Channel Master CM-7000PAL Digital Video Recorder, Black

by Channel Master

Product Features

• View and record local over-the-air digital broadcast
• Record up to 130 hours of SD content or up to 30 hours of HD content
• Pausing, fast forward and rewind functions
• Electronic programming guide
• No subscription fees

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Product Description

Let the Channel Master DVR with antenna enhance your TV viewing experience. View and record local over-the-air digital broadcasts. With the Channel Master DVR, you can pause, fast forward and rewind your programs; you can even use the slow-motion feature to watch clips frame by frame. The Channel Master DVR offers an electronic program guide that allows you to preset recording schedules so you never miss your favorite shows. Unlike many other DVR set-top boxes, there are no monthly subscription fees. The unit includes an infrared remote control, which operates the CM-7000PAL and up to three other Components.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

379 of 386 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good DVR for the money June 13, 2010

By djsteve

I'll preface this review with the disclosure that I own the Echostar version of this product, the DTVPal-DVR (actually, I own three of them). While these are the same physical units as the Channel Master CM-7000PAL offered here (Echostar is the OEM for the Channel Master) the firmware is slightly different and Channel Master provides its own independent warranty and customer service program.

This DVR is an excellent value in comparison with similar offerings. In fact, it is one of the few DVRs which has been designed for Over-The-Air (OTA) recording of digital TV, rather than tied to a cable or satellite service. There are no subscription or licensing fees required for operation, nor any feature limitations imposed. The DVR includes two independent High Definition (HD) tuners, which permits the simultaneous recording of two HD broadcasts and playback of a third previously recorded show. Input from an external antenna is via a standard coax RF connector, and the tuners have better than average ability to lock onto distant stations. HD video output is provided via HDMI and/or analog component outputs, and standard definition video is available via analog composite and/or RF coax (including pass through of antenna signal to TV). Audio is transmitted via HDMI, optical digital, and analog outputs. The digital audio ports support Dolby Digital output for both live and recorded shows.

There is no compression or re-encoding of the recorded material, so playback is exactly the same quality of the original broadcast. It should be noted, however, that output resolution (480p, 720p, 1080i, etc) is set via menu selection and does not automatically switch dependent on broadcast resolution. This just means that by default any scaling required (if any) will be done by the DVR rather than your TV - a function which will be unnoticed by most viewers.

A complete channel guide is provided. This is noteworthy, as many OTA units provide guide information for only the currently tuned channel. Eight (8) days of full channel guide info is obtained from the TVGuide service supported by many major stations, otherwise the more limited PSIP data is downloaded from the individual stations themselves. The DVR does a good job of combining the two in cases where TVGuide information is available for some, but not all, of the tuned channels.

Recordings can be started manually, and if the tuner has been on the current channel prior it is possible to record from the beginning of a show even if it is already in progress. Scheduled recordings are set via the channel guide, and are time-based. This means that a recording will commence at the time/date initially set even in cases that the show's timeslot has been moved. This is an important point and one area where the DVR falls a bit short compared to other (more expensive) units which feature name-based recordings, auto-skip of reruns, etc. This DVR's scheduling capabilities are more akin to a traditional VCR with the addition of a channel guide for reference.

All display material, both live and recorded, can be paused, rewound, fast-forwarded, and put into slow motion. A convenient button on the remote provides an automatic skip forward of 30 seconds, which when pressed multiple times corresponds almost exactly with a commercial break.

An Ethernet port is provided for automated firmware updates, or updates can be manually transferred via a "thumb drive" to the included USB port. The built-in hard drive is capable of storing up to 30 hours of HD material, or 150 hours of standard definition recordings (though this is determined solely by the station - you cannot choose to record HD material in SD format). Other than a somewhat tricky opening procedure for the case, replacing the hard drive for higher capacity is fairly easy and reliable (though not supported by the manufacturer).

In closing, it should be noted that the original DTVPal-DVR units (such as mine) on which the Channel Master is built have had a somewhat rocky history. Early versions of the firmware had a range of issues, some which were simply annoyances and others which were a serious impairment to usability. However, the most recent firmware, released several months ago and initiated prior to the OEM agreement with Channel Master, has proven to be quite stable and reliable. Having three units used on a daily basis in my home, the oldest of which has been in use since product introduction well over a year ago, leaves me confident in recommendation of the DVR for anyone interested in a great value, fairly well-featured OTA DVR.

155 of 160 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars High Def DVR Without the Nickels and Dimes June 21, 2010

By Chris Boylan TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

The DVR (Digital Video Recorder) has changed the way many people watch TV. Now instead of being tied to a broadcast schedule, you can record the shows you want, and watch them at your convenience without having to worry about a blank tape (or a blank DVD) being inserted in the recorder. Because the DVR is hard-drive based, you just need to make sure you've set the timer and that there is adequate space on the internal drive. But moving beyond the VCR paradigm, DVRs (including the Channel Master CM-7000PAL) allow you to pause live TV (great for a quick phone call or bathroom break) or you can begin watching a show 15 minutes after it starts, and fast forward through the commercials while still being done watching the show at the scheduled end time.

Now none of the above behavior is particularly "new" -- TiVo and other hard drive-based recorders have been around for several years -- but what makes the CM-7000PAL HD DVR different from just about every other DVR on the market today is that there is no monthly fee associated with its use. Instead of getting nickel-and-dimed to death by your cable company, satellite provider or TiVo with monthly DVR or guide fees, you can pick up a CM-7000PAL: it pulls in your local HD and digital channels for free, uses publically available program listing information to give you a fairly useful and informative guide, and gets you all of the essential features of those other DVRs, for a one-time purchase price.

The CM-7000PAL isn't perfect - in some ways its operation is a throwback to the days of the VCR. Yes, you can surf through a guide listing of up to 8 days worth of shows on your available channels, and just highlight the show you want to record and hit the OK button in order to schedule the recording. But this scheduled recording has no "intelligence" in it - it's just a recording timer that begins and ends at a scheduled time on a particular day on a specific channel. This is fine for most purposes, but if a show is moved to a different day/time (as sometimes happens the weeks of major sporting events), you might miss an episode unless you remember to go back into the guide that week and set the timer to record the show at its new date/time. Similarly, you cannot program the CM-7000PAL to record only new (non-rerun) episodes of a show. If you set it to record "Survivor" on CBS at 8:00 on Thursday night for an hour, then you'll get whatever is on CBS Thursday night at 8:00 for an hour forever (or at least until you cancel that timer) and you won't automatically get that season finale and reunion show on Sunday night. More advanced DVRs such as TiVo and those available from cable and satellite providers are more intelligent in that they can automatically tape any instance of a show by the show name, regardless of the day it's on, as well as taping only new episodes if that is your preference.

Also, the CM-7000PAL will not work with cable or satellite broadcasts. The built-in tuners (there are two of them) are both ATSC over-the-air (OTA) digital tuners. This means you need an indoor or outdoor antenna in order to pull in your local HD and digital channels. The drawback here is that you can't get any "premium" channels (e.g., HBO, ESPN), but the obvious benefit is that there is no monthly fee for the TV service either. The price you pay for the DVR plus the cost of an antenna (if you don't already own one) is the only money you'll need to shell out. Period. (Well, OK, you might need a couple of extra connection cables too, but these are pretty inexpensive... see below for details).

Having two tuners means that you can record one show while watching another channel live, or you can record two channels live, while watching a third previously recorded show. Also, if your TV has its own built-in tuner (most High Def-capable TVs in the US include an ATSC tuner), then you could record two shows on the DVR while watching a third live broadcast directly on your TV.

In terms of performance, we did not notice any degradation between live HD broadcasts and recorded playback. The unit is basically capturing the live broadcast stream and storing it without any additional compression, so the quality is very high. In fact, in most cases, the quality is actually higher than the quality of cable and satellite broadcasts which frequently use heavy compression to fit more channels into a fixed broadcasting bandwidth. Audio quality is also fine, with a fiberoptic digital output provided in case you want to hook this up to a surround sound or home theater system. Depending on the broadcast, you can get up to a full 5.1-channel discrete Dolby Digital sound output from your recordings or from live TV. If you want to take full advantage of the HD image quality, then you will want to pick up an HDMI cable, as this is not included in the box (I've had good luck with HDMI cables in the AmazonBasics cable line - inexpensive but reliable, IMHO). Also, if your receiver or HTiB system does not support HDMI audio, then pick up a Toslink fiberoptic cable as well, to take advantage of Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.

Overall, the CM-7000PAL is a solid DVR at a fairly affordable price, made even more affordable by the lack of any monthly subscription fees. Our comprehensive review of the unit is available at Big Picture Big Sound (dot com).

151 of 161 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Not the same as a Dish Network DVR December 3, 2010

By jeffincville

After 13 years as a Dish Network customer, I switched to over the air transmissions and purchased this unit because reviews here led me to believe I would be buying a nearly identical DVR to the one I had as a Dish customer. Although I was initially satisfied with this DVR, there are definite differences when compared to a Dish DVR, as this unit does not seem as sophisticated as my 5 year old Dish DVR was, and the weaknesses of this unit have lead me to consider abandoning the product.

Some differences:

* Like with many DVRs, if the DVR has been on the same channel for the past hour, you can rewind back to that point. With a Dish DVR, you could tape the earlier broadcast, with this DVR you cannot. So if you decide 10 minutes into a show that the show is a keeper, you cannot rewind and record. You can only start recording at the live point.

* This DVR will not allow you to manually change the DVR clock. For some reason, my DVR thinks the time is 5 minutes later than it really is. So if I set a show to tape at 7 PM, it really starts recording at 7:05. I contacted ChannelMaster Customer Service about this, and the best they could do was show me how to set the unit to think it is starting a tape 4 minutes early. So I still miss the opening of each show unless I also tape the show that precedes it. This is the biggest irritation with this unit.
Update: it turns out that you can manually change the clock, but the owner's manual never states this. You will need to update the clock on a daily basis, or it wanders away from the real time. Perhaps this is due to the local TVGOS system, but you should ask yourself if you really want to figure out who is in charge of this clock and contact them to remind them to fix their clock (if you can figure out who is responsible).

* When the time moved from Daylight Savings to Standard time, I had to reprogram many of my recurring recordings. The DVR did not change with the end of Daylight Savings, so it was taping shows that were an hour later.

* If you are watching a show and have two other channels pre-programmed to tape a minute from now, this DVR does not warn you that you are about to lose your show. The Dish DVR would give you the option to overrule the pre-programmed shows. With this DVR, you are suddenly watching something else.

* Though I could always program the remote of the Dish DVR to also control my TV, I have never been able to do so with this unit.

Update: Although I stated at first that none of these points were showstoppers and I didn't really regret the purchase, the lack of stability of the internal clock in this DVR has proven increasingly irritating, and for that reason I would not recommend this unit. ChannelMaster technical service has proven very weak in its assistance, and I am considering getting rid of the unit.