Panasonic DMR-EX77 (160 GB) DVD Recorder / HDD Recorder

Be carefull when you buy any electricals from a source who is out of the UK,the one i bought was supposed to be Area 2 but it vwouldnt play DVDS.At the time of bidding i wondered why no one else put in a bid.

I purchased this dvd because I wanted a dvd recorder with a hhd and freeveiw and this model met my needs. Since buying this item i have used it many many times and cannot fault it in any way and it suits my needs perfectly

This is a great dvd recorder very easy to set up and easy to use. The greatest feature of the panasonic for me is the menu its so quick and easy to set it up to record you can do it in seconds.

This item has a 160 HDD drive built in so capacity is great for recording films music etc.
Remote control and startup is a bit slow, response times for different menus also a little slow.
Freeveiw was a doddle to setup
sounds great through a suround sound amp.
Picture quality is reasonable
looks a bit dated however fits in well with other multimedia devices
very pleased

The instruction manual leaves a lot to be desired, and the controls aren't intuitive. But if you can overcome these obstacles, this is an excellent recorder. Just remember you can't record one TV program and watch another at the same time -- but you can get around that problem by connecting a separate Freeview tuner to your TV, as we have.

Easy to setup and easy to use.
It will record from camcorders, vcrs or computers to DVD or its hard-disc or a SD disc.
Picks up digital channels and will pick up satellite channels too but I don't use this feature.

Well designed, efficient recorder and player complete with inbuilt Freeview tuner which gives excellent pictures. Good instructions and helpful technical back up from Supplier.

WHY BOUGHT:
Main reason was to copy old video tapes of family parties etc onto dvd- I have been very pleased with the quality of the recordings produced, especially considering the age and poor condition of some of the videos.
It was the second type I tried - I had bought a Whardale model first (I had 3 Wharfdale machines break in the first 2 months so decided to buy a more expensive machine that would work).

LOVE:
One great feature is you can set to record onto the hard drive from the video so the result will fit perfectly onto a DVD. You can edit it on the hard drive (divide into chapters, set thumbnails, titles etc) the use the fast copy facility to burn it to dvd.

You can also set it to record from the hard drive to exactly fit a disc (as long as the recording isn't longer than 8 hours)(although you can't fast burn this you have to do it at normal speed).

Another great thing is that you can record and play in almost any format (+R, +RW -R -RW and RAM).

The remote control has a small section that can be programmed to turn the TV on and off to select HDMI DTV etc and to change the channel and volume on the TV.This is great as you only need the DVD remote for basic functions.

LIKE:
You can use the TV guide to set a recording and can extend the recording time, record quality etc easily and a box pops up on the screen to remind you to do this

You can override timer recording - ie if you have a timer record set up and are recording manually a warning flashes onto the screen to ask if you want to continue with your manual recording or switch to your timer setting, if you do nothing it automatically switches or you can click to cancel.

The Tv guide always works and (so far) has never said 'no information available'

You can watch programmes recorded on the hard drive at +1/3 with very little sound distortion- people just talk faster and with slightly higher voices! (ie 1/3 faster than the original)and you can switch between +1/3 and normal easily- great for those painfully slow bits in films/ thrillers etc.

I haven't noticed any deterioration of quality between recordings on highest quality and the next level down.

DISLIKE:
Once your recording is on DVD you can only do basic editing (at least with -R discs) ie you can change the title or thumbnail but you can't set chapters. When the DVD burns at fast speed chapters are preserved from the original but normal speed copy does not preserve chapters. When finalising on DVD-R the machine sets chapters arbitrarily at about 10 minute intervals - I would prefer to choose where they should go.

You can't remove subtitles once they are recorded onto the hard drive/ disc they stay there.

The sound is considerably lower than watching the TV so the volume needs to be increased considerably and you cannot alter the output volume in the machine.


HATE:
Having seen the good quality of recordings made from old videos I have a queue of friends and family waiting for me to record their stuff for them too!

GENERAL:
This has all the features you would expect from a mid priced DVD recorder and many features common to PVRs too. If you can get one at a reasonable price then I would definitely advise buying it.

This is a fabulous piece of equipment. It takes a bit of getting used to but it eventually comes together. Still working out copying at high speed etc but quality is great.

This was an excellent buy. My first HDD player. I wonder why I've been using VHS all this time. Yes, the instruction manual is wordy and long, but the features are great. I can get it converted to multiregion if i desire for about £25 but i dont need that. Its picture quality is excellent picking up great hues not seen by me before & crystal clear. The digital tuner and guide are so easy to use, and if I want to edit a recording to put on DVD, well thats easy too. The forward and rewind are super fast, and the HDD is massive. I am thrilled with this and thoroughly recommend it (especially as I got mine second hand & needed to buy a new handset as missing, plus some quality cables, all for about £115.....superb!!