dvd recorder store avi on hdd

[jamespoo]

my mate has a dvd recorder he wanted to sell to me for a good price i wanted to know it can play avi divx mpeg4 mpg mpeg it has a 250gb hdd can you copy the videos from a usb flash stick or a sd card to the hdd ??

and i also wanted to know when i rec a video from my PlayStation or wii ect to the dvd recorder can i then copy it to a flash stick or sd card i hate having to burn dvds

[transporterfan]

Some do, some don't. Some only play from the USB. Do you know the model number?

[DB83]

No. You can never copy content from a usb stick or flash card to the HDD of a dvd-recorder.

[transporterfan]

Like I said...some do. This one can have a library of DivX user content.

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/dvd-recorders/lg-rht497h-608332/review

[DB83]

Like I said...some do. This one can have a library of DivX user content.

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/dvd-recorders/lg-rht497h-608332/review

Ok. My mistake. But content is restricted to Divx so eliminates many formats.

[transporterfan]

True. It will never play a Blu-ray ISO. I would put the money towards a media player.

[orsetto]

i hate having to burn dvds

Then there's really no point whatever in acquiring a DVD/HDD recorder, even if your mate is offering it for almost no money.

The "multimedia" features of such recorders are a joke: the only video files they'll accept are DiVX within a very narrow range of specs. Usually they won't play them directly from USB, the files must be copied to the HDD first (before you can even know if they're compatible). DiVX is usually playable from files on a DVD, but if your goal is to avoid discs, here again such a unit is of little use. Reverse copying from HDD to USB is often severely limited, anything recorded from tuner or line inputs to the HDD is generally restricted to DVD export. A handful of recorders were a bit more flexible about bidirectional USB, but they're needle in a haystack and most were sold only in Asia. They're great boxes for making/editing DVDs, but a one-trick-pony otherwise.

Better to put your money into a dedicated modern media player like WD Live (unless you just happen to need a spare DVD player with recording features). Being able to swap generic HDD archives with ease is a huge advantage over an old DVD/HDD machine with just the one proprietary (and aging) 250GB HDD.