Panasonic DMR-E80H Review

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Panasonic DMR-E80H
3.2 stars
Average rating for this product is: 3.2 out of 5

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tonjon's Review of Panasonic DMR-E80H DVD Recorder

10th Aug 2004

Overall Rating

1.5 stars
  • Value for money
    2.5 stars
  • Image Quality
    2.5 stars
  • Features
    3.5 stars
  • Time DVD Recorder Owned
    6 - 12 Months
  • Sound Quality
    2.5 stars
  • Ease of Use
    3.5 stars
Good Points

The hard disk is a great feature.
Being able to record from the hard disk to dvd-r or dvd-ram is also great.


Bad Points

Mine's in the shop for the DVD. The replacement parts are not readily available.
The control latencies are annoying.
250 item limit for individual programs on the hard disk is too restrictive.


General Comments

I've been an owner of the DMR-E80H for seven months. As of the time of this writing, the deck is in the shop for the DVD drive portion. (DVDs don't 'track up'). The deck has been in the shop for over two weeks, waiting on a part.
The repair is evidentally under warranty, but I suspect Panasonic will not pay me for the hassle of getting the thing fixed.
Comments on the performance of the deck (while it was working):
The hard disk is a great feature. At a SP speed, one can record around 40 hours of programming. Unfortunately, the number of discrete recordings are limited to 250, so if one is normally taping a great number of short events to be used for editing, this limit can be rather frustrating.
The unit can also record DVD-R and DVD-RAM type of disks, both of which can take their material from the hard disk. This allows one to perform some rudimentary editing of video material
I have been able to successfully (when the DVD portion was working) 'finalize' a DVD and then use it on a standard DVD deck. NOTE: prior to finalizing, the DVD is readable only by the DMR-E80H.
In normal use, the latency between pressing a button on the remote and observing the concomitant response from the deck can be annoying, although this delay is not unique to the DMR-E80H (I have a Toshiba deck that also takes time to respond).
There is a feature that allows one to label recorded programs, but every time I use it I keep wishing I had a computer-style keyboard to type in the title, rather than the up and down arrows on the remote. While it might not be used by everyone, it seems to me that a connector that accomodated a PC-type keyboard would make for a much more efficient means of typing in a title. I bet that the software has some hidden support for such an application, but this is not available to the casual user (note to Panasonic marketing types).

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