I bought myself a new 42" LG TV (Full HD). I got a hd box off Ebay and it fine. My main problem is I have a Philips DVD recorder, which is silver (everything else is black). Was thinking about buying a surround, with DVD recorder but they are very limited. So I have decided to buy a new DVD recorder, any recommendations?? £200 to spend, maybe slightly more.

Ah, the age-old question....................with a Sky HD box, do you 'really' need a DVDR?

Unless you must archive stuff (which you can do adequately on a 'cheap' machine (silver or black), why not spend the cash on a really nice amp and speakers?

Rgds,
Scorp

Yea having different coloured stuff can look nasty.
I have a Black LG 42" job, a silver DVDr and a big ass Gold with wood grain sides Yamaha AMP. So ive got all three hifi colours on the upside they do a great job.

But Scorpio could be right, the best recording level you can get from a current DVDr is 576p I think so is it really worth buying a new one, maybe better off with a good AMP.

Is recording to a DVDr from HD any good ? PQ that is, do you notice much of a difference between HD & a good SD picture once recordered. If anyone with experience can let me know please.

Thanks

An SD DVDR can only record in SD even if fed a Sky HD image, however, it will look as good as if it were fed an SD image!!

So, something archived upto (say) 2 hrs will look fine.

Rgds,
Scorp

So you saying it won't look any better when fed HD even tho it is recording SD, bugger I was hoping for just a little improvement at least

It will often look better (depends) because of the higher bandwidth given to HD, it won't be HD though. How it compares to HD depends on screen size/viewing distance ratio - you might not notice that much difference or you might.

Recording an SD picture from Sky HD is definitely a big improvement. The reason is, the downscaled HD gives the best possible SD picture, free from any compression artifacts that would otherwise be present in a broadcast, heavily compressed, SD picture. e.g. An SD recording made from something on, say, Sky Sports HD1 is visibly much better than the same recording made from Sky Sports 1.

Incidentally, I think it's a disgrace that broadcasters are allowed to use so much compression on SD broadcasts. If I was paranoid, I'd seriously wonder if it was part of a plot to get us all to move to HD. The cheap channel's (and ITV's) PQ over Sky or Freeview is often worse than UHF analogue.

Ok cool thanks, I won't cancel my Sky order then

Seriously I am getting Sky-HD but I record programs onto DVD like SGA & BSG for m8's in Oz cos they are 6-12 months behind so I was hoping for any PQ improvemnt cos they have Plasma TV's as well.

I would just add (in case it wasn't obvious) that even recording off HD Sky the quality will still not be as good as a commercial DVD, just better than a home recording off SD Sky.

I recommend the Sony RDRHXD870B DVD/HDD.

http://www.johnlewis.com/Technology/...1/Product.aspx

If you shop around on the net you should you should be able to get it for around £225.

It's way better than a sub-£200 deck.
Last edited by Apollo 1875 : 24-09-2007 at 09:33

Thanks for all your help. I popped down to my local Comet today and bought myself a DVDr/HD. I went for the LG RH277H see it here http://www.comet.co.uk/cometbrowse/p....do?sku=394041

Works really well and its black.

Thanks again.

I wonder how long it will be before we go back to silver? providing of course we skip the wood effect casings! :P

Personally I couldn't care less about the colour of the equipment, however for those who do it would make sense for the manufacturers to sell alternative fascias like they do with some mobile phones.