Customer Reviews

Panasonic DMR-ES25S DVD Recorder with DV Input with HDMI and SD Card Slot

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

First, let me say this - There is no perfect "basic" DVD recorder. (at least not for under $200) Different models have pros and cons which need to be weighed carefully. But I think this Panasonic is the best of the bunch.

I bought this recorder after trying out the Samsung DVD-R135. (which I would say is this players closest competitor.)

The DVD-R135 was very nice (great DVD menu creation!)but I just couldn't get past the lousy LP recording mode. Many programs I record are longer than 2 hours (like football games) so I HAD to have a recorder that captured decent quality into the 4 hour range. So after reading other reviews, I gave the Panasonic a try.

Lets get the bad out of the way first:

1.) No power light (its tough tell if the unit is on or not)
2.) No "time remaining" - so you can't tell how much time is left to watch during a movie
3.) No "Open/Close" button on the remote
4.) Couldn't use the "Commerical Skip" on DVDs burned on other recorders or at the "FR" custom speed.
5.) No "Skip Chapters" buttons on the front of the unit - Keep that remote handy!

These missing items are particularly frustrating because they are standard features on just about all other recorders.

Can you get the past those nitpicks? I hope so, because here is the good:

1.) Good LP recording mode - which means you can record for 4 hours and still have decent quality. (other players have lousy LP quality) Think about this for a minute - its a big deal.

Its also got flexible recording. This allows the recorder to match the recording time to the best quality possible. (The Samsung also has this great feature)

2.) Records on almost everything - DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD-RAM...you name it, it records on it. FYI - DVD-RAM is a bit like having a computer hard drive on your disc - you can rewrite it almost endless times, move chapters/data, edit, delete, etc. And its very reliable - disc errors are unlikely. (The Samsung only records on DVD-R and DVD-RW)

3.) Plays almost everything - Regular DVDs, Dual Layered DVDs, VCDs, etc. I've seen some mention that "homebrew" DVDs (meaning DVDs recorded on another player or PC) might not play, but I haven't had any problems. This includes DVDs burned on 3 different PCs)

In fact, I had a DVD burned off on my PC that has always had a "rough spot" on it. It played fine on my PC but skipped on my old player and the Samsung I tried. The Panasonic DMR-ES25S played the "rough spot" without missing a beat!

4.) Average remote, but good for entering text - The remote takes some getting used to but its better than the Samsung remote. I especially like the recessed directional control for moving around. Its great for entering text, which took forever on the Samsung.

So it comes down to a simple fact - The good far outweighs the bad with this player.

The Samsung DVD-R135 has great menus, menu creation formatting, and all of the missing items from my Panasonic "bad" list.

BUT the Panasonic DMR-ES25S scores big with a solid LP mode, huge Disc compatibility (playing and recording)and a better remote.

In its price range, the Panasonic was the only player that had everything that I HAD to have in a DVD recorder. So I can live with the few missing features.

And I keep thinking about how it breezed through that rough spot on my burned DVD while the other players choked on it.

So in my opinion....the best of the below $200 DVD recorders is: The Panasonic DMR-ES25S!

This lightweight and inexpensive component is incredibly powerful and capable given that the price would have gotten you only a barebones DVD player just a few years ago. My primary goal is that of transcribing a videotape collection now several decades old to DVD for better archival storage and ease of transport when moving. The DMR-ES25S has a variety of other features, such as the SD Card Slot input, which I've not taken advantage of.

First: Setup is a breeze. Plug it in, hook up your choice of outputs to your preamp, your choice of inputs from your preamp, and you're good to go. There's no question that this is potentially complicated for an A/V novice but Panasonic makes it easy by allowing a simple RF (coax) cable input and output so that the unit will essentially replace a VCR in a simple VCR/TV setup. That is, you can take the cable from the wall, plug it in to the back of the DVD-R, then take another cable and run it to the TV, and you're done. This type of setup works, but doesn't provide the unit's full audio or video capabilities. The player has component, digital optical, S-Video, and composite connectors all available. For my setup, I ran the cables directly from the VCR into the DVD-R, then from there to the pre-amp. This allows me to watch my videotapes as they run through the DVD-R, which is what I want because I'm recording as I go.

Functionality: This part is straight-forward once you get the hang of it. Push the record button and start your source. That's it. For DVD-R's and their assorted brethren, you simply keep recording until you run out of space. I find that the 4-hour mode for a single sided 4.7GB DVD-R is fine and doesn't lose any quality over videotape. DVD-RAMs give you much more flexibility at a price. (At the moment, DVD-R stock runs about a quarter per disc while DVD-RAM stock is about 1.35 per disc). The flexibility of editing, adding chapters, and so forth is quite good with the -RAMs, and this is the way to go if you plan on moving your home videos to disc.

As others have mentioned, this is a consumer grade DVD recorder, so don't plan to use it to transfer pre-recorded commercial macrovision-encoded VHS tapes. Although there are workarounds for this out there, it's simply easier to replace your tapes with commercial DVD's.

The remote control isn't the most intuitive one I've seen, but it gets the job done without a lot of waiting around for recorder response time. Some actions, like finalizing a disc, take several inputs to accomplish, but again, for the most part, the remote is fine and offers some universal support for TV's.

Instructions are complex but well-written. Again, this is a very complex component so plan to take some time studying the documentation. If you plan to use just a few functions, you'll be off and running within an hour, but if you want to get into the details of editing a DVD-RAM, you'll be experimenting for the better part of a day.

The only downside of the unit that I've found is that there's no indication that it's turned on! It displays the time of day, like a VCR, when it's off. Push the power button and it displays a message saying hello, then reverts to the time again. There's no little green light or other indication that the unit is turned on.

Picture quality is excellent. The component itself runs quietly and without generating excess heat. Overall, I'm very satisfied.

The video quality is phenomenal when viewing uupconverted standard resolution DVDs through the HDMI connection at 1080i or even 720p. This unit has all the features I needed, including Dual Layer recording and SD card picture viewing and slideshow recording. It is easy to set up and burns all of the media I have tried on it, from expensive archival quality to throw away cheap DVD-R disks. The Quick Start recording feature is fantastic, taking no more than 1 second to go from off to recording. All of the features operate as advertised which is a breath of fresh air in this day of overhype marketing. I highly recommend this item.

I never had the problem with audio via HDMI cable as the previous reviewer reports.

I've had the es25 model for about 2 months. so far i'm very satisified. I also have owned the es20 model for a couple of years. a few of the problems i had with the es20 is that it could only use 8x and lower, which is getting harder to find. i also encountered several occasions when it would make strange noises and not want to record. i eventually realized that i needed to clean it more often. several people have problems with the es25 model not having an open/close button on the remote. that is an obvious error, because the machine does have a sensor for opening/closing by remote. if you happen to have the es20 model, the remote will work this function, as well as most with the es25 model. this may be true for other es models. another problem i had with the es20 was naming recordings. for instance, if i recoreded "wedding crashers" it would say "wedding crasher", and the "s" would be on the next line. this drove me crazy. with the es25, it shows you what it will look like on the finalized version. i'm giving the es25 five stars. it serves all my purposes. it's worth it even if i couldn't eject via remote. so, if this is important to you, i advise you to track down a remote for es20 model. i also advise owners to clean your machine often. especially if you do a lot of recording. the es25 is also compatible with double layered discs which is great for people like my that record football game and like to record on sp mode. i can now put a game on only one disc instead of two discs. i hope this has been helpful.

I bought this DVD recorder specifically to record a daily TV show (wife) and to provide an "Upcovert" of DVD movies (me) to near HD quality; both goals were achieved by this cost-effective device. One unanticipated outcome is the overall quality of the TV picture quality. I am one of those who has a 40' LCD TV who has been less-the-pleased with the analogue TV reception; have also been too cheap to upgrade to digital cable. This machine solves that problem. Running the cable through the DMR-ES25S somehow boosts the quality of almost all of my cable channels. When running the TV off of the device's internal TV tuner, it also stretches the picture to fit my widescreen without noticable distortion. Last, the set-up directions should be modified to include integration with a surround sound system - it took about 10 extra minutes of trial and error to figure that one out but I was overall pleased with the guide book.

There are enough reviews on this so let me just add my part. Certain options are hidden to much in the menu. Like turning on Subtitle. My previous Panasonic DVD player had a remote control button for this.
So far the recording is very easy and works well. I have not had any bad DVDs burned by this device. Frankly the up-converting aspect makes the picture too red and I do not see the difference with standard Progressive scan. I bought it for DVD recording and it works better than expected.

Nice machine. Allows you to watch shows as you are recording them which is the primary reason we bought this one. This feature works fine but I noticed that the recorder seemed a little noisy at first when we were watching and recording at the same time. A few months later I no longer notice the noise, not a big deal. The remote control is great and works really well with our TV. It is also nice that the machine comes with a free RAM disk. My only wich was that they made larger RAM disks, I can only record two hours using SP which ends up being only one hour show since I usually record one minute before the show and a few minutes after so one show takes about 63 minutes. I just delete each show after watching.

I purchased this product recently and found it to be working very good, the set up was easy to follow and simple enough for an amateur.I am however experiencing a problem with the HDMI hook up.I presently have an existing HDMI cable( not Panasonic)which I hook up from the recorder
to a HDTV Samsung.I am getting good video but no sound,on checking other reviews another reviewer apparently was experiencing a similar problem until he purchased a Panasonic cable.Well presently I ordered a panasonic cable and I do hope that this cable will solve the problem with the sound,hence the reason I gave the product 4 stars.

I did my research on DVD recorders and the Panasonic DMR-ES25S delivers the most bang for the buck. I was looking for a DVD player and recorder that would compliment my Direct TV DVR. I wanted to move programs I wanted to save over to DVD and free up hard drive space on the DVR. This recorder works perfectly with great picture quality in XP,LP and SP modes. Even extended play mode while not perfect is acceptable. I have had this recorder for about a month and I have had no problems with it. The player seems to play anything I give it without skipping and the picture quality on DVD movies with the HDMI connection is terrific. I would recommend this product to anyone looking for a DVD recorder under $300 and at the $149 that its being offered for is a steal.

This was a great buy. Everything works as I had hoped, EXCEPT! There seems to be an incompatibility issue connecting to my JVC rear projection TV with a HDMI to DVI cable. Often it will take several minutes to start-up the picture. When it finally comes in it looks good, but because I have an older TV anyway, I am satified with 480p using the component connections. I'll just take that expensive HDMI/DVI cable back and keep the recorder because I am so pleased with all other functions. Great for recording TV and VHS onto DVD. And one day when I have a TV with an HDMI port, I am sure it will get the 5th star.

Also, I realized when I got the recorder home that I needed an optical audio cable to connect to my receiver. I have been using coaxial for years and had been pleased. This unit does not have a coaxial jack. I was annoyed at having to buy another $22 cable, but mostly annoyed because yet another person working at Best Buy/Circuit City doesn't know about the product and offers this kind of information and I had to make another trip to the store. Naturally, the only thing I learned about was the extended service plan.

Overall, this is a very good DVD recorder.