JVC HR-XVC26U Progressive-Scan DVD/VCR Combo (Black)

Rating:
Summary: Great Buy
Review: Everything works as stated. I've been able to play my DVD+R,-R, VCD's, photo cd's. Able to record shows on the VCR while watching a movie on the DVD player. I've only had it for a week so far, so hopefully nothing goes wrong.

Negative
VCR is very loud when fastforwarding and rewinding.
Automatic time setting did not work, had to do it manually. Not sure if the problem is with my cable provider or the unit itself.

Rating:
Summary: A Poorly designed product.
Review: I thought this unit was going to be a good space saving replacement for my old vcr and non DVD-R/RW compatible DVD player, but I was wrong. All around this product is poorly designed, especially the remote control and user interface.

Although this unit boasts it is DVD-R/RW compatible, DVD-RW discs that work properly with almost every other player skip during high motion scenes and during scene changes. Since I bought this player to play back media recorded on my computer, this makes the player rather useless to me.

I didn't like the remote control layout at all. Since many buttons are shared between the vcr and dvd player, most have two labels on top of them which is confusing. When performing certain functions the buttons you need to press are located far apart from each other. Buttons with similar functions are not clustered together. The remote can supposedly operate a TV. The instructions make no mention what brands of TV the remote can operate or how to program it to operate them. This leads me to belive that the remote can only operate a JVC brand television.

This player has many annoying little quirks. Powering on the unit will first power up the VHS deck causing wear and tear on the components, and then the unit will automatically power up the DVD deck switch over and start playing the disc before it will let you switch back and use the VCR. Ideally the unit should remember what deck you used last and only power up that one instead of both.

For VCR timer recording, not only does the VCR deck have to be powered off, but the "timer mode" has to be engaged by pushing a button on the remote. There is no button on the front panel to engage "timer mode". Worse yet, if you lose your remote and timer mode is engaged, there is no way of turning the VCR back on again.

The front panel display is just a simple LED display. Virtually every other DVD player on the market has a dot matrix display. Instead of saying "No disc" it crudely says "No dc". The display is constantly on which is annoying if the unit is in a bedroom. For DVDs switching between displaying the elasped time and time remaining is a complex menu operation.

Although the tape counter can be reset, there is no function to automatically rewind the tape to the zero mark.

The open/close button has to be held for a long time before the disc tray opens. There is no button on the remote to open/close the tray.

This unit can play SuperVCD's, but forget about searching backwards through them. It will take you 30 seconds to go backwards 1 minute.

As another reviewer mentioned, the automatic clock set simply does not work, even though that feature works properly with other VCRs in the house. Setting the clock is frustrating since the arrow buttons don't behave as you might expect them to.

On the positive side, the video quality of the VHS deck was excellent. The VCR had the rare feature of selectable sharpness settings, and video stabilization. I liked the ability to do VHS index searches via the DVD chapter buttons. The unit can also automatically guess the amount of videotape left on a cassette. The ability to customize DVD/VCD picture brightness, contrast, sharpness, color,tint,gamma was a welcome addition that is noticably absent on my Sony DVD player.

Overall the media incompatibility, remote control, and user interface issues earn this player a solid thumbs down.

Rating:
Summary: it won't show closed captioned tapes
Review: I used this as secondary unit for my bedroom. I'm disappointed that this unit won't show closed caption from recorded or store-bought VHS tapes. I tried to run the same tapes on my new primary Panasonic DVD recorder/VHS unit in my living room and it showed closed caption without any problems. Since it's too late for me to send it back, I will sell it or give it to Goodwill. Good thing this unit wasn't expensive, so I didn't lose much. I will buy another Panasonic (DVD reader/VHS combo) to replace the JVC unit.

Rating:
Summary: Yummy tapes, but hard to use.
Review: It ate two of our video tapes. It did a horrible job of autosetting the channels and the time (our old super-cheap VCR did fine on both.) And it was hard to use, requiring you to switch between vcr and dvd functions in odd ways (like, when there was a DVD in, I had trouble changing channels on the TV).

Rating:
Summary: JVC
Review: Received this in mail couple of days ago. Went to hook it up..the color coded cabled not in box. Called JVC...on hold for ever! Finally was told cables are not included in purchase and to go buy them in Radio Shack....come on JVC the least you could do is include the cables!!!!

Rating:
Summary: 2 UNITS SAME PROBLEM
Review: The featurtes and picture quality are first rate, however both units I recieceved had the same anoying problem of freesing for 10-20 seconds at each scene change. I hear that there is a firmware fix but I do not choose to deal with this. This item should be recalled and no longer sold on the Amazon site.

Rating:
Summary: Multi-Tasking Combo Unit.....With A Few Problems
Review: This review refers to the JVC DVD/VCR Combo(Progressive Scan/HR-XVC26U)...

This JVC Combo has it's good points and not so good points. I like that it's excellent at 'multi-tasking'. You can watch a DVD while recording your favorite episode of "Friends", or "ER", or a another movie from Turner Classics. It also can be used to play your CD's(One at a time). And it presents a very nice picture and great sound through your Home Theatre System. It is compatiable with both Dolby Digital and DTS. Hi-Fi VHS recordings also sound great.For the most part, it will automatically track your VHS for you and will also let you know if a cleaning is necessary.

There are a few little things about it that make me a hesitant to give it a superior or even an above average rating. My major complaint would be that every once in a while, about every 10th DVD or so, the screen will all of a sudden go to green. The only way to get back to the movie is to turn the power off, then back on , let the DVD reload, go to scene selection, and pick up where you left off. I thought at first, it may be the DVD itself, but I restarted the films shortly before the interuption occurred, and found the DVD played fine the second time around. It's not a big deal, I guess, but certainly interupts the flow of a storyline. I use a lens cleaner occasionally, so I know that dirt was not the problem. Other little things would be that the disc tray is very slow to open(may not be important unless you are impatient like me), and as another reviewer pointed out fast fowarding and rewinding of tapes is a little on the noisey side.

The instruction manual is pretty thorough. It's a 91 page booklet, that should answer all your questions. It gives you instructions and diagrams for setting up and wiring for any type of connection you want to make. Whether you use cable, satellite, or just an antenna, whether you are using S-Video or are lucky enough to have Progressive Scan, it will take you step by step. The manual is pretty easy to follow if you have ever set up a DVD player or home theatre system before. If it is your first time, you made need some help, as there are times it seems the instructions assumes you know what they are talking about. Basic recording and Timer programming is also covered. The Combo unit also has MP3 and JPEG playback with detailed instructions as well. I don't use these, so I can't report on that aspect. There's a trouble shooting section, which answered some of my questions before I panicked, a question and answer section, an index with a list of terms and pages, and a limited warranty(1 Yr parts/90 day labor). There is also some phone numbers, one for JVC Americas Corp and a toll free number for service locations.

The remote does everything but pop the popcorn for you, but you really need to keep the manual handy until you get the feel for it.

I would say, if you find a really good deal on this unit, it's worth it for all it's capabilities, the great quality picture and sound it presents, and thinning out the amount of wires plugged in(I have never had A DVD player that didn't eventually have some little problem). Keeping in mind, that if one function does not work, the whole unit will have to go in for repair,this may be nice to have as second DVD player. I don't know if the problems I had(the green screen) is just my player, but if this is something that would annoy you, fahgetabout it!, there's many more to choose from out there.

Three and a half stars for the whole package.

Shop around....Laurie

Rating:
Summary: NOT AS ADVERTISED!
Review: This unit DOES NOT play VHS over the component video output as listed. I had to return mine. The correct JVC model if you are looking for this feature is HR-XVC37U.

Rating:
Summary: great unit for money
Review: very nice unit
no skips or green screen!
Pic on dvd and vhs r great!---no excessive noise on rewind or ff
Excellent Dolby with use of 3d phonic feature!
has every thing my twice the price Sony that died
just wish it had eject on remote
so i'm LAZY
PS
ave Netflics I LOVE it

Rating:
Summary: Good functioning space-saver
Review: We wanted to reduce the number of components in our "rack" since we built a new AV room and wanted to hide everything as much as possible (as opposed to the college days when you wanted to cram as many components into your rack as possible!). Anyway, this unit is just a tad over $100 at retail shops, and performs well for its intended purpose.

We use the DvD player for all our new stuff and Netflix arrivals, and then use the VCR to play all the kids' old VHS movies (which we have hundreds of!). The unit performs well and the manual is very thorough.

There are many features that you may never need, and have not found anything lacking for our needs. I have the unit hooked up to a Philips 60" rear projection TV and an Onkyo TX-SR701 receiver. I only have three complaints about this unit:

1) The VHS motor is very weak for rewinding tapes; if there is the slightest drag on the casette mechanism (either from age or poor construction) this unit simply won't rewind the tapes! Or, it will putter along so slowly that it is agonizing to watch. I plan on buying a separate tape rewinder in order to deal with this problem, which really should be unnecessary.

2) Noisy DVD operation. This is my first DVD player, so I'm not sure if this is a common issue or not, but when playing DVDs you must have the sound volume up pretty high in order to not hear the high-pitched whine of the DVD spinning in the background.

3) You must use two input channels on the TV or receiver with this unit if you want to use component video for the DVD player. The VHS player only outputs via S-Video or composite - no component video. I looked around and could not find any other combo VCR/DVD players that output VHS to component, so this is something I just decided to live with.

The setup can be a bit tricky, since you have to use cables for audio and video as if you were setting up two separate components. (Assuming you are interested in the high quality digital output of DVD), For the VCR portion, you will need a pair of RCA cables for the audio and an S-Video or composite cable for video. For the DVD player, you will need a "coaxial" cable for the digital sound output (just a fancy RCA cable) and then a component (or S-Video) cable for the video.

This also means that if you are going directly from this unit to your TV you will need two separate input channels to be able to use this unit effectively.

The TV tuner seems to work great, and the setup was a snap. Overall, the thing that knocked this from a four or five down to a three for me was the annoying inability to rewind VHS tapes.