DVD VCRs by Panasonic

[Jerry Jones]

http://www.panasonic.com/consumer_electronics/dvd_recorder/default.asp

$1499 list.

That's bound to go down in the months ahead.

Jerry

[wkulecz]

Circut City had one of these in the Sunday paper for $999. It appears they lack 1394 ports so its only analog in for recording :-(

--wally.

[paulw]

I think that the philips one has better specs. A little more expensive but does have Firewire.

http://www.ce-europe.philips.com/images/highlights/dvdrw/uk/dvdrw/specs/specs3.html

[Jerry Jones]

Wally,

Surely it has at least an analog S-Video port... I hope.

The Panasonic Web site information is so sparse.

Could you tell from the ad you saw?

Jerry

[dchip]

I just e-mailed Panasonic's consumer division about this unit a few days ago asking why no firewire. If I could burn a DVD directly to one of these from my timeline without having to go back through the camera I would probably buy one now.

From what I have read this unit makes nice DVD's. One individual said he could not make a distinction between the 2 hour "SP" mode DVD-R he burned on it and the DV master tape. It's got AC-3 audio compression and the whole process is hardware based so very fast.

I could forget about the firewire-in if the price on this continues to drop. Already the DMR-E20 can be had for less than $800 on the web. It's amazing how well manufacturers like Panasonic have got their resellers backs when it comes to published list prices. $1499, huh?

You could probably find some detailed spec's on these at a site such as www.crutchfield.com

[mits]

Hi all,
i think that there is a big difference between the Panasonic and the Philips DVD-recorders. It has to do with the media that each one uses; Panasonic uses DVD-R and DVD-RAM (very incompatible with dvd players) while Philips uses the new media (format) DVD+RW and DVD+R (to come early next year). According to Philips DVD+RW(R) is supposed to have the best compatibility with existing DVD-players but this remains to be seen. A link about DVD+RW is http://www.dvdplusrw.org/

[dchip]

These things describe the recording as "Studio Quality" but also says they use "Hybrid VBR Technology." Wonder what that is?

[Dr Mordrid]

"Studio quality" may well mean they're using MPEG-2's 4:2:2P@ML Studio Profile. This is a 4:2:2 broadcast quality profile as opposed to the 4:2:0 used in most MPEG's.

This profile is also one of the the main features in Ligos's GoMotion Pro SDK. GoMotion Pro is supposed to offer realtime MPEG-2 capture at higher quality than DigitalS or DVCPRO50. This makes me think they want to make a move on DV as a camcorder data format.

Hybrid VBR changes the VBR settings scene-by-scene using a feature called "Visual Modulation". Think of it as a smart VBR.

Dr. Mordrid