Apex DRX-9200 DVD Player / Recorder

Rating:
Summary: For the money, very impressive.
Review: Recently purchased this locally for a whopping $79 dollars after discounts and rebates, so I wasn't expecting too much. To my suprise, I was able to record (via the SVideo in) anything I threw at it. Picture quality was suprisingly good. I even managed to make "archival" copies of several DVD's in HQ mode (2 hr) that were almost indistinguishable from the originals. Haven't tried the firewire nor modulated outputs. Did a gtreat job with DirecTV with SVideo.
I feel I got more than I paid for.

Rating:
Summary: Does the job, but...
Review: At the highest video quality setting of one hour per DVD disc the picture quality is indistinguishable from the source. The picture quality is good at lower settings.

The price is right.

But...

The menu setup was programmed to maximize inefficiency. It takes six button pushes just to get to the program setup menu. Once there, it will take at least 18 more button pushes. OK, I am used to VCRplus where you could finish your programming in as few as seven button pushes.

All these button pushes wouldn't be so frustrating if you didn't have to perfectly aim the remote as you push the button. I like remotes that let you bounce the signal off your friend's face and it still works.

The clock runs fast. It gains a couple minutes every few days. If you forget to reset it, you will miss the ending of your TV show. Even $40 VCR's have automatic PBS time clocks. A $10 watch keeps better time.

The manual is almost useless. You have to hunt around the DVR's on screen menu to find out what's available. For example, when setting a time to start your recording the AM/PM is not adjustable. If you enter 7 you will get 7 AM. To get 7 PM you have to enter 19 (military time I guess). Or you can just keep pushing the up button like you do on a $9 alarm clock. There is no mention in the manual about how to automatically record every weekday but if you push `up' when the date is highlighted it is available (but easy to miss). Neither of these (or many other issues) is covered in the manual.

The audio on the recorded discs (and when watching TV through the DVR) is low (about 2/3rds of my TV). It is also tinny. Additionally if you turn on the DVR without first changing the TV to its DVR input channel you get 2 seconds of LOUD static before it returns you to your show.

The playback usually 'blips' with a second long freeze-frame at least twice an hour.

My penultimate complaint is that the DVD locks up about once a week. It won't accept any input from the remote or on the console itself. You can't even turn it off. The only thing you can do is unplug it and start over.

My last complaint is the 25 Memorex (off brand?) DVD+RW's I bought for the Apex. They recorded once just fine but never again. They still work just fine on my computer's DVD recorder though.

This is my second but... last Apex.


Rating:
Summary: where is the audio menu?
Review: audio ouput is low,
owners manual says make adjustments in audio menu,
3 emails - company unable to help
advised to unplug unit to reset
ignored my question -where audio menu?
tell me what a great machine I have
not so happy with the inputs only being on the front

Rating:
Summary: Very Bad Product
Review: First I had a Phillips DVD Recorder, and when that wasn't working I broke down and got the APEX DVD Recorder. Well, no luck again! I am very disappointed in this. It is very hard to navigate around, you have to turn the channel so many times to get on the right source, the menu is ungly and complicated, the remote control barely works unless you are right underneath it, and you can't change from AM to PM when setting the clock or scheduling a record. I don't recommend this product and would rate it a 1 star. I'm going to try Panasonic or Sony next.

Rating:
Summary: Poor Customer Service
Review: Hooked up the unit and the remote didn't work. Called the toll number in California had to explain in detail what I did to assure that the remote was inoperative plus give all my information. I was then told that I would be contacted within 1 or 2 days with a return authorization number. After 6 days I call back and again had to give all the information and then put on hold. The agent came back and said that they were having a computer problems and they would call me back in 8 days. I tried to get a supervisor to vent my frustration and was put on hold again. After 5 minutes I was told to call back in 30 minutes that no supervisors were available.

Rating:
Summary: disappointed
Review: I just received my second apex 9200 dvd recorder/player. The first one stopped at every chapter stop. (I must interject here that amazon.com was fantastic at taking care of my problem.) Just received the replacement. I thought I'd give it a real test and recorded a movie that was 2 1/2 hrs long. The quality was fantastic. The only drawback is that it still freezes at every chapter stop on my jvc equipment, yet it plays beautifully in the apex and in my HP computer DVD Player. Oh well, you cant have everything for $119.


Rating:
Summary: Very nice design, but.....
Review: Purchased this unit due to rebate offered and lightweight up-front cost. I was pleased until I connected a camcorder and VCD player to it and these devises were not recognized (it kept asking me to power the devices on, but they were already powered up and turning everything off and on made no difference). Could not get it to record, except from TV, which was my least preference for recording from. The RF output did not work either, thus, it was determined by technical service (which answered straightaway, for which I am giving this a higher rating than deserved for the unit itself, thusfar) and told me to return it to Amazon, which will be done forthwith. Perhaps, I received a lemon and I will continue this review after the unit is replaced and I have had a chance to see it's capabilities then. (Provided, of course, replacement does not function as lackluster as this particular one that is being returned did!) Very explicit directions were included with this unit, which is a plus, much better than other products that I have purchased and the design is quite nice, very lightweight, slim and attractive, which are other pluses. Easy to follow set-up menus, as well. Wish it would had performed as expected, rather than having to pay to have it shipped back for the replacement and the time involved in this process. I have a GoVideo 6640 DVD recorder that I use and it performs admirably, however, is not as stylish or as small (slim) as the Apex DRX-9200.

Rating:
Summary: Happy So Far!!!
Review: We purchased this DVD recorder for the rock-bottom price of $100 on Thanksgiving, as did my brother. After reading some reviews, my brother returned his and bought the LITE-ON model and we kept ours. We have had very few problems. We are mostly copying home movies from our VCR. We are using cheap no-brand DVD+R/RW discs without any real problems. The only problem we had was playing them in our OLD DVD player (one of the first on the market!) Even then that was the DVD+RW disc and it played some of the titles, but not all.

The menu system is clumsy, but not worth paying more $$$ for a user-friendly menu system!!!

The only other complaint we have is the number of inputs. Could use more, but again, for the cheap, cheap price we don't mind switching around cables occasionally.

Everything else is great! Another brother just went the computer-DVD-recording route (very expensive)and seems to regret all the $$$ he spent and the amount of time it takes him to record a DVD.

Rating:
Summary: Beware of Apex's future
Review: While the Apex DRX-9200 is a better-quality product than its predecessor (which has been discontinued), it still feels low-quality when compared to Panasonic DVD recorders. It also does *not* work with DVD-R or DVD-RW, but only the "plus" format. I think it looks a bit ugly and is a bit on the heavy side.

But the main problem is the future of Apex Digital. According to the New York Times (12/28/04), the company owes its Chinese supplier over half a billion dollars in unpaid bills, and its president was arrested by the Chinese police for "[...]." From the recent lack of new products from this company and the horrible customer support it provides to customers, I'll caution anyone about buying an Apex. Yes this is a bargain, but if yours doesn't work a couple months from now, you might not be able to get it fixed. (But then again, this recorder is only $120 after rebate...)

Rating:
Summary: Great Buy for the Price
Review: You can't go wrong with this item for the price compared to other models. I've had mine for about 3 mos. and been very satisified. If your looking for a decent model with easy to use features I would recommend this model. It does the job. I've heard APEX support service could be a problem but I've had no need for them. I would recommend the Memorex DVD-R & RW's. I've been pretty happy with the quality and able to play them on both my Sony and Panny DVD players.