Panasonic DMR-EX773EBK 160GB HDD DVD Recorder with Freeview+

 

 

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I bought this to replace a Sony recorder which had no Freeview, and because a recently bought Panasonic TV seemed to have much better reception in our marginal area than the (very expensive) Sony set-top box.

It's grindingly slow in pretty much everything it does, but it produces much better pictures than the (5+ years old) Sony. If you record in highest quality to the hard drive, when you copy to your DVD, if it doesn't fit, instead of choosing an arbtirary recording mode (SP 2 hours, LP 3 hours etc) it compresses your files just enough to fit exactly onto the disc ("flexible recording") so you always get the best possible pictures. The algorithms are much improved too: I squeezed the whole of "Reds", a film lasting well over 3 hours, on to a single DVD-R and there wasn't a trace of mpeg2 artifact.

Reception a definite improvement on the old STB.

Pause live TV excellent.

There are a few personal irritations most of which are pretty trivial and relate to the software.

Slow reaction to every button press I have already mentioned, advertising panel on program guide noted by others.

No intelligent chaptering! Hasn't this been standard for ages?

Be careful with weekly timer recordings - it can't cope with these unless they start at the same time each week.

Listing recordings on the hard drive: poor selection of information. Tells you to the nearest minute when each recording was made, and even the day of the week, but no duration or size of the file. (Actually, I don't think the word "Gigbytes" apprears in any menu or display).
Every time you make the list or return to the listing screen after doing something, it insists on playing the currently selected recording in a little window, including sound, from the beginning. In an unedited recording this is usually a bit of banal dialogue from a BBC employee and becomes excruciatingly irritating when heard for the 20th time. (If it won't let you switch this off, at least put a TV mute button on the remote!)

Editing: I spend quite a lot of time removing adverts and think I will grow to like the available buttons (which include chapter +/-5mins; buttons for +1min and -10 secs; "joystick" for frame-by-frame) but remote design could be improved: the buttons are all different sizes and arbitrarily placed. When doing a repetitive job like this you don't want to have to keep looking at your fingers.

Can't do anything else when copying. I don't know if it would be possible to release the freeview tuner just by revising the software.

If you set the machine to switch itself off after copying, it will crash, and you will have to disconnect the power and reboot. As a matter of fact it has minor crashes from time to time which together with the slow response times (and a few other trivial irritations and malfunctions which I can't remember) suggests that the software is pretty ropey, possibly because it's new. No software updates yet, but when these arrive they should make this fine machine even better.

(March 2011) 9 months on and no sign that the creaky software has been updated. It has now several times failed to produce a proper DVD - the disk has no chapters and is not and cannot be finalised so can't be used in any other machine and is to all intents useless. (If this happens to you, you must switch the machine on and off at the mains or it will just do it again.)

I suspect the Sony equivalent might be better.

I purchased this product 3 months ago now and I have to say it is one of the best technology purchases that I have ever made. You can watch DVD's whilst you are recording a show which I was not expecting and you can also watch something that you have previously recorded whilst recording something else as well. I have used mine to record a lot of films from the TV onto the hard drive, then edit out the adverts and transfer onto DVD which I think is going to save me a lot of money in the long term!

The TV guide does have adverts on the left hand side, but to be honest I never even notice them and do not find them to be overly intrusive. The Series Link appears to work well but now that I have this DVD recorder I have found that I hardly ever watch normal TV any more, but just record everything and watch it when I want, which also means I can fast forward the adverts. On most TV shows when you press the skip forward button it skips straight to the end of the adverts but on some shows you end up having to do it manually with the fastforward button, but it's not really that much of a big problem.

Overall I have found it to be a very good product which does what it says on the tin!

Having previously owned a Panasonic DVD Recorder I found the product was easy to set up and run. Sometimes when you press some of the keys on the remote control there is a slight pause before it activates but you soon get used to this. I have now tried recording to the Hard Drive, Timer recording and transfering to DVD and finalising and it all seem to work well. Previous reviews have critised the advert window in the program guide but I personally did not find this is a problem. I can therefore recommend this productPanasonic DMR-EX773EBK 160GB HDD DVD Recorder with Freeview+

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4.0 out of 5 stars I bought another!
Hello All, Just a short review of this DVD/HDD player from me.

This is my second Panansonic machine, I purchased one of these when they first came out several years... Read more

Published 8 days ago by Gert

4.0 out of 5 stars An excellent DVD recorder once you get used to its quirks
The Panasonic DMR-EX773EBK was a replacement for my old Pioneer DVD recorder. So far, I am generally pleased with my purchase although I do miss how easy the Pioneer was to use in... Read more

Published 17 days ago by TheLibrarian

4.0 out of 5 stars hdd recorder
Got this machine to replace my Funai 3in one recorder which i had for a good while.This machine has not the same funtions and it took a while to get used to. Read more

Published 19 days ago by Dummy

5.0 out of 5 stars Very satisfied
Out of the box, plugged in, auto set-up, working within minutes. Does everything that I want from it. Many more features than I will ever use. Read more

Published 26 days ago by Royalgeorge

2.0 out of 5 stars Challenge
Probably the most complicated DVD on the market. I had an expert help with the instalation, it took hours. I have only got to basic use after having had it months. Read more

Published 26 days ago by Alfred Dickinson

4.0 out of 5 stars Read the manual
I had a Daewoo HDD/DVD Recorder linked to my Panasonic TV and it was always playing up. So I decided to by this item so it was matched. Read more

Published 1 month ago by L. Woolner

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic Machine and save £££ not paying for Sky+
I cancelled Sky+ because i did not have the time to watch half the programmes that were on. I bought this recorder instead and it is great. Read more

Published 1 month ago by Kevin

4.0 out of 5 stars Its OK
Its OK and has a lot of functions but they are not as easy to use as the Sony equipment that had just given up after very good service. Read more

Published 1 month ago by patti

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Product
Does everything I expected of it. Now I can record freeview at the touch of a button (well almost). Easy to use and playback. Read more

Published 1 month ago by ALF

2.0 out of 5 stars Panasonic Dvd Recorder.
I bought this to replace my old panasonic recorder which is this but without the hdd and usb i sent it up plug in my usb pen and it cannot read videos it only comes up music... Read more

Published 1 month ago by Dead Man

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