Who's familiar with the Panasonic DMR E20?

[RappWizard]

I am debating on purchasing the new Panasonic DMR E30. Although I know this DVD Recorder is not for video editing (it doesn't come with firewire input of your Mini DV videos) that' s not the only reason I would be buying it since I like the idea of being able to store my favorite programs from TV and TIVO onto DVD.
Nevertheless for those of you out there who are familiar with the Panasonic DMR E20 how can this stand alone device be used for recording and storage of your videos off of your DV camcorders. As you can tell I am somewhat of a novice to this area but I know the basics (I have Vegas Video 3.0 and Dazzle DVCll ). I don't do alot of video editing and only as a hobby. Should I go ahead and buy a DVD Writer like the Pioneer DVR-A04 or can you use the Panasonic DMR E20 / 30 as an alternative for recording your finished edited videos that have been rendered back to mini Dv, for example. Any guidance or opinions would be greatly appreciated and welcomed.

[PhilipL]

Withdrawn

[obiwan176]

I have transfered dv to the dmr-e20 and it looks identical to the original except for a little color loss. Am totaly impresses with the dmr-e20 and its recording ability. I get $1.12 princo media from rima.com and all have worked perfect on almost all players that they have been played back on. I would not spend the $ onthedmr-e30 because the only difference between it and the 20 is that it has progressive video but does not record any different than the 20.

[RappWizard]

Thanks for the valuable feedback guys. That's just the info I was looking for. I am still probably going to go for the DMR E30 instead of the DMR E20. The best prices I'm seeing on the internet for the E-30 are just as low as the E20 ( approx. $530 to $580 range) and actually I would prefer progressive scan. I have seen favorable Editor Reviews on the E30 but thus far I have not been able to find one single user review, since its so new. If you hear anything let me know and visa versa. Thanks again.

[mazinz]

dont know how much you have to spend, but the panasonic dvd recorder deck with the built in 40gig hardrive is coming to major retailers by October.
Also note i had the dmr-e20 and the dvds it made were HIGHLY incompatiable with MANY dvd players. the disc would stutter or skip at times and its not the media (memorex) as its the same disc i use for my PC dvd burner and anything made with that was fine. Also note that at times some scenes will get fuzzy for a second and then go away. this would be fine if it were not for the fact that it kept doing it every few seconds/minutes.
Also half the time this machine does not record a full size pic for dvd. many times it records 352x488 or 704x480. I am conviced this machine cannot record 720x480.
i have no idea though if the dmr-e30 fixes any of these problems ( idid contact panasonic and they forwarded over my email to their tech dpet, still waiting for a reply). On the plus side any kind of horrible shit, gltichy, video droput, noise you encounter it records with ease and everything stays in sync (unlike a pc capture card that usually chokes on such things)

[thxkid]

I have both the Panasonic DMR-E20 and their DMR-E10 and I use it all the time to record backups from DVD's, Dishnet and family Hi8mm, it works great. I even used the ram disc to edit DVD's down from the R or PG-13 to a Soft PG version. you can edit to the exact frame on the DMR-E20, turned True Lies into a PG movie. I have used TDK, Compusa and Primedisc DVD0-R's and they have played perfect in any speed in all but one player the APEX 1100. Your 1 hour speed you loose nothing maybe look a little better cause this machine has a full blown TBC bulit in, plus it has manual adjustments for just about anything including recording and playback filters, 2 hr speed is great for DVD's and Laser Discs you want to backup, the 4 hour and 6 hour I use maining to record from the dishnet of programs on Ram that I just watch and record over again, 30minute shows, Formula 1, etc.....
In the 1 hour mode I have record back and forth on a ram disc 4 times before seeing any real lose of picture color and sharness and this all played back on a 36in JVC.
I don't even use a VCR anymore, I am completly digital now.
I got the DMR- E20 at circuit city for $649 and the DMR-E10 at Amazon.com for $399, a plus about the DMR-E10 it has a 5.1 digital Dolby decoder bulit in with complete speaker and volume adjustments.
Keep in mind ALL these and future recorders have the Serial Copy Mangment Chip built in, without anyway to bypass that chip.

[Eug]

the disc would stutter or skip at times and its not the media (memorex) as its the same disc i use for my PC dvd burner and anything made with that was fine.

It still could be the media, or else a defective unit. It would have been interesting to try TDK, Mitsui, Apple, or Pioneer media.

Keep in mind ALL these and future recorders have the Serial Copy Mangment Chip built in, without anyway to bypass that chip.

You can buy things that will remove both this and Macrovision, but these are not usually cheap and not easy to find. Most of the stuff out there only removes Macrovision.

[mazinz]

quote
"It still could be the media, or else a defective unit. It would have been interesting to try TDK, Mitsui, Apple, or Pioneer media."


actually its still the recorder , lets say i made disc A with it. Disc A will play fine in some of mine, stutter or skip in others, or in a slightly older machine freeze after 32 seconds for no reason. Again though it does play fine in some (my poineer 525 plays them fine). Anything i have made using the same media or using the actual same clips (copied from the disc made back to my pc) and reburning them onto the same media works fine and eliminates any problems with the disc that was made with the panasonic. i have used tdk and other m,edia but for my pc burner only.
this is why i still suggest its the recorder. Also i really have not found many if any players that handles its xp speed either it chokes up the machine as lot of the time the bitrate will stay at 10 for a matter of time choking the machine. this has occured when making dvds on the pc as well using such a high bitrate

[oldfart13]

If you want to check out the new Panasonic Deck be prepared to be able to read a bit of Japanese as it's available in Japan now on the Matsushita website out of Japan. Yes, it has a 40 Gig hard drive and DV ports but it also costs the equivalent of $1200US! Let's hope the cost goes down somewhat before it turns up over here...

[oldfart13]

Addendum to above: eCost has the HS2 at $750US....

[fscrocco]

I have the e-20. I messed around alot with capturing a few years ago with a Matrox Marvel g400. A lot of work for not good quality. Had to live with some frame drops, lower resolution, long encoding times, etc. I love the e-20. I record on Ram, bring into my Panny lf-d321 internal (computer) recorder, export (with MovieAlbum from Panasonic), author, and burn on dvd-r with menus. Works great. I use Ulead MovieFactory, cheap and easy to use. You can also do some editing, transition effects, etc., on the mpg files with Ulead Video Studio 6.
For the one that has trouble recording at 704x480: Disable the Hybrid option. The unit records at variable bitrate, but will also drop down to 352x480 occasionally with the hybrid option.
I would never go back to the old way with capture cards unless I had to do alot of fancy edits, transitions etc.

[CapsMike]

I have an E30 and really love it. I use it mostly for backing stuff up from Tivo. I think the costs are comparable for the E20 and E30. There was one Sunday a few weeks ago when a silver E30 was $500.10! I like the progressive scan although I think the joystick on the E20 remote might have worked better than the E30's buttons. You can back up DV through S-video, as others have said... I'm curious about the 30 second lag mentioned in the manual for multiple recording sessions. Everything I have done has been a one-shot deal so I haven't seen it yet.

If you can wait, I'd hold off and see what the HS2 can do. With that hard drive, I see it as a replay TV/Tivo/Ultimate Tv system with the recorder built in. HS2 may be the next big thing. I never expected it to only be $200 more than the E30.