Customer Reviews

Panasonic DMR-E50K DVD Player/Recorder , Black

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I bought this unit with the intent of copying my VHS collection and using this recorder in place of my VCR. After reading reviews from various sources, I bought this model over the next closest - Philips. (By the way, what's up with few brands providing black cabinetry?)

This unit is very easy to use. To get the most out of the unit READ THE MANUAL! One of the best features is the flexible record, allowing optimum recording for those more-than-2 hour-programs. This feature provides the highest quality recording available for the time that you desire to record. Unlike the VCR, where you'd have to record on the LP (or SLP) mode if a program is more than 2 hours, this option will give you the best picture it can in the disc-space provided. To my eye, programs of 2:20 look no worse than if it was recorded on SP.

Of course, some of my prerecorded VHS tapes are copyrighted (but not all) and can't be recorded - this was expected.

There is some concern regarding DVD-R playback on other machines. (Don't forget to FINALIZE. This is all covered in the manual.) IF you have problems, try various brands of media. My JVC player had no problem with Verbatim, Memorex or TDK. However, only the TDK would playback on my Toshiba player. I loaned all three brands to a friend and all 3 played on his Philips and Panasonic players.

My only complaints are:
- Can't record on DVD-RW.
- No (audio) digital input (no brands I could find had it)

I had considred buying a PC-based DVD recorder, but based on the complaints of various friends who have PC-based DVD recorders, I made the better choice by buying this product - MUCH easier. Now my friends are considering buying a DMR-E50.

The wife & I decided to hold off on buying a DVD player until they could record, and those units were more affordable. To the DMR-E50K I can only ask: "Where have you been all my life?!?"
This is a great concept and a wonderful machine.
I currently have 2 VCR's slaved to one another then channeled through this unit, the satellite receiver and either the DVD player from my home theater, my camcorder or my digital camera connected to this machine. It is not an overstatement to say that this device is the workhorse of our Media Center. And it's up to the job.
Until I brought this out of the box, my wife was recording her craft shows to video tapes. Twenty-some of them, to be exact. This means that on a 6 hour tape, there might be 30-40 minutes of stuff she wants to save for future reference. Now, she can use the timer to record the whole show, but edit out the stuff she doesn't want to keep. Also, all those tapes will, someday, have the parts she wants to keep transfered to DVD.

As other reviews have noted, I am also transfering my old video tapes to DVD and simply based on the space I'm clearing up, this machine is worth the price.
The only media problem I've ever encountered was when I bought the wrong format. Other than that, all the media I've used have worked well.

Picture and sound are first rate. I am using the unit for backups of my video tape collection and for dumping programs off my Tivo unit. I am completely satisfied with the results except that I have also had the problems experienced by several of the negative reviewers. The unit worked fine for me on Verbatim, Sony and Panasonic disks but rejected 1 out of 3 of Fujifilm DVD-R. When it locked up on the Fuji disks it went into a "death spiral" where it would attempt to recover, fail but would not allow you to eject the disk. I had good luck unplugging the unit for 10 minutes and then holding the open button during the recover phase. This allowed me to remove the offending disk. Seems to work fine afterwards. Lesson is good disks mean good results. Anything else is at your own risk.

If you're looking for a DVD Recorder to transfer over non-copyrighted material, Panasonic's DMR-E50K does the job without a hitch!

If you're new to DVD, I wouldn't recommend this as your first player. The instruction manual is a little confusing if you're not already familiar with wiring and general setup. Recording a DVD is similar to recording a CD-R in a CD Recorder. You must finalize the DVD-R before it's playable on (most) other DVD Players. If you don't, it won't play on any other machine other than the DMR-E50K.

The picture and sound is very good. Recording time varies from 1, 2, 4 or 6 hours on a single sided 4.7 GB DVD. The top two speeds (XP & SP) look great! The two low speeds (LP & EP) really looks like the VHS equivalent.

After reading other reviews and specifications with other DVD Recorders, my main concerns were disc and player compatability. The DMR-E50K works with Panasonic's DVD-RAM (playable only in the DMR-E50K), and offers editing and re-recording on the same disc over and over again. As for DVD-Rs, the DMR-E50K has no problems recording with TDK brand DVD-Rs. I have 3 DVD Players (not including the DMR-E50K) and after finalizing a DVD-R, the finished DVD worked on all of them: Audiovox, Panasonic (different model), and a high end McIntosh.

The Panasonic DMR-E50K does exactly what I expected it to do. It offers Progressive Scan, S-Video, Composite video, DTS Output, Dolby Digital 5.1 playback (on pre-recorded discs), and the convenience of recording over and over again on a single DVD-RAM disc.

On the negative side, it only records in Dolby Digital two channel stereo (Pro-Logic compatible), and only offers an optical digital output (not coaxial).

I wouldn't consider this player to the "causal" viewer. However, if you're into DVD and want recording capability, Panasonic's DMR-E50K may just be what you're looking for.

I brought this from Amazon a month ago and it works just as easy as a VHS recorder. All you need is a blank disk and tell it when to record and it will record with it's built in timer. I have been using several brands of DVD-R disk and only have problems with the cheap ones(i.e. no name brands). The problems only happen rarely. For example, the recording will stop and go to recovery mode. But don't worry if goes to recovery mode, previous recordings are not destroy. However, you can't record anymore to that disk. The recorder also uses DVD-RAM disk and this is my most favorite type of disk. It treats a DVD-RAM disk like a hard drive. There is no recovery mode or hiccups that I have seen happen to a DVD-RAM disk yet. ...

I've recorded over 200 movies on this recorder, and the results are usually excellent, but sometimes there are disasters.

This recorder is not for everybody because sometimes it's glitchy, even with Panasonic's disks. If the recording passes the first 111 seconds, it usually will continue, but don't count on it. When it reaches that magic moment, it will sometimes bomb, meaning the laser lens is dirty, or the disk quality is not to the recorder's liking, or the power is too spiky, or it's the wrong day of the week. Maybe this touchy behavior is unique to my recorder, but I missed getting a few treasured movies off the cable. Who knows when those will be aired again. Recordings of broadcast t.v. are not nearly as good as those on digital cable, but sometimes the network presentations have good quality broadcasts almost worthy of DVD recording.

Sometimes the recorder mistracks, getting the temporal sequencing out of order. That's annoying. However, if the recording is ripped to the PC, then the re-recording can smooth out this problem and a few others such as stuttering and pixelation madness.

It's touchy. Sometimes DVD players have trouble playing the finalized disks. Frequent cleaning of the recorder's laser lens is necessary to prevent the problems given above.

I suppose this glitchy nature is because of the power in the laser. Lower power increases the lifetime of the burner, but the disks being burned have to have a perfect surface and disk opacity has to be very high so the low burn power of the laser doesn't pass through the disk but gets concentrated. I'm not sure this is best explanation for the recorder's malfunction with other manufacturer's disks, and occasionally with Panasonic's. The 50-cent disks from other manufacturers will work most of the time, but expect a few failures.

When it records timed events, most of the time the final product is excellent. However, it would be nice to have a keyboard to type in the titles. Using the telephone-like keypad is inconvenient. What was Panasonic thinking? An infrared keyboard would be a big help.

While the DVD-RAM disks can be edited, using the keypad makes editing inconvenient. In order to make RAM recordings watchable on DVD players, I had to purchase Panasonic's inexpensive and versatile player that can read RAM disks. Playing the RAMs on the player makes DVD mastering possible with the DVD recorder.

I wish Panasonic had software that would allow editing of recordings prior to finalizing. That would make things more convenient.

When I buy my next recorder, I'm going to be looking for greater ease of use and for features that address the problems I've had. I don't want to mislead anyone, because this unit has many good features.

Should people buy this machine? Yes, oh yes! Low price, high quality. It is very good most of the time, but you should know the things I and the other reviewers have to say, so you know what to expect, and so you won't be as disappointed and frustrated as I was initially. Keep the laser clean and most of the time it will behave well.

While superb recordings can be made with the SP (standard play setting), the LP (long play)setting is perfect for most recordings. The recording quality of LP is very good. That lowers the cost of recordings, so the more expensive Panasonic DVD-R disks are more affordable. The same cannot be said for EP (extended play), but even EP recordings are remarkably good.

This unit does a great job of playback. I have never had a DVD player/recorder and it looks great with store-bought DVD's or the DVD-Ram disc that panasonic supplied. But as another reviewer mentioned, it does not read DVD-R. I used several Maxell DVD-R discs (I don't know why the brand should make any difference) and the player says: NO READ. You must purchase DVD-Ram discs or you won't be able to record anything. I did see that others claim that DVD-R works in their units and the manual says it should, but I had no luck and I wouldn't spend $ 400. if you think you're going to record on DVD-R with this unit. Best of luck. Other than that, it's great. You also must have a THREE JACK (Yellow, White & Red) Output a/v on your TV or you will not be able to record from your TV set. If your TV is more than a couple years old, and it has TWO A/V jacks in the rear of the the set, you will not be able to record from your TV or VCR.

The machine worked great right out of the box. The manual leaves a bit to be desired, however. All of the required info is there, but it takes some digging to find the information you want. The machine works fine with all the brands of DVD-RAM disks I have tried, provided they are formated correctly (which the deck can do). The only real disk compatibility problem I have found is with Imation disks, which must be "unlocked" on a computer with a DVD-RAM drive before they can be set up for formating and use. I've settled on TDK DVD-RAM disks and have had no problems. Commercial movie DVD's play great, with great video & DOLBY digital optical pass-through to a decoder, and DVD-R recordings work fine. (I've archived some of my old VHS tapes with no problems.) This one's a keeper!

I purchased a E50 about two months ago and couldn't have been happier with it! It did everything it promised...recorded, played back...I could even play my discs back on other (even relatively older) DVD players. Then, it all started to change. I had been using Memorex discs, and in a pack of five, usually the recorder would turn one into a coaster. Then the ratio got higher until finally it wouldn't record at all. I started troubleshooting, tried different disc brands and even used the *supplied* Panasonic DVD-RAM disc, but no dice. It just wouldn't record anymore.
I took the unit back and it was replaced...and...so far so good. It's been about a month now with the new unit, and every disc I've recorded has come out working. Just for giggles I bought some cheapie CompUSA discs...even they work! TMC has been showing classic Oscar winners all month, and vintage Charlie Chaplin...which I now have on DVD thanks to this recorder!
I also enjoy having the front end inputs with S-video & RCA. Great for hooking up my MiniDV Camcorder to caputure vacation videos to DVD...so now we can share them with friends without having to hook our cam up to their TVs.
From reading the reviews here, there seems to be a problem in the manufacturing of these units, because when they work, they work wonderfully. I guess it's Russian Roulette as to whether you get a working model, or a paperweight.

*** out of ***** Because of the Forrest Gump rule on these recorders..."You never know what your gonna' get."

I bought this unit based on other reviews I had read regarding compatibility. So far the only disc this thing will read is the one that was shipped with the unit. Even though TDK, Maxell and Sony discs were tried with the correct region and designations, the unit will not read them. Frustrating to say the least and no way to format or no help in the manual if this occurs. Maybe I am missing something here, but it appears they want you to only purchase their products.