Customer Reviews

JVC DRMV1S Progressive-Scan DVD Player/Recorder and VCR Combo , Silver

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(53)

 

 

What caught my eye about the JVC DR-MV1SL was that it boasted VHS playback in progressive mode! There are S-VHS VCR players that will playback an S-VHS tape in S-VHS mode (400 lines of resolution). But these VCRs will play regular VHS tapes like any ordinary VCR player, with just 230 lines of resolution. When you have an HDTV (mine is the 50" Samsung DLP HDTV), the lower resolution VHS tapes really start to look bad.
So, coming back to the DR-MV1SL, the specs say it can play a regular VHS tape in progessive mode, which is 480 lines progressively scanned (not interlaced, like S-VHS or regular VHS). This should account for a really good picture. And that was my primary reason for buying this DVD/VCR combo. Here's some very useful stuff I found out:

1) The unit does indeed play a VHS tape in 480 progressive mode. But the quality was not always much better. The picture was somewhat sharper, and more full of color. But I also started to notice a lot more jagged lines. In defense of this unit, there's really only so much you can do with a lower quality signal. This unit tries its best to upgrade that signal - but the end result was not so spectacular. A little better, but not much.

2) Limited use of dubbing VHS tapes due to copyright protection. You were probably aware that this unit would not dubb VHS tapes onto DVD if the tape had a copyright signal on it. But did you know that ALL Disney and Pixar tapes are copyright protected? My wife has almost a 100 of these Disney animation tapes and I thought I'd pick our favorite ones to backup onto DVD. Surprise, surprise, not ONE could be copied. Even the old Disney tapes like Cinderella, Lion King, etc. - none of them could be copied.

3) But if you're lucky enough to find a tape that you can copy onto DVD, the results are very good. I managed to find 5 VHS movies that I could copy onto DVD (Mission Impossible, Jumanji, etc.). 4 of them came out perfect, just 1 of them had a 3 second skip in the middle of the movie. But that VHS tape was very old and poor quality.

4) Recording TV programs onto DVD is nice and easy. The resulting picture also looks quite nice, sometimes even better than the original TV broadcast signal.

5) The unit will only record on DVD -R, -RW and -RAM formats. It won't record on any of the +s (I tried a DVD +R and it didn't work). Also, the recording speed of the discs doesn't seem to matter (nothing is mentioned about disc speed in the manual). I tried a 4x and an 8x - no difference in terms of recording time and end quality. Also, the unit will playback almost ALL the formats (I tried a recorded DVD +R and it worked fine).

There were few more minor details (like the blue light, which can be totally dimmed, the remote which can get confusing since the buttons double up for the VCR and DVD - but this is probably true of all VCR/DVD combos and you eventually get used to it). But I figured the points I mentioned above were the most important and most useful (at least to me) and they were not really mentioned clearly anywhere else.

Summarizing: Picture quality is great with the DVD, VHS tapes look a little better using the progressive output. Copyright protection of tapes (like with Disney) make it impossible to backup tapes onto DVD.

Overall, I think this is a very nice unit with lot of packed features in it. However, I returned mine back to BestBuy primarily because I couldn't backup my Disney collection, because VHS playback was only a little better, and because the price I paid was a little too much (around 400). If this ever went on sale for less than $300, I'd seriously consider buying it and keeping it.

UPDATE (11/17/04):

I still think this unit is very nice and I'm sticking to my 4 star rating. However there were some things I forgot to mention before and some new information about OTHER products (from JVC) that I think would be useful to those shopping around.

1) I forgot to mention that NO AV cables come with this unit (No RCA cables, no S-Video cables). Only 3 (that's right, three) RF-cables and an RF splitter. At first I thought this was a mistake, but then I checked the manual and it confirms the same.
I thought that that was bad of JVC. This unit is noted for its progressive output - they should have at least included one component video cable!

2) JVC also has another new model out right now - the DR-MX1S which is basically this unit (DR-MV1S) + an 80GB hard drive. So essentially, it's a 3 in 1 - sounds very nice. Depending on where you look, the MSRP of the DR-MX1S varies - the JVC website has the MSRP at $999, Amazon has it at $1099 and I've seen some other websites that list it as high as $1299. Of course, MSRP doesn't matter that much as long as you can get a good price. Amazon currently has it listed for a fairly competitive price of $699. I suspect it'll go lower in time.
I would love to try out the DR-MX1S since I think a hard drive is best for daily recordings of TV shows. But I'm waiting for it to be available at my local store first.

3) JVC also has an OLDER model - the HR-XVC37U that supposedly does the SAME thing as this unit (the DR-MV1S) in that it can display VHS in progressive mode! It's also a DVD/VCR combo like this unit, but it's also a lot less expensive since it does not have the capability of a DVD recorder. Amazon has it listed as the HRXVC37U, in case you want to search for it here.

So, there ARE other options. An older, less expensive JVC model (without DVD recording capability) or a newer, more expensive JVC model (with an added hard drive). Just thought some might find this information useful. Happy shopping!

This unit has many great features. The problem is that there are way too many problems with the VCR. First unit, a VCR tape got stuck within one month. Took unit to dealer. Unit was repaired. Within 2 weeks another VCR tape got stuck. Dealer replace the unit with a new one. Within one month a VCR tape got stuck. I was told by the dealer, that 3 other people had similar problems with their units. Appears that this is way to common.

We purchased this JVC unit in early June from Crutchfield. The first problem was dubbing from video to dvd-the manual was wrong. We got help from JVC on the phone and worked that out. Then, about a month ago (past the short 90 day warranty) the unit would spontaneously start flashing "loading" at various times. We might be watching a video or dvd-it just starts flashing. We can't turn it off-the unit had to be unplugged and cleared before it stops. If it happens when set to timer record, it stops recording-so we've lost programs we wanted to record.

Crutchfield says it's not their problem. JVC doesn't anwser emails and the customer service people just say mail it (at our expense) to the service center with a $50 check before they'll even look at it.

This is obviously a problem others are having but JVC won't deal with it. I've lost all loyalty for JVC products-and I've filed a complaint with the Wisconsin Consumer Protection Department.

Don't buy this unit-it's buggy!

Although technically impressive, the DR-MV1's that I've had all suffered from VHS tape drive problems--resulting in tapes getting stuck during the loading process. I've had this happen several times and exchanged the problematic unit for a new one--then it happened again. I'm on my 3rd unit and the same problem just happened. I'm going to return it and buy and different brand. I called JVC and they told me that "no problems have been reported with thousands of units sold so far", but checking the Amazon review shows that this model has several problems.

In the past week I have purchased and returned five JVC DR-MV1SL recorders. All but 1 functioned properly in the record mode from VHS to DVD, and produced at least one good copy before failing. They began to turn themselves off after less than two minutes of recording, ruining the DVD media, and of course failing to provide the copy. All VHS tapes were of original material. Was this product rushed to market with quality control problems, or was I just unlucky enough to encounter five defective machines in a row? What are those odds? I have given up, and will purchase a stand-alone DVD recorder by another manufacturer.

Ok, so I bought this unit to have a combo unit that could playback and record vhs tapes and dvds. The dubbing stuff is a bonus but I don't use it.

First, in my testing, the DVD recording works great- you can write to almost any format and mastering into DVD format is simple and fast. I would argue that the DVD recording is better than the VHS. Supposedly you can also record DV from your camera. There is even a feature to record a DVD and watch and earlier part of what you are recording simultaneously.

The unit is a little difficult to figure out- you definitely need to read the manual before you try to do anything.

Now for the bad. After owning the unit for several months, it suddenly started stopping in the middle of dvd playback, loading, or recording, and started flashing "loading". It will eventually turn itself off, or you have to unplug the unit, plug it back in (it will still flash "loading" for a minute or so) and let it shut itelf off.

I haven't tried to fix it yet but i have found the best solution so far is just turn the unit off completely and let it rest, and it will start working normally again (for awhile).

Anyhow the fact that it broke is what got it 3 stars instead of 5. If JVC helps fix it I might rate this a 4, otherwise a 0! We will see...

This machine just doesn't work! The first unit we bought jammed up and froze the very first time we tried loading a VHS tape to watch! We kept getting the word "loading" flashing in the front panel, and no other action. The whole thing reminded me of a computer crash! Unplugging the unit and plugging it back in did no good, so we took the unit back to where we bought it. The sales representative was able to get my tape out for me, then insisted I send the unit into the JVC service center for repair and upgrade. I reminded him that this is a brand-new machine on which we just spent $379.00 the day before! I was told, "that is what warranties are for." To make a long story short, I went to the store manager who replaced the defective unit with another brand-spanking new JVC DRMV1S. However, after less than a week of use, the word "loading" flashed on the front panel of the new unit while everything else froze up, locking in another of my tapes and a half-recorded DVD. I took the equipment back, and was offered yet another JVC DRMV1S as a replacement by the store manager. Instead, I got our money back, then turned around and bought the Panasonic DMR-E75V. Since then, I have been able to put all our home movies on DVD without a single hitch, glitch, problem or concern -- the picture and sound quality resulting from that Panasonic are GREAT! The Panasonic was also able to erase the portion of the DVD that the JVC messed up, so I was able to use the rest of that disc for dubbing!

I went back to the store 2 weeks after the last incident and saw they had a whole pallet full of JVC DRMV1S on sale for $99.00 each. I wondered at the time how many people will be made angry even at that price! Over a week later, pratically all the units were still sitting on that pallet! Evidently, word-of-mouth got out on this loser and folks are staying away in droves. I suggest you do the same!

I went to the JVC website and the company knows this "loading" freeze problem exists. Even on their site, they suggest returning your unit to one of their service centers for repair and upgrade. Why would anyone expect a customer to buy something brand new, then expect them to send it somewhere else to be fixed before they can use it? Why doesn't JVC just recall this garbage and apologize to their customers? I also now wonder why stores still carry it based on the reviews here.

Due to this incident, and because of problems other folks and I have had with previous JVC products in the past, I intend to never buy JVC again. Wish I could give this item zero stars.

I wish I'd read the reviews on here and at epinions BEFORE I bought it. VHS tape got stuck the very first time I used it. DVD would start to record and then say "loading". It wouldn't read JPEG files. Before this I've never had a problem with JVC but I don't know how they could have let this one get out to the stores. This bad of a product could destroy their reputation. I took it back and switched it for a Toshiba D-VR4. I havent had trouble with it...so far anyway

This product is defective. It keeps flashing "Loading" everynow and then and becomes inoperable. I have not found any solution so far and the JVC customer support is mediocre at best. My unit was only 3 months old when this problem started. JVC makes poor quality products and do not buy them and they will not fix their problems.

What a piece of junk. I'm a computer tech, and I've never seen something as anti-intuitive as this piece of cr*p. If I didn't know a lot about tech stuff, i wouldn't be able to program it. As it is, I have to read the manual EVERY time before I attempt to do something.
The problem with flashing "LOADING" continuously is real and more annoying than you can imagine. There is literally NOTHING you can do about it; you have to unplug the thing, and wait.
I've tried to take it back to Best Buy, but they won't have it. I'm seriously considering taking a hammer to it and buying a TiVo.
If you are looking for a DVD Recorder, I BEG you, save yourself the headache. Steer clear of this piece of garbage.