DVD recorder advice needed.. (1 Viewer)

I'd like to get a recorder soon and I need some advice from the pros. I will mainly be using this unit to transfer my Star Wars LD's to dvd, and then after that, transfering home movies on compact VHS and miniDV to DVD. Occasionaly I might see myself recording off TV, but not that much.

I'm leaning towards the units WITHOUT the hard drive, simply because I think my cable company will be offering a HDPVR soon. I'm a loyal Panny man so I've been looking at This Model.

Right now I have an HD set top cable box from my local cable company. It is connected to my Tosh 57H81 through component cables. If I got a DVDR/PVR, would I just have to pass the COAX cable from the wall through the DVDR/PVR to my cable box to be able to record off cable? Also, would I still be able to use all of the cable box's onscreen guides and so forth?

I know I wouldn't be able to record HD programing to DVD, but could I record it to the DVDR/PVR's hard drive?


Finally, a question to those of you who have made DVD's of your Star Wars LD's:

How is the image quality if you use FR (flexible recording time) to get each movie on a single side of a disc?

Thanks.

J.

I can't answer your detailed questions, I'm afraid, but I would advise this: make very sure that the model you buy can record from other digital media. I have a Panasonic and it refuses point blank to copy other DVDs, etc, even if they aren't copyright (like home movies ). If you're intent on copying from your LD this could be a rather important point. However, I've got to ask - why are you recording Star Wars from LD (technically speaking illegal, I suspect) when it's coming on DVD? Also, as far as I'm aware, any recording you make will only be in stereo; I don't think any DVD recorder offers surround sound as yet.



If your system in the US is anything like our Brit system, then the answer is that you record the signal that is normally fed straight to the TV. So in other words, if it's what you can see on the TV, then it'll record. However, I would seriously doubt that if you're copying a programme it'll record any extra information embedded in the original signal.

I'd also add that if you do have a hard disc recording unit, it makes life a lot easier.

As for the Star Wars LD's, they are the original theatrical presentations, unlike the DVDs which are being released. These are of the Special Editions only. Damn you Lucas

Thanks for the responses so far.

As for the SW lasers, they are indeed the original theatrical versions.

How about thoughts on the FR mode of recording? How does it compare to Pioneer's VBR mode?

Cheers.
J.

It's quite effective. You're simply letting the unit know how long your recorded footage is going to be so that it can use the maximum quality and bitrate settings for the designated time (filling the disc). With a HD unit, I'd setup a FR recording and pad it out for a minute or so (to compansate for switching LD sides), which I'd then subsequently edit out prior to dubbing.

Well, how come my Panasonic won't record non-copyright DVDs and nor will other people's Panasonics that I personally know about? [They'll record all non-copy protected VHS tapes without any problem].

Do you mean that the latest generation of Panasonics will? In which case, this is a definite improvement.