writes to dvd-ram, dvd-r, dvd-rw, and dvd+r media. Dvd-r media has a narrow edge in terms of compatibility with dvd players. Dvd+rw has the honor of not requiring finalizing to playback in other players but is a less compatible media. You should try to see these units for yourself because often image quality is in the eye of the beholder. Here is a thread which illustrates this point.

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=273291&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlig...20es30&start=0

Regarding if a combo is a good choice for you, I would say it depends much on your interests. If you are exploring this forum and wondering if a TBC, a process amplifier, or color corrector would be of benefit or if you have many tapes of varying quality which may require more processing; then a combo is probably not the best choice. Combos like the Panasonic can be used with these items. I have done it but it is not as convenient as separates.

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=274579&highlight=panasonic+es30

I have relatives who own combos and one of them loaned me a Panasonic DMR-ES30V for awhile. Speaking very generally, people who buy combos tend to be less inclined to learn much about the process of converting tape to disk or have few tapes to transfer or the tapes are in sufficiently good condition that no additional processing is needed to do a satisfactory job.

[Louis Cyphre]

When you say " back up those bulky VHS tapes" are they commercial tapes?

Most of them are martial arts instructionals. So, yes, but as for Macrovision, I think only a handful of them are copyright-protected. I have a TV tuner card as well. I can use that one if I have to.

[Louis Cyphre]

The main difference between Philips and Panasonic combos is that Philips write only to dvd+rw/dvd+r media whereas Panasonic writes to dvd-ram, dvd-r, dvd-rw, and dvd+r media. Dvd-r media has a narrow edge in terms of compatibility with dvd players. Dvd+rw has the honor of not requiring finalizing to playback in other players but is a less compatible media. You should try to see these units for yourself because often image quality is in the eye of the beholder. Here is a thread which illustrates this point.

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=273291&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlig...20es30&start=0

Regarding if a combo is a good choice for you, I would say it depends much on your interests. If you are exploring this forum and wondering if a TBC, a process amplifier, or color corrector would be of benefit or if you have many tapes of varying quality which may require more processing; then a combo is probably not the best choice. Combos like the Panasonic can be used with these items. I have done it but it is not as convenient as separates.

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=274579&highlight=panasonic+es30

I have relatives who own combos and one of them loaned me a Panasonic DMR-ES30V for awhile. Speaking very generally, people who buy combos tend to be less inclined to learn much about the process of converting tape to disk or have few tapes to transfer or the tapes are in sufficiently good condition that no additional processing is needed to do a satisfactory job.

Thank you for the link, trhouse. Panny's ES30VS seems to be a clear winner in this case. I saw the unit going down below $270 the other day, but I'm not sure if the deal is still available.

For now, time is an issue for me, but when I'm ready, I'd love to put my hands on the whole capturing process and learn about multimedia production. I have Leadtek's TV2000XP/EXPERT, but my desktop's been funky lately, so I didn't get to play with that too much.

At any rate, thank you all for the trouble, guys. It's very helpful.

[trhouse]

Panasonic has a new combo replacing the DMR-ES30V called the DMR-ES40V at Circuit City for $284.99. A return was available for $249.99.

[slacker]

I am still EXTREMELY happy with my Panasonic ES30VS after several months and mucho tape transfers. In fact, the more I learn about video, the more I like about this particular machine. It performs where it counts! Period.

Now that I know some of the ins and outs of this video "stuff", I can tell you that ALL of my 1 and 2 hour VHS and Hi-8 tape transfers are

artifact free
macroblock free
IRE CORRECT
detailed
sharp

Some machines soften the picture too much, brighten the picture too much, call it noise reduction when they destroy the details, blah, blah. Not this one!

If you need to FIX your videos because you stored them somewhere unforgiving for 10 years this is NOT the machine for you. If your tapes are in good shape and you're looking for a combo UNIT, this is the ONLY one! The VCR is great, the DVD recorder is great, and it is much more user friendly than some of the other units out there, a joy to operate.

You will NOT be disappointed with this machine!

The Panasonic ES40VS I would look at if it has DV inputs. I need DV inputs now!

[trhouse]

The DMR-ES40V does have a DV input. It is in a separate drop down drawer below the front panel stop and play buttons.

[slacker]

Thanks trhouse.

I figure it doesn't make sense to capture Hi-8s to DV and then turn around and transfer them to dvd using composite or even svideo inputs on a dvd recorder. Digital to digital would yield better results I'm betting. Looking at it as an option to high encoding / burning times after edits on the PC.

[trhouse]

Gshelley61 did quite a few DV transfer tests with recorders on this thread,

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=279460

As you suggest, they are very good although a few S-video captures actually get surprisingly close.

[slacker]

trhouse,

I agree! Although, I was thinking more along the line of black levels. With this digital - analog and analog - digital translation that has to occur, I believe if I hook up my DV camcorder to svideo, the video will come out too dark. In other words, I believe that the dvd recorder is EXPECTING analog CONTENT coming from svideo inputs, rather than digital CONTENT. I suppose I could change the DEFAULT black level on the dvd recorder to composite = lighter when transferring DV and see if that transfers the video with the CORRECT IRE levels. I'll give it a try!

[edDV]

The ideal combo would be set up for high quality dubs of VHS-C and other home recorder VHS material (S-VHS could be optional). Among other features it would have:

- Automatic dynamic tracking for tracking tapes from misadjusted reording VCRs (most of them)

- Equalization of audio tracks, automatic and manual audio noise reduction.

- Video noise reduction.

- Noise bar masking, VITC masking.

- Video black level detection (7.5 IRE NTSC, 0 IRE PAL nominal) with soft clamp. AGC for white detection.

- TBC or Framesync

- Logging functions to choose segments to be recorded. This will eliminante 80% of the need for post editing.

- Intermediate recording to HDD so editing can be done there. Ethernet or IEEE-1394 interface to HDD so the captured material can be transferred to a computer for editing and returned for TV preview and DVD burning.

- Ability to download other material to the HDD for playout to the connected TV.

Such a machine would still refuse to record Macrovision commercial tapes.

I think most people expect these features but none are there (except Macrovision). I'm waiting for such a machine.

[rogun]

I was given a Pioneer RT-500s as a present and I'm very happy with it. I would have never bought this unit myself because a) I don't like combo units and b) I'm loyal to certain brand names and Pioneer isn't one of them, but I've been pleasantly surprised with this unit. I've backed up home movies from 20+ year-old vhs tapes that I've had repeated problems trying to back up using all sorts of methods, including using a composite feed to various computer capture cards, but the Pioneer RT-500s worked perfectly.

The only things that I've found that I really don't like about the unit are a) it doesn't work with DVD+R media, which hasn't been a big problem as of yet, and b) it doesn't play region-free DVDs. Hopefully there will be a hack available soon for the last problem, but I haven't found one yet.

I think that I'd still prefer a non-combo unit, but the ease of dubbing vhs tapes is quite nice with this unit.

I think this recorder is, or atleast was, available from Sams Wholesale Club for around ~$250.

[bldn10]

Newbie here.

"Combos are no good. Prone to errors, and the VCRs inside them are often junk."

So, presumably a separate recorder and VCR is the way to go A decent combo is $250-$300. What recorder and VCR would you recommend in that total price range that are not junk? Or, is that simply not enough money at this point in the development of DVD recorders to get anything but?

FWIW my fine old Mitsu VCR died and the tray in my Pioneer 320 5-disk player will not stay open so I was thinking of replacing both w/ a combo unit. I will be transferring some VHS tapes, creating DVDs from my digital camcorder, and recording some programs off TV. When I get my next PC w/ DVD writer will I want to do the camcorder video on it as opposed to the DVD recorder? If so, then perhaps I don't need as much power in a DVD recorder. I do want the disks I create to work on other peoples players.

Does anyone have any idea how to fix the tray on my Pioneer? It opens and closes automatically before I can get 1 disk in and out, much less 5. That had burned me out on Pioneer but I see that their units are generally well regarded.