Philips DVDR80 Progressive Scan DVD Player / Recorder

by Philips

Product Details

Product Manual [2.72mb PDF]

• Shipping Weight: 9 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0000AERJS
• Item model number: DVDR80
• Average Customer Review: 1.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #191,718 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

The wait is over: the Philips DVDR80 DVD player/recorder lets you share your home videos with others, relieve your VCR of its regular TV taping duties, and enjoy quality home cinema presentations on standard or high-definition televisions. Using the model's extensive inputs, including an i.Link digital video jack, you can transfer and assemble your most treasured camcorder footage, archive all your old video tapes, or burn video from your PC straight to high-capacity DVD--up to an amazing eight hours per disc side using either DVD+R or DVD+RW, thanks to the Variable Bit Rate (VBR) recording system.

The DVDR80 is the first DVD recorder to feature Sat Mouse technology, which will automatically change the channels on your satellite receiver, further simplifying the recording process. The DVDR80 also features a disc manager that allows instant viewing of all recorded discs.

You can also use the DVDR80 like a VCR, burning televised programs directly to disc using the handy Guide Plus+ onscreen TV program guide. Recording functions include safe record, one-touch record (OTR), track append, track divide, track erase, automatic/manual chapter marker insertion, disc write protection, favorite scene selection, index picture screen for instant content overview, and Selectable Index Pictures.

DVD+RW discs require no finalizing--you can record, eject, and play them with minimal fuss, thanks to "background formatting." This feature, which lowers total burning time, is an advantage over the "dash" formats. Other DVD+RW advantages include on-disc content editing and multisession writing.

And, through DVD+RW and DVD+R's compatibility with most existing DVD players, they're a great way for you to share your special memories with family and friends. The unit's Virtual Time Base Corrector ensures better-than-original copies from old video tapes.

The DVDR80 is also a first-rate DVD player, featuring progressive-scan video outputs, Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1-channel surround-sound passthrough, MP3 CD playback (CD-R/CD-RW), and compatibility with most DVD media (including video-mode DVD-R and DVD-RW).

Whether your living room is currently home to an HDTV or you're merely thinking of "someday," the DVDR80 stands ready to deliver the full potential of your DVDs using a sophisticated Motion Adaptive System (DCDi by Faroudja) that corrects visual artifacts and optimizes the video image. Progressive scanning, referred to as 480p for the number of horizontal lines that compose the video image, creates a picture using twice the scan lines of a conventional DVD picture, giving you higher resolution and sharper images while eliminating nearly all motion artifacts.

Top-of-the-line component-video inputs and outputs help minimize digital and line-scan artifacts on compatible advanced televisions, while composite- and S-video inputs and outputs bring compatibility with nearly any video component and television monitor. Audio inputs consist of two-channel analog jacks with 16-bit analog-to-digital conversion and Dolby Digital 2.0 audio compression (compression is nondefeatable).

Two sets of left/right analog-audio outputs channel audio to Dolby Pro Logic receivers and stereo televisions. Both Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1-channel surround-sound signals can be routed through the player's digital-audio outputs (one each of RCA coaxial and Toslink optical) for direct connection to a full-featured audio/video receiver. If you don't have a surround receiver or six-channel speaker setup, you can still make every movie night the ultimate experience: 3D Sound simulates surround sound through two speakers (even the stereo speakers on your TV).

What's in the Box
DVD recorder, remote control, remote batteries, a G-Link/IR Blaster, a user's manual (English), a blank DVD+RW disc, an AC power cord, a stereo analog audio interconnect, a composite-video cable, an S-video cable, a coaxial digital-audio cable, and a coaxial RF antenna (audio/video) cable.

Product Description

The exciting PHILIPS DVDR80 provides the ultimate in DVD recording, with pristine picture quality, high end audio performance and intuitive ease of use. An on-screen TV guide allows masterful point-and-click programming. And you can easily create perfect copies of home videos through i.LINK digital camcorder connections. Digital masterpieces are just a click away! RF, Optical & Analog Inputs 1 Coaxial Digital Audio output S-Video & RGB Component Video outputs Included in box - 46-key remote, DVD+RW disc, A/V cables, coax digital cable, coax antenna Dimensions - 2.9H x 17.1W x 13.1D; weighs 8.81 pounds Warranty - 1 year parts - 90 days labor

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your money, September 10, 2004

By 

D. Krepak - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Philips DVDR80 Progressive Scan DVD Player / Recorder (Electronics)

I received this machine as a replacement for a previous dvd recorder (Philips dvdr985) that Philips could not repair. Both machines did the same thing. After having them for 6-7 months they stopped functioning properly. The timer will not work so unless you are home and use the qtr button the machine will not record. The machine will turn on, but nothing will record. When using a dvd+r disc using the M4 mode to record, it will erase the first movie recorded. Disc error messages when finalizing and unknown data messages occur with regular frequency no matter what type of disc (dvd+r or dvd+rw) or manufacturer. My unit is still under warranty but I was told by Philips I would have to pay to have the unit shipped to and from them if I want them to look at it. Since this machine is doing the same thing as my previous one I am electing to toss it in the garbage rather than spend any more time and money dealing with it and Philips. Sony is now making a dvd recorder that will record dvd+r and dvd+rw discs so I am buying that one.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Worst electronics purchase I've ever made, September 3, 2004

By 

mistie - See all my reviews

This review is from: Philips DVDR80 Progressive Scan DVD Player / Recorder (Electronics)

If you value your sanity, avoid this piece of junk like the plague. In less than a year of ownership, we have had multiple problems. At times the recorder has stopped timer recording with no rhyme or reason--ex: one day I was watching the tv while it recorded a football game....with a half hour to go it just shut off, and when I got it turned back on and checked the timer settings, I hadn't goofed, it really was supposed to record for another half hour. I guess the recorder got bored with the game and didn't want to record any more!

Then there have been the times when I've recorded a program, and then when I've tried to watch it, I get the message "disc error" for no apparent reason. Or, how about recording two hours of home movies only to have it decide that it doesn't want to finalize the disc? Talk about frustration.

What other problems have we encountered? Even when the unit is functioning normally, if you set it to time sequential programs on different channels, you'll lose about the first minute of the second program. That's because the recorder finishes recording the first program, has to do something to finish (I'm not sure what), and then it will start the next recording. By that time you've lost the beginning of your next show.

Other things: I've recorded a +R disc and then (disc never removed) tried to create the titles and finalize the disc. The unit won't do it, instead it gives the message "data not detected." Again, a waste of time and money.

Or....you can put in a finalized disc that has played in the recorder before, but you'll get the message "no disc." Later it will play the same disc. We're talking about discs without smudges, dirt, scratches, warping etc.

Then there are the times when you're trying to watch a commercial (movie) disc....it will freeze throughout a scene, then after a few seconds play for a second or two, freeze again etc. etc. until you give up in frustration. At that point we take the disc, put it in a different player in another room, and watch there. It's the same disc, nothing altered about it, it's just that other brands can play it but the Philips gets glitchy.

Last week I almost had 3 months of wasted work on my hands. I had finished tranferring all our home movies to dvd, and was making copies for all the family members. I hadn't finalized the discs, though, because I wanted to first make sure that all the titles and dates were correct. I had 45 unfinalized discs and suddenly the Philips no longer wanted to finalize anything! I would reset the unit, it would finalize two or three, then do nothing....I must have spent 6 hours resetting the unit over and over until I could get the discs completed. I had to throw out three discs because the finalizing went wrong and the discs were unreadable in any player, i.e. ruined.

If the glitchiness of this unit wasn't enough to make you avoid it, let me tell you about my failed attempts to get help from Philips customer service. It started about three months ago when I was having problems recording; the unit would no longer record on blank discs it could previously use. I called customer service and was told that I needed a firmware upgrade, and that it would be sent in two weeks because it was backordered. After a month with nothing received, I called back and was told that my case would be referred to a specialist, who would call me. Another two weeks went by with nothing. So, I called back and was again told the same thing. By this point I was tired of the runaround, so I asked if I could download the upgrade off the internet. I was told how to do this, and after downloading, burning my own cd and putting it into the unit, it upgraded and seemed to work. The "specialist" never did call, but since it seemed to be functioning, I didn't care.

Well, since then all these other problems have cropped up. I have called Philips repeatedly, to no avail. In their favor, at least they have moved their customer service center and the new people seem to know much more about the product. But, the company doesn't support even their own service reps. In numerous calls, I have been unable to find out the location of a repair place. I have tried using the Philips automated system that says it will let you enter your zip code and then you'll get a repair location; after three transfers you get--can you guess--kicked back into the customer service menu! So, I tried looking it up on the web, but that doesn't work either. Even when I enter the zip code for one of the repair stores listed on the back of my manual, it gives no results. Maybe those stores exist, but who knows? The last thing I want to do is mail off this very expensive piece of junk to a place that may or may not exist!

So....I tried e-mailing Philips customer service. What happens? You get a return e-mail telling you to call them! But if you call them, even the reps don't have any way to access repair location information! Who ever heard of a company where the company itself doesn't know where they fix their own product??

Honestly, at this point I'm wondering if my only recourse is to contact the Better Business Bureau, and hope that they can help.

After all these headaches, two days ago we bought a Pioneer DVR-520H-S recorder. This one has an 80G hard drive, and I'm finding out that having a recorder with a hard drive is a huge advantage. It simplifies recording and editing; I can record to the hard drive and then only copy what I really want to keep. I know, with the Philips you can do the same thing onto a +RW disc, but good luck getting the Philips to work! Plus, editing isn't nearly as easy as on the Pioneer. The Pioneer is much more user-friendly, and guides you through each step of whatever process you're trying to do (copying, recording, etc.) I am VERY happy with the Pioneer DVR-520H-S, and would strongly recommend it over the Philips DVDR80. If you don't want to go with Pioneer, I would still check out recorders with a hard drive, so far we're finding it to be much more useful. Regardless, please spare yourself hours of frustration and many wasted dollars on ruined discs; buy something besides the Philips DVDR80.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Add me to the list of mad customers, October 23, 2004

By 

George D. Fain "Electronics curmudgeon" (Ocean Springs, MISS, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Philips DVDR80 Progressive Scan DVD Player / Recorder (Electronics)

I bought my DVDR80 in August of 2003. About six months ago, it just quit reading DVD+R. It still read DVD+RW. Now it doesn't read them either. Whether the disk is made on the PHillips unit or on my PC with NERO, the disks will not read. IT still reads and plays commercial DVD. I have a $500 DVD player. {Looks snazzy though!} I made ONE recording I kept with this unit. That makes this a $500 recording. I could have bought a lot of DVDs for that. I am going to replace this with a standard DVD player. This was a bad and an expensive idea.
Think about it long and hard before you buy this. Wal-mart has a DVD Recorder for about $250. It hurts less to throw one of those away.