Rating: 
Summary: Horrible Product, Horrible Service
Review: I am going to make this short and sweet. I am on my fourth Philips DVD unit in less than two years. There is very little help from Philips, if it were not for the in-store warranty I would not have any working machine at this time. The biggest problem with the Philips recorders are continued failures in their lasers and software. Philips will avoid supporting these products at all costs. What a horrible waste of my time, money, and sanity. Please boycott all Philips products, as thousand of Philips DVD recorder owners are in the same boat I am.
Good day
Rating:
Summary: Look at anything BUT a Philips if you are smart
Review: "The one star is required and no negative stars are available so it got a 1" I used my DVDR80/17 for 8 faithful months not paying any attention to the reviews. If you do buy one I hope for your health's sake your DVDR80 is better than mine. After fourth trip to the "authorized repair facility" it was returned with only four recording modes, not having the 2x (or 2.5 hour mode) and the M6 and M8 (not that I used them but they wern't there). I haven't tried to do anything but play a DVD as yet because I was sick at my stomach after the setup and seeing only the M1,2,3,4 modes were available and really did not want to go any further at the time. The first time it tried to play a disk it went into the record and I had to pull the plug to turn it off. After the second setup it did play a disk. BUT, to contact Philips and get anything but the check this check this, then the well I see from the history this has been done. IF you can understand the person in the first place. If you live upstairs go out on the balcony give a good yell. You will get a better faster reply. As I was told they are out of the repair picture after they turn it over to joe shmuck's repair shop. And the repair shop will talk very nice about how they will fix it up just fine, but mine is still broke after FOUR trips. Every time it was returned from the shop it was worse than before. I personally wish I had never seen the Philips name, I would be $600 and many hours aggrivation better off. So Beware! READ those reviews, folks like Amazon, cnet, dvdhelp, and a host of others put them there to help you, to keep you from making the same mistake many others have. Wish I had listened!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Awesome reproduction quality - Easy to use - AAA+++
Review: Being fairly inept at new fangled things I was a little leary about some of the reviews saying this machine was hard to understand and that the instructions were vague.Okay the instructions are a little bit vague BUT the online instructions from www.Philips .com seem to be more user friendly and contain more advice. But with a very, very little bit of instruction I have been able to make wonderful reproductions of the grandchildrens baby videos. Also I have a down syndrone nephew that I have been able to make some great movies for his use. From the T.V not copied because I know thats illegal. :o) I would rate this one of my best purchases in electronics. A close second would be an Infocus X1. Both are GREAT !!!
Rating:
Summary: run and hide this things psychotic
Review: I am not one generally to anthropomorphize electronics, but after more than a year with this recorder I am left with the notion it has serious problems. I have spent more than 16 hours waiting for and talking to Philips customer service...they can read you the manual, but since you're reading this I assume that will be as much help to you as it has been to me. At this stage I know more than customer service about their machine. The interface is difficult and cumbersome I recommend avoiding the system. It periodically will not recognize DVD-R disks, although it always recognizes DVD-RW media. It randomly changes channels, stops recording in the middle of a program, etc.
Try Sony I hear their system is easier to use.
This is a shame because when it works it makes beautiful quality images.
Rating:
Summary: Add me to the list of mad customers
Review: I bought my DVDR80 in August of 2003. About six months ago, it just quit reading DVD+R. It still read DVD+RW. Now it doesn't read them either. Whether the disk is made on the PHillips unit or on my PC with NERO, the disks will not read. IT still reads and plays commercial DVD. I have a $500 DVD player. {Looks snazzy though!} I made ONE recording I kept with this unit. That makes this a $500 recording. I could have bought a lot of DVDs for that. I am going to replace this with a standard DVD player. This was a bad and an expensive idea.
Think about it long and hard before you buy this. Wal-mart has a DVD Recorder for about $250. It hurts less to throw one of those away.
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your money
Review: I received this machine as a replacement for a previous dvd recorder (Philips dvdr985) that Philips could not repair. Both machines did the same thing. After having them for 6-7 months they stopped functioning properly. The timer will not work so unless you are home and use the qtr button the machine will not record. The machine will turn on, but nothing will record. When using a dvd+r disc using the M4 mode to record, it will erase the first movie recorded. Disc error messages when finalizing and unknown data messages occur with regular frequency no matter what type of disc (dvd+r or dvd+rw) or manufacturer. My unit is still under warranty but I was told by Philips I would have to pay to have the unit shipped to and from them if I want them to look at it. Since this machine is doing the same thing as my previous one I am electing to toss it in the garbage rather than spend any more time and money dealing with it and Philips. Sony is now making a dvd recorder that will record dvd+r and dvd+rw discs so I am buying that one.
Rating:
Summary: Don't use with a large 16:9 television
Review: I was so optimistic about the DVDR80 that I bought it on-line, and now have to deal with the pain of returning it on-line. However, I find that I'm putting it in a situation that it just can't handle. I have a Samsung HCL5515W 55" rear-screen projection HDTV monitor with a 16:9 aspect ratio. I use it in a home theater setup to watch high-definition satellite/OTA programming and DVDs. I intended the DVDR80 to replace a JVC XV-S65 that has worked reasonably well, but sometimes won't stay in progressive-scan mode, and occasionally takes a little hiatus entirely. However, the DVDR80 just can't deal correctly with 4:3 aspect ratio disks or inputs on a 16:9 display. In its 16:9 mode, it insists on expanding the picture to a ludicrous extent, cutting off the tops of peoples heads, for example. Not just a little. It looks as if it's zoomed in all the time (yes, I did make sure that zoom is turned off). In it's 4:3 modes, it stretches the picture horizontally, producing an intesting, but tough-to-watch, funhouse effect. I called Philips tech support, and they basically read me the manual, explained that I had no other options, and suggested that I pick whichever set of settings that produced a sub-standard image that appealed to me more than the other sub-standard images. It turns out, by the way, if that if you're dissatisfied with having the Indian support tech read you the manual, there is a nice post-office box in Miami that you can write to. The device can play wide-screen DVDs and get all the picture info on the screen at the correct aspect ratio, BUT the vaunted Faroujda filter produces a grainy, pixelated image in which pixel-crawl is almost always evident, and is sometimes so severe that the outlines of objects are obviously changing, when they move only slightly. I can't make use of the unit's Guide Plus function, as I am a satellite subscriber. However, I was still forced to sit through an analog channel scan during initial setup that (no kidding) took more than 20 minutes to complete. There's no way out of that. Despite the total lack of Guide information, the Guide still comes up immediately when you put in any DVD. This, fortunately, can be disabled. In short, I find that I've put this gadget into exactly the wrong situation. Buy this device if you have a small (maybe 40" or under) standard-definition television and are a cable customer. I'll bet it works great there. If you have a large projection, plasma, or LCD display and use it with satellite hi-def, RUN, don't walk, toward some other model.
Rating:
Summary: Worst electronics purchase I've ever made
Review: If you value your sanity, avoid this piece of junk like the plague. In less than a year of ownership, we have had multiple problems. At times the recorder has stopped timer recording with no rhyme or reason--ex: one day I was watching the tv while it recorded a football game....with a half hour to go it just shut off, and when I got it turned back on and checked the timer settings, I hadn't goofed, it really was supposed to record for another half hour. I guess the recorder got bored with the game and didn't want to record any more!
Then there have been the times when I've recorded a program, and then when I've tried to watch it, I get the message "disc error" for no apparent reason. Or, how about recording two hours of home movies only to have it decide that it doesn't want to finalize the disc? Talk about frustration.
What other problems have we encountered? Even when the unit is functioning normally, if you set it to time sequential programs on different channels, you'll lose about the first minute of the second program. That's because the recorder finishes recording the first program, has to do something to finish (I'm not sure what), and then it will start the next recording. By that time you've lost the beginning of your next show.
Other things: I've recorded a +R disc and then (disc never removed) tried to create the titles and finalize the disc. The unit won't do it, instead it gives the message "data not detected." Again, a waste of time and money.
Or....you can put in a finalized disc that has played in the recorder before, but you'll get the message "no disc." Later it will play the same disc. We're talking about discs without smudges, dirt, scratches, warping etc.
Then there are the times when you're trying to watch a commercial (movie) disc....it will freeze throughout a scene, then after a few seconds play for a second or two, freeze again etc. etc. until you give up in frustration. At that point we take the disc, put it in a different player in another room, and watch there. It's the same disc, nothing altered about it, it's just that other brands can play it but the Philips gets glitchy.
Last week I almost had 3 months of wasted work on my hands. I had finished tranferring all our home movies to dvd, and was making copies for all the family members. I hadn't finalized the discs, though, because I wanted to first make sure that all the titles and dates were correct. I had 45 unfinalized discs and suddenly the Philips no longer wanted to finalize anything! I would reset the unit, it would finalize two or three, then do nothing....I must have spent 6 hours resetting the unit over and over until I could get the discs completed. I had to throw out three discs because the finalizing went wrong and the discs were unreadable in any player, i.e. ruined.
If the glitchiness of this unit wasn't enough to make you avoid it, let me tell you about my failed attempts to get help from Philips customer service. It started about three months ago when I was having problems recording; the unit would no longer record on blank discs it could previously use. I called customer service and was told that I needed a firmware upgrade, and that it would be sent in two weeks because it was backordered. After a month with nothing received, I called back and was told that my case would be referred to a specialist, who would call me. Another two weeks went by with nothing. So, I called back and was again told the same thing. By this point I was tired of the runaround, so I asked if I could download the upgrade off the internet. I was told how to do this, and after downloading, burning my own cd and putting it into the unit, it upgraded and seemed to work. The "specialist" never did call, but since it seemed to be functioning, I didn't care.
Well, since then all these other problems have cropped up. I have called Philips repeatedly, to no avail. In their favor, at least they have moved their customer service center and the new people seem to know much more about the product. But, the company doesn't support even their own service reps. In numerous calls, I have been unable to find out the location of a repair place. I have tried using the Philips automated system that says it will let you enter your zip code and then you'll get a repair location; after three transfers you get--can you guess--kicked back into the customer service menu! So, I tried looking it up on the web, but that doesn't work either. Even when I enter the zip code for one of the repair stores listed on the back of my manual, it gives no results. Maybe those stores exist, but who knows? The last thing I want to do is mail off this very expensive piece of junk to a place that may or may not exist!
So....I tried e-mailing Philips customer service. What happens? You get a return e-mail telling you to call them! But if you call them, even the reps don't have any way to access repair location information! Who ever heard of a company where the company itself doesn't know where they fix their own product??
Honestly, at this point I'm wondering if my only recourse is to contact the Better Business Bureau, and hope that they can help.
After all these headaches, two days ago we bought a Pioneer DVR-520H-S recorder. This one has an 80G hard drive, and I'm finding out that having a recorder with a hard drive is a huge advantage. It simplifies recording and editing; I can record to the hard drive and then only copy what I really want to keep. I know, with the Philips you can do the same thing onto a +RW disc, but good luck getting the Philips to work! Plus, editing isn't nearly as easy as on the Pioneer. The Pioneer is much more user-friendly, and guides you through each step of whatever process you're trying to do (copying, recording, etc.) I am VERY happy with the Pioneer DVR-520H-S, and would strongly recommend it over the Philips DVDR80. If you don't want to go with Pioneer, I would still check out recorders with a hard drive, so far we're finding it to be much more useful. Regardless, please spare yourself hours of frustration and many wasted dollars on ruined discs; buy something besides the Philips DVDR80.
Rating: 
Summary: Good...but not great
Review: Ok, first let me tell you the pros and cons... I'll start with the cons (it's tradition, right?): CONS:
I'm a consumer that likes to keep things simple, flexible, and solid. I dislike "features" that get in your way. The Guide+ is one of those features. Some people might like the ease of entering a "code" and then sitting back and let the recorder do the work. But, this "guide" seems to get in the way. The comment from the other poster is right. The timer guide disables the the external connections (1 and 2). The timer is only used for recording timed TV or cable. Just to be fair, I don't normally time my DVD recorder to record a VHS tape. So, I really don't need to "time" a VHS (external 1) or Laser Disk recording because I have to BE THERE to press play, don't I? The timer works fine for recording a TV/Cable show (which is the ANTENNA/CABLE connection; Coaxial). The external 1 and 2 connections are used for VHS or Laser disk (RCA cables). Next, the software is a little on the slow side (the software that actually runs the DVD player). The commands (record, stop, play, pause, guide, etc) take second to respond. The DVD recorder seems to be "thinking." So, make sure you aren't in a rush when pressing buttons. You must be very deliberate on the "button pressing." Don't press a button, and then start pressing the buttons again because it didn't respond fast enough. Patience, we're only talking a second. It would be nice if the commands were faster, though. The DVD recorder seems to designed as a "cable tuner (just like VCRs)" That's where you plug your cable line directly from the wall to your DVD recorder. But this is not the case for most homes. Most people I know have a CABLE BOX. And they use that box to control the channels. Not a VCR or DVD recorder's tuner. So, a lot of features on this DVD recorder will not be used (Guide+ is one of them). Also, the channel scan is useless because the only channel you need is 3 or 4. From then on you just use your own cable box to change channels (while keeping the DVD recorder on 3 or 4). The auto date/clock sync feature is not used too if you use a cable box. Also, I you plan on using a cable box, don't use the G-Link. The G-link is a cable that runs from the back of the DVD recorder to the front of the cable box. It' used to change the channel of your box (timer recordings). But if you use a cable box, the Guide+ forces you to chose a channel. If you need to record channel 44 on the cable box, but at the same time you need the DVD recorder set to 3 or 4. You can't use the G-link, because it changes the 3 or 4 channel to 44. HELLO! Channel 44 on the DVD recorder has NO PICTURE. Channel 44 on the cable box does have a picture. But you need the DVD recorder to STAY on 3 or 4. The G-link seems to have a mind of its own too. When you turn the DVD recorder off, it scan the channels. It must be trying to find more channels because it's "hungry?" Not sure. PROS:
The quality of the picture from recording has been very good...
The recoding mode (speed) is a very useful feature. You can choose from:
M1 = One hour recording, DVD quality
M2 = Two hour recording, Near DVD quality
M2x = Two 1/2 hour recording, S-VHS quality)
M3 = Three hours recording, S-VHS quality)
M4 = Four hours recording, VHS quality)
M6 = Six hour recording, VHS quality)
M8 = Eight hour recording, LP VHS quality) For me, I found M3 the best for my needs. Very good quality picture, and 3 hours of recording. I've recorded my old Laser disks and cable. Both times I've used 2x or 3. And I like the picture quality. M1 is DVD quality, but it's too short (one hour). Next, I like the fact that I can use DVD+R and DVD+RW for recording. The DVD+R will play in most DVD players. They play in my dad's player (Sony) and my own Playstation 2. So, DVD+R is compatible with most brand DVD players. The DVD+RW discs have been very useful for recording something and then erasing it for my next recording. This saves money for +RW discs. For permanent copies, use the DVD+R. Although this DVD recorder records on DVD+R and +RW only, it PLAYS almost every type of disk:
DVD Video
DVD-R
DVD-RW
Audio CD
Video CD
Super Audio CD
Super Video CD
CD-R (Audio/MP3)
CD-RW (Audio/MP3)
...and of course, it plays DVD+R and DVD+RW. Overall, I'd give this player a B- on some features and a C+ on other features. It's a good recorder/player, but not great. Since DVD recorders are relatively new, I didn't expect much. My next purchase I'll probably look at the Panasonic or Sonys.
Rating:
Summary: Good...but not great
Review: Ok, first let me tell you the pros and cons... I'll start with the cons (it's tradition, right?): CONS:
I'm a consumer that likes to keep things simple, flexible, and solid. I dislike "features" that get in your way. The Guide+ is one of those features. Some people might like the ease of entering a "code" and then sitting back and let the recorder do the work. But, this "guide" seems to get in the way. The comment from the other poster is right. The timer guide disables the the external connections (1 and 2). The timer is only used for recording timed TV or cable. Just to be fair, I don't normally time my DVD recorder to record a VHS tape. So, I really don't need to "time" a VHS (external 1) or Laser Disk recording because I have to BE THERE to press play, don't I? The timer works fine for recording a TV/Cable show (which is the ANTENNA/CABLE connection; Coaxial). The external 1 and 2 connections are used for VHS or Laser disk (RCA cables). Next, the software is a little on the slow side (the software that actually runs the DVD player). The commands (record, stop, play, pause, guide, etc) take second to respond. The DVD recorder seems to be "thinking." So, make sure you aren't in a rush when pressing buttons. You must be very deliberate on the "button pressing." Don't press a button, and then start pressing the buttons again because it didn't respond fast enough. Patience, we're only talking a second. It would be nice if the commands were faster, though. The DVD recorder seems to designed as a "cable tuner (just like VCRs)" That's where you plug your cable line directly from the wall to your DVD recorder. But this is not the case for most homes. Most people I know have a CABLE BOX. And they use that box to control the channels. Not a VCR or DVD recorder's tuner. So, a lot of features on this DVD recorder will not be used (Guide+ is one of them). Also, the channel scan is useless because the only channel you need is 3 or 4. From then on you just use your own cable box to change channels (while keeping the DVD recorder on 3 or 4). The auto date/clock sync feature is not used too if you use a cable box. Also, I you plan on using a cable box, don't use the G-Link. The G-link is a cable that runs from the back of the DVD recorder to the front of the cable box. It' used to change the channel of your box (timer recordings). But if you use a cable box, the Guide+ forces you to chose a channel. If you need to record channel 44 on the cable box, but at the same time you need the DVD recorder set to 3 or 4. You can't use the G-link, because it changes the 3 or 4 channel to 44. HELLO! Channel 44 on the DVD recorder has NO PICTURE. Channel 44 on the cable box does have a picture. But you need the DVD recorder to STAY on 3 or 4. The G-link seems to have a mind of its own too. When you turn the DVD recorder off, it scan the channels. It must be trying to find more channels because it's "hungry?" Not sure. PROS:
The quality of the picture from recording has been very good...
The recoding mode (speed) is a very useful feature. You can choose from:
M1 = One hour recording, DVD quality
M2 = Two hour recording, Near DVD quality
M2x = Two 1/2 hour recording, S-VHS quality)
M3 = Three hours recording, S-VHS quality)
M4 = Four hours recording, VHS quality)
M6 = Six hour recording, VHS quality)
M8 = Eight hour recording, LP VHS quality) For me, I found M3 the best for my needs. Very good quality picture, and 3 hours of recording. I've recorded my old Laser disks and cable. Both times I've used 2x or 3. And I like the picture quality. M1 is DVD quality, but it's too short (one hour). Next, I like the fact that I can use DVD+R and DVD+RW for recording. The DVD+R will play in most DVD players. They play in my dad's player (Sony) and my own Playstation 2. So, DVD+R is compatible with most brand DVD players. The DVD+RW discs have been very useful for recording something and then erasing it for my next recording. This saves money for +RW discs. For permanent copies, use the DVD+R. Although this DVD recorder records on DVD+R and +RW only, it PLAYS almost every type of disk:
DVD Video
DVD-R
DVD-RW
Audio CD
Video CD
Super Audio CD
Super Video CD
CD-R (Audio/MP3)
CD-RW (Audio/MP3)
...and of course, it plays DVD+R and DVD+RW. Overall, I'd give this player a B- on some features and a C+ on other features. It's a good recorder/player, but not great. Since DVD recorders are relatively new, I didn't expect much. My next purchase I'll probably look at the Panasonic or Sonys.
|
