JVC XL-R2010BK CD Recorder

Rating:
Summary: Works Great!
Review: I ordered this for my mother. It arrived quickly, set up with no problems, burns CDs wonderfully, and will work well as a mini live music recorder. She couldn't be happier.

Rating:
Summary: Stops recording on its own
Review: In manual analog line-in mode or digital coax-in mode randomly stops recording after 30 sec. of "no signal". The notion of "no signal" is the units's own, means that if the signal is below some threshold, it is interpreted as "no signal". Everything is fine if the music you are recording is "ooompa, ooompa". There is no way to record Arvo Part or Penderecki, for example.

There is no way to deactivate the auto-stop functionality or to adjust the threshold. Since I am not interested in "ooompa" music, I decided to return the unit.

"Manual recording" should be manual: I decide wnen I start, I decide when I stop.

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding deck with a confusing manual
Review: This is a great stand-alone CD burner/player....with an incredibly lousy manual. And that's too bad because once you spend time "playing" with the deck and experimenting with the features you'll find it a very sophisticated and capable machine.

Rather than list the features of this deck in an organized manner in the operating manual, they are published in a most haphazrd manner. For instance; the deck will automatically place track markers between cuts (provided this feature is selected and there is a minimum of 4 secs of silence between cuts). What do you do if, in recording your favorite LP (or any analog program material), a track marker is not automatically inserted? There is a fix, but it will take you some intense study of the manual to find out and a bit of ingenuity on your part. The answer; the deck has an "Auto Track Spacing" function that, when enabled, puts the requisite 4 second spacing between cuts and, with the "Auto Track Marker" function selected, will adjust the spacing and add the track marker. Nowhere in the manual will you find the relationship of these features when they are combined. The features are explained individually and somewhat cryptically; feature explanations often raise more questions than they answer and hence the required "hands on" time in order to fully exploit the functionality of this deck. The JVC is very slim, quite attractive and, unlike most of todays equipment, has a certain heft and solidity to it that belies it's diminutive size. The drawback to the "sleek" design shows up in the very tiny segmented recording level meters. Unlike analog tape, for which major tape saturation (levels well above 0 vu) results in a smooth and listenable distortion, digital 0 vu exceedences results in harsh and quite unlistenable distortion. The JVC's small meter sizes makes reading and setting the optimum recording levels a bit of a challenge.

If you are willing to spend time reading (studying) the manual and woking with the deck prior doing any serious recording, you'll be happily rewarded. The JVC features are many and they are mostly quite useful ones. The deck has a wealth of inputs and outputs, both analog and digital, and there is the capaility to signal mix from two different input sources. If the manual was written better and the recording meters a bit bigger, this JVC would be a 5-star. Regardless, this deck is a solid, sophisticated piece worthy of consideration for those looking to buy a qulaity, stand-alone digital recorder.