Good Combination of Features in a first-of-its-kind product
Written: Jan 24 '04 (Updated Jan 24 '04)
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Pros: Ease of use, styling, image quality, TiVo features
Cons: No support for DVD+R, price
The Bottom Line: If you're eager to have the combination of DVD-R and TiVo features, buy it. Otherwise keep your fingers crossed that this market will grow soon and the price will drop.
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| grunion's Full Review: Pioneer DVR-810H (80 GB) DVD Recorder |
Last weekend a movie was coming on TV at 3:30 AM that I was really interested in seeing and sharing with my wife and kids. I had looked for it on commercial DVD but it has not been released. Having had a DVD player for the past couple of years has spoiled us to its image and audio quality; thus I was under-enthused about taping it on VHS - moreover, the connections between my VCR, TV and cable box are so confusing by now that just taping something without being there to monitor it was hit and miss.
So I started looking into DVD Recorders and found quite a plethora of choices and price ranges.
In parallel we have had friends who talked about TiVo as if it was the Second Coming. Since we get so many channels on our Digital Cable network I always feel as if I'm not getting any of the value of it by missing the bulk of what I might find to be of interest. Also because of kids and busy schedules we're often unable to veg in front of the TV during the time the shows we are interested in are broadcast. I do have rather eclectic tastes in television and the shows I like are often broadcast at odd hours.
Thus the Pioneer DVR-810-H, the one DVD-R that had a built-in TiVo, seemed like a really good option to me. Visions dance in my head of transferring all our VHS to DVD to save a heap of space in the family room, and send copies of home movies to the grandparents. I bought it from Good Guys from a knowledgeable salesperson who sold me on it through their 30-day no-risk policy. The store price was $990 but they had a 10% off offer running that day, so I paid $900 plus tax. Understand that considering the overall level of entertainment appliances installed in my family room that this would be working with, this unit was clearly a level above in price and features.
Upon opening the box I was pleased with the look and styling of the unit. It has a streamlined brushed-platinum finish with a light bronze tinge that far outclassed any of the other current occupants of my entertainment center. It was well-packaged and the cables and manuals were easy to find and assemble. In addition to the recorder and remote (with batteries), it included pretty much everything a typical set-up would require - a power cord, phone line splitter, 25' phone cord, short RF coax cable, composite A/V cable, Serial Data control cable (for connection with certain cable boxes), and IR control cable. The two cables I needed that weren't included were an S-video cable and an audio cable. It also included an installation guide and user guide.
From opening the box until sitting back down on the couch with it assembled took about 45 minutes, not too bad at all. The installation guide was well written and easy to follow. After assembly there is an easy to walk through on-screen set-up wizard that took about 20 minutes. There is data that the unit gets through the phone jack that takes a few hours to format before the unit is 100% functional, but it is certainly usable in the meantime.
It would be best if the unit could be permanently plugged into either a phone jack or broadband connection but my setup permits neither. During the initial setup, and subsequently every few days, I'm required to plug the unit into a phone jack. I leave the phone cable plugged in to and coiled up near the unit so it's not inconvenient to run it over to the opposite wall every few nights.
In general I haven't been disappointed with the Pioneer so far. It is quite easy to use. The on-screen menus are clear and intuitive. The remote could be slightly larger (I miss the wonderful remote on the DVD player this is replacing, the Sony DVP-S550D) but considering all the functions it is capable of I must say it is well designed. I have been very pleased with the image quality - the default setting is "Extreme Fine" quality that permits only one hour to fit on a single DVD-R, we have subsequently ratcheted down to "High" quality to permit us to fit more on the internal hard drive and copy two hours to a DVD. Output options include Composite A/V, Component video with progressive scan should I ever find it within my budget to spring for a large screen TV, and S-Video, which I am using. Audio output options include optical digital audio for systems with DTS encoders but my primitive audio system is rather underclassed for that, so analog stereo audio suits us fine for now.
There are options to connect the unit to your home network to access music or photos on your computer, or access the functions in other rooms, but I have not yet configured that.
I won't get into a lengthy review here about the TiVo service but I can see why people like it. The Pioneer comes with TiVo Basic included, which includes recording shows by time and channel, VCR Plus or via an on-screen program guide that has program info up to 3 days in advance. It also comes with a free trial of TiVo Plus which extends the program guide to 14 days, permits program search by a whole bunch of criteria, a "Season Pass" feature (which permits recording of every episode of the same show), and Suggestions (which have not been so hot so far). After the 45-day free trial the TiVo Plus service costs 12.95/month - too high in my opinion.
I must confess disappointment that the unit didn't support the ability to watch one show while another was being recorded. When people say TiVo "changes the way you watch TV" they're right - not necessarily all for the better, but it is different. For example you learn to just save up a whole bunch of programming that you might be interested in so you can have something to watch while another show is recording. I have a bunch of partially-watched shows and movies sitting on the hard drive that I need to get back to before they are deleted. It is now frankly more preferable to watch something that has been recorded rather than live TV so you can fast forward through the commercials. Though it is great to be able to pause live TV too (you can also slo-mo replay live TV but I find that feature to be of dubious value).
The DVD recording options are easy to use. But if a program has been recorded to the DVR at a particular quality, that quality cannot be changed when recording to DVD. Disappointing is the fact that only DVD "minus" recording formats are supported, apparently meaning that the DVDs thusly recorded won't be playable on most low-end DVD players. So much for the grandparent-home movie thing.
Also disappointing is the size of the hard drive. 80 GB may sound like a lot but just in the week we've had it we have to make choices about which unwatched shows we need to delete so we can make room for new ones.
In all, I'm still a bit tenuous about the purchase considering the price. I may well return it before the 30 days is up, with the hopes that additional manufacturers may soon see the wisdom of combining these features and prices dropping accordingly. I might also take a look at some of the other DVD-Rs with hard drives, or Media PC options. But if the money isn't that big a deal to you, and you don't care about the DVD formats, I would definitely recommend it.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 900
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Epinions.com ID:
grunion
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Reviews written: 3
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