Many thanks...........I thought it was a bit too cheap.

I have the Panny EH60D. It CAN dub to other DVD formats in the original aspect ratio, just not at high speed (for high speed dubbing to anything other than DVD-RAM, you have to decide in advance that you'll do this, and then the HDD original recording is made in 4:3 format for some reason). Like the Sony, the Panny can dub to DVD-R and -RW and keep widescreen aspect ratio (well it does on my setup) - just at normal playback speed. DVD-RAM does it in about 12-15 minutes for an hour's programme at SP (on 2-3X DVD-RAMs).

I've read that somebody is having trouble with the Panny switching back to 16:9 overnight when they specifically want 4:3. Mine's in a 16:9 setup anyway so nothing odd happens but it's worth bearing in mind that there are so many variables with this that it could be a weird culmination of mixing an EH60D with a particular TV, particular cabling and so on - i.e. it's may not be a universal problem with this model.

In the reverse of what the above poster says - I've nothing against Sony (I have a Sony TV and separate Freeview box in another room) but I know and like my Panasonic EH60D! So I suspect either is a good buy - the Panny or the Sony 710.

Can you record from a STB to the HDD on these machines?

Can anyone help guide me with the quality of the various recording modes ? I'm just trying to work out which mode I would use most often and therefore how many recordings I'm going to be able to get on the disk. (I'm look at a 910 - 250gb drive)

Which mode is equivalent to the quality I get on my existing VHS recorder ? would it be SP or LP ? I really have no idea.

I reckon that recording at HP or HSP would still give me plenty of space to work with but am I going to notice a drop in quality, using my VHS recordings as a benchmark.

thanks for a great and informative thread.

You can with the Sony. Not tried it though.

I have the Sony 710 and I always use SP. This is easily good enough for the TV I have which is a Tosh 36". Recoding in SP mode uses about 2gb per hour of recording. SP mode is better than VHS, so probably LP is equivalent to VHS.
As the 710 has a 160gb HDD you could save about 80 hours worth of programs on it in SP mode
However the 710 HDD has a limit on the amount of titles it can store and that magic number is 300.

Not sure what the max title holding capacity is for the 910 though.
If it's the same 300 as the 710 and you bought a 910 = 250gb HDD this equals about 125 hours in SP mode. if you record in a lower buit rate say LP you could record more hours but you would have more titles.

Hope this helps.

I would caution everyone to be careful if purchasing from Pixmania. I suffered when I bought a Canon digital camera from them. They do not advise customers upon order of something in their Terms and Conditions:

5. Product information

The photographs illustrating the products are not part of the contract. If there are any errors in them, we may in no way be held liable for this. We cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of the information contained within specification sheets and product descriptions provided by our partner suppliers. This applies in particular when any technical or physical alterations are made to the product on the initiative of our partner suppliers.
All our offers are valid only while stocks last.
Also please note that you should be aware that for all Canon, Epson and Pentax products instruction manuals do not come in English.

The documentation for my camera was in German and I had to spend about £15 getting an English copy which meant that I could have purchased more cheaply from another supplier.

Re the question on recording from an STB, what is an STB?

Withdraw my last question, I've just realised its a set top box.

Good work. How did you manage to find these low prices?

thanks - just the info I was looking for. I'll probably use a slightly higher mode for recording movies but SP sounds fine for daily recordings.

On the Panasonic, there are 4 modes - XP, SP, LP and EP. On a DVD, that equates to total recording capacity of 1 hour, 2 hours, 4 hours and 6 or 8 hours respectively. EP is switchable - I have mine on 8 hours - they say the compatibility is perhaps slightly less with old players and the sound slightly lower quality at this setting than 6 hours.

I use SP mode myself - I am pretty eagle-eyed (though our TV, for the record, is a 28 inch CRT Sony Trinitron so I can't speak for huge plasma screens and the like, but the room's only 12 feet so I get a detailed view of it!) and SP is indistinguishable from live broadcasts on my setup, both analogue and Freeview. Therefore I consider XP overkill and haven't bothered using it - though it does allow the option of REALLY high quality sound, apparently, using LPCM (if I remember the acronym correctly) as well as the Dolby(?) system the other modes use. The Panasonic's 200GB HDD has a total capacity of 87.5 hours in SP mode.

LP mode on the latest Panasonics like mine is better than hitherto, as the previous ones and most of the competition halved the resolution at LP. The new Pannys don't, having a cleverer compression instead. This means the picture is still very detailed, though compression shows up on fast movement with heavy detail (e.g. rapid panning of nature programme with loads of savannah bushes etc. when tracking down some African wild animal in the long grass!) - then the details "sizzle" a bit. EP drops the resolution and more compression is apparent; "they" say that EP is equivalent to VHS but I find that the digital nature of DVD/HDD recording means that I personally prefer the look of VHS to EP on digital recordings (bear in mind that my VHS is a Panasonic with a very good performance though). LP strikes me as at least as good as the best VHS, and SP is miles ahead - as I say, it looks like a live broadcast, not a recording.

There is also FR mode (flexible record) which can pick an intermediate recording quality (not limited to the 4 described above), either that required to fit the programmed recording into the remaining empty space on a DVD, or when recording to the HDD it picks a speed to ensure the recording would exactly fill an empty DVD. Most other makes have an equivalent setting, and Pioneer and Toshiba appear to major in having loads of intermediate settings available to pick yourself. Which may be useful or overkill, depending on your own style of using the recorder!

Indeed - Pixmania are really a French company but they have websites "personalised" to each European country they offer service to, so it's very easy not to realise this, especially as they have a collection depot in the UK. So there's a pretty high likelihood of getting a European-spec product, which often doesn't matter but could be a bit of an unwelcome surprise in some cases.

Regular visitor/contributors to the Digital Video Recorder Forum are already aware and have been for sometime that Pixmania sells grey products i.e. euro kit with the user manual in the language of the source country.

I have nothing better to do than play with Google all day, obviously!

On the Panasonic vs Sony issue, it's interesting to read the Panasonic threads in the forum, and hear people discussing 4:3 vs 16:9 problems too! I guess no new product is bug free...

Thanks folks - I had heard that Pixmania was French based & there have been some concerns over service! I hadn't realised there was a difference in spec between UK & non uk versions so I'll be cautious!

I've always used SP up to now and like the others I find it far better than VHS and virtually indistinguishable from live. I use a Sony 28" CRT Freeview box (28DX40 I believe) and I'm more than happy with SP. I haven't even felt the need to experiment with the other modes but I probably will when I have time.

Can you connect a camcorder to copy onto DVD with the 710?

Yes, you can connect using RGB, composite video, s-video, or I-link, there are connectors for the latter three on the front of the machine.

For general timeshifting I use EP mode which I find similar or better than VHS and gives me roughly 4 and a bit hours when dubbed to DVD-RW (which I watch on my laptop when on call at weekends). If I want to permanently archive something I record at SP. With a 28in 50 Hz TV I don't really notice any improvement at the higher setting - you won't get any better than the input signal anyway.

Sony vs Panny

I like both brands and still don't know which machine to go for between the 710 and H60D.
I've a Panny Plasma and an Sony All-in-one home theater system. And one thing I've noted is that the Sony is less permissive about the remote pointing. If I am not point my remote properly, it won't like it. The Panasonic works all the time even if my pionting is not perfect.

1) So what about these 2 great machines ?
2) my Sony home cinema has a lot of toggles, making the use of universal remotes less user friendly. Is it the case here as well ? What about the Panny ?

thank you

Sorry for not replying sooner Eddie i could not post for some reason, just found out had to reactivate account!
Thanks for yr responses.

In response to A1 obvious really most of my sources to record would come from external not internal freeview such as cable tv via scart either onto HD or DVD so as these are 16:9 encoded outputs would want to know if it were to be switched to 4:3.

In response to A2 my friend still is on analogue cable and has no scart out. There is a phono video out but the audio out is mono, so if he were to buy this all his recording would be in mono, there is stereo but via RF out.

In response to A3 This may do though. What I do at present is loop all the vcrs and cable and freeview boxes via RF on differing output frequencies feeding the one at the end of the chain back into the aeriel from the roof via a splitter and signal booster. Thus I am able to watch all devices via RF on a different channel in any room in the house. The old On digi freeview also only has a loop Rf so my question would be does the Sony output its own signal via its RF out ie can you plug it into a tv without scart/video in using th RF out, tune in the TV and watch the output either DVD/HD/Freeview on the Tv? If yes I can put the Sony in the Loop and watch around the house.

In Response to A4. Shame, very silly of sony I mean ok no twin tuner but if theres more than 1 direct input you should be able to send either/or to different recorders.

Thanks Eddie. I await yr reply or those of others.

a3

there is no modulated rf on this unit....you can only watch freeview by scart....unless you buy a external modulated rf converter.

In response to your response to A1. You can select three options/settings for Line input Aspect Ratio. Either 16:9 fixed, 4:3 fixed or Auto. I've never tried recording through the line input but I would have thought the Auto option just records whatever Aspect Ratio is coming down the line.

In respone to your response to A3. Please see post number 421 from Sunny333.

Can't find it but I remember someone asking about recording from a Sky box. I've at last had some time to play around.

If you have the Sky box connected to Line 3 then you can manually record by selecting line 3 input (beneath the sliding panel on the Sony remote) and simply pressing record.

You can set up the timer manually to record from Line 3 and leave the Sky box tuned to the channel you want to record.

You can set the timer up on the Sky box and use the "Synchro Record" button (again below the sliding panel). Mine's a Pace Digibox and you HAVE to set the "Autoview" option for the selected programme on Sky. The Sky box will then turn on at the scheduled time AND turn on the Sony 710 to start recording. You have to leave the 710 tuned to Line 3 as I think it will start recording from whichever input/channel is currently selected.

I tried to make the 710 "wake up" and record by manually turning on the Sky box but this didn't seem to operate using the Pace box which is why I figure you have to set up the Autoview feature so that the corrrect signal is output. Other digiboxes may behave differently. The Sony manual says that to use the digibox inbetween setting the synchro record and the recording starting you have to turn off synchro record and then, when you have finished watching whatever you wanted, turn it back on again. I didn't need to do this with the Pace digibox as only the Autoview seems to send out the synchro signal. This makes it more flexible.

Hope this helps whoever it was!

Thats very disappointing..sony are barmy some of us still have some old tellys without a scart! using a portable in the bedroom only RF in. Ok if you gave a digital tuner but why no RF out? so if you play a DVD or from Hd nothing out of the Rf bar the input RF, crazy. This is the clincher for me I'm afraid I will not buy it cos of this or may get the Euro version with analogue tuner assuming it gives output from the RF, does it anyone know?

Thx 4 yr answers BTW