Reviews of JVC-10

[chris98007]

I am wondering why it is still hard to find any reviews of this recorder. Cnet seems to have fallen way behind on reviews of products. I know this recorder is somewhat new, but come on it is the buying time of the year. Anyone have any insight?

[BJ_M]

JVC DR-M10S DVD Recorder

Great Ideas, Poor Quality
by harper1970 (10/20/2004)
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful

Pros: Lots of cool features
Cons: Poor quality

Ok, so I bought this unit to have a combo unit that
could playback and record vhs tapes and dvds. The
dubbing stuff is a bonus but I don't use it.

First, in my testing, the DVD recording works great-
you can write to almost any format and mastering into
DVD format is simple and fast. I would argue that the
DVD recording is better than the VHS. Supposedly you
can also record DV from your camera. There is even a
feature to record a DVD and watch and earlier part of
what you are recording simultaneously.

The unit is a little difficult to figure out- you
definitely need to read the manual before you try to do
anything.

Now for the bad. After owning the unit for several
months, it suddenly started stopping in the middle of
dvd playback, loading, or recording, and started
flashing "loading". It will eventually turn
itself off, or you have to unplug the unit, plug it
back in (it will still flash "loading" for a
minute or so) and let it shut itelf off.

I haven't tried to fix it yet but i have found the
best solution so far is just turn the unit off
completely and let it rest, and it will start working
normally again (for awhile).

If you buy this one definitely get the extended
warranty.

[BJ_M]

just got it -- first impressions, November 15, 2004

Reviewer: T. Chang "amazon realtor" (Milpitas, CA) -

I just got this for 1 week now -- mostly been transferring videotape to DVD. What I'm writing here is my first impression, as I've only used a small portion of the features so far. The setup has been mostly straight forward. I like that the inputs are available in the front as well as the back. I like that it has the i.link for Sony camcorder transfer in the front. The manual can be a little confusing. I've trying to setup the menus and title menus, but it seems I only have 1 master top menu. The chapter menus are not configurable. The manual is not much help here. You can enter the DVD title using the screen display of a keypad -- moving aruond with your cursor can be a little tiresome. The reason I got this was that Consumer REports rated it well -- I believe it was the JVC-DRM10SUS. I assume this is the same one. The quality so far is good. I will add another review when I've tried the Sony camcorder transfer and my Dish Network recording features.

[BJ_M]

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&domains=www.videohelp.com&as_qdr=all&....videohelp.com

[sullen]

If you do a search just in this forum you will get a ton of threads on this machine. My general opinion on this machine is excellent. I know there are issues with this machine, just like every other machine, but the quality of recordings produced by this machine outweigh these issues.

*edit
The work has been done for you, I was just too lazy to follow the above link before posting, but not so lazy as to not edit my post to reflect my laziness.

[chris98007]

This machine in the opinion of most here is in the top 3-5 and that is great. My only question was if this machine is so great why are there not any staff reviews on any major sites? They seem to have lots of Panasonics and govideos, Toshibas and Pioneers.

Again, this is a major time of the year for electronic purchases and you would think there would be lots of reviews of a top 3-5 machine.

[lordsmurf]

In terms of video quality, this is one of the best DVD recorders that has been made to date.

This gets my highest rating.

(The DR-M10S ... do NOT get the combo unit MV-1S.. or ANY combo unit from ANYBODY... always flawed mechanics).

It has some power issues that are fixed simply by disabling the POWER SAVE feature that is on by default. If that is not done fast enough, it may cause permanent damage. See "loading" complaints in this forum. Like ALL other recorders, it will also get angry at bad source being fed into it.

As far as "major" sites.... which ones?

Panasonic was first. That is why there are more. They also have one of the worst recorders when it comes to CLEAN video quality.

GoVideo is a horrible company. Stay away. VHS users usually understand why.

Pioneer is a good one too, also always in top 3-5 units. I rank it 2-3, shares that rank with LITEON units.

[chris98007]

Lordsmurf

Thanks for the reply. I am know that the JVC is one of the best in quality, that is why i do not understand the lack of test reports. You would think that JVC would be pushing this model big time for reports. As it is do you think the average customer would walk into a store and know to buy one of these? No, they would walk away with a sony or panasonic.

[broadway]

It has some power issues that are fixed simply by disabling the POWER SAVE feature that is on by default.

Are you sure it is disabling and not enabling?

On my JVC the POWER SAVE feature was disabled when I got it.
In other words, the front LED displayed the time when the unit is powered off.

After a few instances of the LOADING message, I went in and
*enabled* the POWER SAVE feature. Now, the front LED is completely
dark when the unit is powered off.

[lordsmurf]

I think you're correct, that "OFF" is on and "ON" is off. Just figure it out by watching the clock disappear (that means it is NOT POWERED). You want NO POWER to the machine when you turn it off. Extended power to the unit, like anything else electronic, can cause problems in the long run.

[lordsmurf]

Lordsmurf
Thanks for the reply. I am know that the JVC is one of the best in quality, that is why i do not understand the lack of test reports. You would think that JVC would be pushing this model big time for reports. As it is do you think the average customer would walk into a store and know to buy one of these? No, they would walk away with a sony or panasonic.

I don't agree. Many of those "fair and balanced" sites online only review the products they get sent to them for free. That's never been the way I operate.

Just look at Tom's Hardware; he has his snoot so far up AMD's butt that fair reviews on Intel CPU's are probably impossible these days. I post complaints about magazine articles here from time to time, as many are cluelessly written and full of bogus facts.

Most consumers are stupid anyway, and listen to a clueless salesman at Best Buy, so those reports would largely go ignored.

I wouldn't lose much sleep over what you are seemingly observing as a high quality product slipping silently under the radar. Many products are like this. Just be proud of yourself that you were able to identify a high quality product, and carefully advise others of your excellent find as you can.

[samijubal]

Keep me off the list of people liking the machine. Practically every recording I made had bad spots in it, there were lines in the picture in every recording too, this with 3 different machines. The second one didn't even last a week before loading problems. I dumped the sorry machine like a hot potato and took $150 loss.

[BJ_M]

Lordsmurf
Thanks for the reply. I am know that the JVC is one of the best in quality, that is why i do not understand the lack of test reports. You would think that JVC would be pushing this model big time for reports. As it is do you think the average customer would walk into a store and know to buy one of these? No, they would walk away with a sony or panasonic.

I don't agree. Many of those "fair and balanced" sites online only review the products they get sent to them for free. That's never been the way I operate.

Just look at Tom's Hardware; he has his snoot so far up AMD's butt that fair reviews on Intel CPU's are probably impossible these days. I post complaints about magazine articles here from time to time, as many are cluelessly written and full of bogus facts.

Most consumers are stupid anyway, and listen to a clueless salesman at Best Buy, so those reports would largely go ignored.

I wouldn't lose much sleep over what you are seemingly observing as a high quality product slipping silently under the radar. Many products are like this. Just be proud of yourself that you were able to identify a high quality product, and carefully advise others of your excellent find as you can.

i really agree on tom's hardware ... it USED to be a great site years ago -- but it is SOOOOO commercial now that it is basically just one big ad ..