!!!BEWARE!!! Before you buy a SAMSUNG DVD-R175 Recorder read this !

[highvolumeJP]

(removed).
Don't buy the DR7 or R175 they both are very bad!

[jjeff]

Yes it's too bad when respectable companies take the low road and outsource their name. Any ideas who makes this pos? Funai makes most DVDRs and if they made this Sammy it sounds like they must have a "low" line as well.
Lack of S-video would have killed it for me also, I think LG also omits S-vid on some of their DVDRs. The multiple speeds sounds nice but I still like Flexible Record best.

[MJA]

The only thing I will buy made by Samsung are TV's,and cell phones .everything else avoid from cameras to camcorders to dvd/bluray players .low ratings/quality(Samsung BD-P1400 is one example )

[samijubal]

Samsuck tarnish their name? I don't know how they conned people into thinking their stuff is quality. Admittably they have gotten better in recent years but before that they were bottom of the barrel with Funai making products that lasted longer in many cases.

[jman98]

Samsuck tarnish their name? I don't know how they conned people into thinking their stuff is quality.

Some Samsung products are of extremely high quality, such as their HDTVs. Honestly, it's hard to find a better HDTV at any price than a Samsung. The problem is that they don't make such high quality merchandise for everything under their name.

[lacywest]

I do have two Samsung PC monitors ... a 17 in and a 19 in ... they work nicely.

But during the Summer of 2008 ... I bought a 26 inch HDTV with PC input and in about 3 days the HDTV tuner stopped receiving a OTA signal clearly .... kept saying weak signal or no signal.

Packed it up and took it back to Best Buy ... a floor sales clerk said they were having problems with the TV tuners in them. On the web I found a post from somebody who had a 51 inch and samething happened ... a technician came out and replaced the circuit board and fixed it.

So ... for another 60 bucks I bought the Sony 32 inch 4000 model ... 2 HDMI ... 2 component ... Svideo and a PC input. I have it connected to my PC using the Component 1 ... connection.

I have not been happy with the BS that Sony has been doing over the past years but this 700 dollar HDTV works very nicely. Its in my garage sitting on my workbench with my PC and Pioneer VSX-815 Silver Receiver connected ... things get rocking out here.

I have Acoustic Research speakers everywhere in my garage ... not all of them are hooked up ... just stocked piled from Ebay purchases ... what I do have connected are a pair of AR 48S for the fronts under my work bench and Boston Acoustic HD5 [Book Shelf size] on top of my workbench and Acoustic Research AR28s as my rear channels and a AR 8 inch powered subwoofer under the bench and a small AR PL100 Slim Design speaker for my center channel sitting in front of my Sony TV.

I bought two sets of AR PL 100 speakers and I am using one of those in my Bedroom setroom ... sounds very good ... one set costs about 150 bucks on the Internet if you look around ... the subwoofer uses a single Power IC chip to power the 8" subwoofer ... I am not using it ... I'm using with more power plus I have 2 Design Acoustic Passive Subwoofers connected to help the small AR satellites provide the bass.

[marvel2020]

Well I've got the Samsung BD-P1500 Bluray player, had it for about 2 months now and it's performed excellently, and now with the latest firmware on it, it plays Avi's.

The only thing that lets it down is that it can't be made region free for SD DVD's and Bluray's so I either have to buy Region 2 or Region Free Blu Ray's.

And I'm no to worried about Region Free playback for SD DVD's on it anyway, I've got my Toshiba XE1 or EP10 for that and I've the OPPO 983H arriving in 3 weeks time.

[orsetto]

Apparently this explains the continuing second-hand high demand for the older, better brand name recorders on eBay and Craigs List.

Samsung is hardly alone in the DVD recorder junkpile: nearly any machine sold in the USA these days under any brand name is a rebadge sourced from Funai, or even worse third parties. Last time I looked, only Panasonic and Sony were still selling their own designs, with the Sonys quite a comedown from their heyday. If you're in need of a new DVD recorder, its a short list of options: Panasonic on the low end or perhaps the Phillips/Magnavox units with HDD for a bit more money. Otherwise opt for used, or a Canadian Pioneer or Canadian Panasonic with HDD.

[highvolumeJP]

Yes it's too bad when respectable companies take the low road and outsource their name. Any ideas who makes this pos? Funai makes most DVDRs and if they made this Sammy it sounds like they must have a "low" line as well.
Lack of S-video would have killed it for me also, I think LG also omits S-vid on some of their DVDRs. The multiple speeds sounds nice but I still like Flexible Record best.

The R175 uses a MAGNUM MS-xxxx chipset, those are low-end, value line, cheap chipsets - The drive inside said Toshiba/Samsung, but whatever it is their drives suck anyways. The Toshiba DR-7 uses a panasonic chipsets (the lowend value line) and a FUNAI drive

The multiple bitrates on the R175 is a gimmick - the unit has so many flaws out of the box that I'd rather have a good unit that can record decent 2h and 4h, like the Dr7.

Of course forget about recording complex scenes with lots of movements, and so, on most cheap recorders, at those bitrates.

[highvolumeJP]

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