Connecting DVD Recorder to TV and Digibox - Help!

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Post by guest 4 »

Handing Rosbif a glass of Brandy and coke, any good?

I'd love to have a fiddle with all those knobs and sliders, wouldn't have a clue what I am doing, but I think it would be fun.

Ruth
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Post by tree-peony »

LOL it could also go horriby wrong!!
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Rosbif
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Post by Rosbif »

:lol: Ah thanks for the brandy and coke Ruth, did the trick!

Yes all those knobs and sliders do look fun, I once went to a recording studio with an ex boyfriend who was in a band and they were recording a demo CD, it was very interesting to see how it all works.
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Post by Topcat »

well actually, i LOVE wires
TP how can anyone love wires!!!

I'm useless with recording stuff as well. I bought a DVD recently and put all the bits in the right holes and it still didn't work. But my 12 year old grandson came along and had it working in 10 minutes.

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Rosbif
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Post by Rosbif »

TP someone else suggested if I got another digibox then it could be set up like that to record digital channels, any idea if that would work?
:?
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Post by tree-peony »

I think it would probably depend on your signal strenght tbh as you woud be splitting the analogue signal

(TC it's cos I don't do stuff like handbags and shews ;) )
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Post by Rosbif »

Well TP after everything I decided to take it back yesterday as I felt I wasn't properly informed of its capabilities and it didn't really do what I wanted. They took it back no problems! :D

So now I am going to do some proper research and make sure I get something that does exactly what I want it to!

:? :oops:
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Post by tree-peony »

fair enough!
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Post by Mountain Goat »

Rosbif, unless you've given up, can I make some suggestions? We've just been through it.

Figure out what you've got. Satellite dish, cable or just ordinary aerial? Might need to look out the window.

If just ordinary aerial, then you're into Freeview, which gives you a vast range of progs. including Film 4 and the main reason we finally junked Sky (in UK).

You want to make sure you've got a good Freeview signal. Can lend/give you a Freeview receiver no prob. to test out.

If it works OK then fine. If it doesn't you may need a better aerial. Signal is usually good in Brighton area.

The best Freeview box is Sony (as it's got an excellent programme display) but you can't buy them separately anymore, except on eBay, but not recommended as they're now a silly price and also some faulty stuff being dumped.

Go for a Sony DVD recorder with Freeview incorporated or Sony DVD recorder with hard-disk and Freeview. Depending on model it will transfer all the titles and prog. information to your DVD and/or hard-disk when recording, and also excellent for dubbing (recording films on hard-disk and then copying to DVD). Can recommend specific models. Get from John Lewis as they give you free extended guarantees, and haggle price (as it will be cheaper elswhere) south. Richer Sounds in Brighton doesn't have the right gear at the moment, and Sony shop is good advice but high prices.

We've tried Panasonic (for us unreliable), Samsung and something else, and although sort of OK, programme display awful and very picky about which DVDs you use. Sony eats them all.

Oh, and use Scart for everything, so whatever you get, lots of Scart sockets.....

Bob's your uncle.

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Post by Hells Bells »

Scart is apparently a French invention, and one they actually got right.
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Post by Rosbif »

Thanks MG :D

I haven't got an Uncle Bob only George and Brian :wink:

We have a freeview box already (just a £30 tesco one) so we get freeview TV and its connected via ordinary aerial I think. The previous tenant in the flat had NTL cable, but I am not paying any subscriptions so presume that is cut off. However, I will investigate where the wire actually goes to and make sure its aerial and not the NTL box still working. We have also got a satellite dish and a Mondial box that my BF was using to get French TV, however, that stopped working - he couldn't get a signal any more (we weren't paying for it!) so that's not in use now.

I do want a DVD recorder with hard disk as I can't be bothered faffing around with DVD's etc unless there is something I particularly want to put on DVD!

So ... to record one digital channel and be able to watch another I need a DVD Recorder with built in freeview as well do I? Thats what the guy in Curry's didn't explain to me very well when I bought the last one! I will have a look where there is a John Lewis round this way - can you haggle the price in JL, never tried that!

I have also been looking at BT Vision as we have BT Homehub, do you know anything about that? Only problem I can see is that you can't obviously put anything onto DVD if you want to save it.

RB baffled by technology:?
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Post by Mountain Goat »

RB

A tentative answer....and wait for it to get shot down.

Most of the current Sony DVD/hard-disk recorders (except for one costing something nuts like £2k) offer you some sort of multi-tasking. i.e. record one channel to DVD or hard-disk and watch another already recorded on hard-disk, but not record two channels at once.

With Freeview in your Sony you could do whatever you wanted with the machine and watch another channel on your TV through your Freebox simultaneously.

The secret on flexibility is having Freeview in the DVD recorder/hard disk machine.

Figure out what you want to do on the machine and then ask the Sony shop guys or John Lewis (easiest is PJ on Sloane Square, not sure if Croydon or Crawley up and running yet). When you've figured which model you want, buy a glossy Video mag (not a bad idea anyway), and get the best walk-in price in the town/city you're going to buy (non-internet). Then present that to your JL store (must be same town or they add on the postage costs). You may have to initially pay full price, and refund of the difference arrives later. If you get that far, PM for details. Got £150 off a £400 machine with ours.

I know nothing about BT Vision/Home Hub but may be worth investigating 'cos our experience above is 6 months or so ago.

None of this applies abroad, of course.

MG
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Post by Rosbif »

Thanks MG, have just been reading about BT Vision and I don't think its really suitable. So will start doing some investigating on the Sony DVD recorders with freeview and HDD - what model did you get?

What a great name for a company
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RB
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Post by Mountain Goat »

We got the snappily named Sony RDR-HXD860 which makes it almost impossible to compare prices on the 'net. Though I see JL have now got it at £279 (£399 earlier this year when we hit them) and Kelkoo have one at £150 with PRC Direct......which is a bit hard to believe and seriously worth the money.

Probably advise getting at least a 160GB hard-disk (about 160hrs recording on LP). Sony also gives you a larger range of recording modes, so you can get from 1hr to 8hrs on a DVD. Their tech support is reasonably dire, though, on the 'phone.

It's also worth haunting a few of the Video forums, although they can be a bit scary without getting up to speed on the jargon first.

MG
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Post by slartibartfast »

I have had a freeview box for a long time, and a Panasonic DVD-RAM recorder (an excellent bit of kit). Later on I bought a Panasonic Plasma TV with a built-in Freeview where you could set the Freeview program to record and the TV would control the DVD recorder.

It was an improvement on having to set the Freeview Box to turn to the correct channel at the correct time, and remember to set the DVD Recorder to record on the right AV channel at the right time ... but still far from perfect.

I resisted Sky & Cable for years but since getting a SKY+ box it has absolutely transformed how I watch / record TV. Recording is all menu driven (including all digital channels). Series "linking" is great allowing you to set a program to record and not worry about missing the others in the series. It can record 2 programs at the same time ans you can play-back a third. The "live" pause and rewinding of a program you are viewing is really handy.

It is the leap-forward that MP3 players were to cassettes.

Virgin do their own version (V+ ?). Other hard-disk recorders may be good but make sure their record selection works from a fully functional on-screen programme guide.

I haven't factored in cost or content into the above as that's a personal choice.

The biggie for me was I used t juggle a 2 DVD recorders and a freeview tuner (and sometimes a VCR) to record what I wanted to watch and view when I wanted to view it. The SKY+ box has replaced all of the faffing and is beautifully easy to use.

When I bought a DVD Recorder I was aware it was a stop-gap until hard disk recorders became cheap enough. That happened a lot quicker than I thought. SKY+ etc is good until everything is on-demand but for me it still has enough legs at the moment. If I need to "keep anything" I can copy it to a DVD or a VCR .

There are other hard disk recording options out there but unless you actually need to create a DVD IMHO there are better options than a DVD recorder. If you really need a DVD of a TV program buy a tuner card for your laptop (Analogue and Freeview) and burn a DVD from there
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