Customer Reviews

Samsung DVD-V8500 DVD/VCR Combo

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I was looking for a good DVD player, but am still holding on to the VCR idea and love my tape collection. I know for the hardcore DVD viewer, this would not be considered, but was great for me. The instruction manual is easy to use. Installation was easy. However, in order to hook it up to an HDTV, you need an extra set of cables (not included). The remote is easy to use. I am unable to set this up to my cable remote, as the codes I entered did not work. No big deal, the Samsung remote is easy to use. I would recommend this model to anyone buying a VCR/DVD combo.

I thought my unit was broken when I first
hooked it up, because switched to VCR it still
showed the "blue greeter" screen for DVD. I
heard somebody else had this experience with
the S-Video, so I tried Composite Video
(yellow RCA) - same story. Only when I
hooked up the RF-out jack (yuck!) could I
see the VCR video. Oddly, I could hear
the audio on Line-Out, I just couldn't use
either of the Video jacks for Line-Out. I
thought my unit might be broken, so I
called their customer support.

After hanging up on me several times, they
eventually said you can only view the VCR
on RF-out. Since I have Tivo, I don't need
to hook up my Cable to the VCR - I just want
to watch tapes. So my cable is already
hooked up to my TV/Tivo. I could hook up
the RF-out to a 2nd RF-in on my TV, but who
wants to switch back and forth between
RF-in jacks on my TV, and maybe leave it
in the wrong state and mess up a Tivo
recording? Time to send it back. Note the
User manual mentions nothing of this. It
makes it sound like S-Video should work for
everything.

I'm still not certain my unit isn't simply broken or
misconfigured. Why would Line Out switch the Audio
if it can't supply the video?

But their Tech Support won't listen or help, and tells me this
is how it's supposed to work. Sheesh.

If somebody has a different experience, please share it, because
if it actually *worked* I'd give this unit 5 stars.

The best feature is the ability to plug your memory card in and view all those digital pictures! I have been shopping for a long time, reviewing Consumer Reports, Amazon, Epinions.com, etc. Like many, we have a plethora of old VCR tapes or camcorder tapes that need a VC player. Setup is easy, batteries for the remote included and color coded cables too. You may want to pick up a S cable. Codes are included to make this remote work on your TV. In our setup we have a cable tv, dvd recorder and now this beauty!

My parents bought this combo unit, and I have gotten a chance to use it fairly extensively. I wanted to use it to transfer some old VHS tapes into the computer, so they let me borrow it for a week. I already have a DVD player, so I mostly concentrated on the VCR functionality. It did appear to play DVDs just fine, and I watched one or two without incident. I went out and purchased a Turtle Beach Video Advantage PCI so I could do the data transfer into the computer, and hooked everything up last night. Before this I watched some of the tapes to see what the quality was like and if I should bother with trying to back up that particular tape. Here are my thoughts on the unit:

Pausing and unpausing takes too long. It cuts the sound as soon as you hit pause on the remote, but it actually takes a few seconds to start pausing the playback. This means that whenever you pause, you miss three or four seconds of audio, and the only way to hear it is to rewind the tape a bit.

Furthermore, there is no slow fast forward/rewind. You can't pause it and then back up slowly to the point where the audio cut out, you have to do it as a normal rewind, which is approximately the speed of light. It's easy to overshoot and end up watching a minute or more of commercials or stuff you've already seen.

The auto tracking function is good, and I was amazed at the quality of the playbacks on most of the tapes, all of which were recorded off TV from the late 80s to mid 90s. However, there's a tracking bar that appears on the screen when you first put in the tape, and it usually takes several seconds to find the best track.

On some of the tapes I also noticed an irritating switch between normal audio and hi-fi, which caused the sound to fluctuate wildly and a (HI-FI) logo to appear right in the middle of the screen. This seemed to happen the most when theme songs were playing or the tape had been fast forwarded or rewound. Half the theme song would play quietly, then the logo would come on the screen for a full 10 seconds or so and the music would be blasting.

I returned the unit to my parents after I had transferred some of the tapes, and I'll probably be getting my own combo unit soon. But it won't be this one. There's just too many irritating niggles on the VCR portion.

I love my combination vcr and dvd. I have many old vcr tapes which I enjoy watching and now I have many dvd's recently purchased. The combination vcr/dvd makes it easier to enjoy all my movies. It's features are excellent. I recommend it highly.

This unit does the job perfectly. It has advanced features that are usually found in higher priced players. The picture and sound quality is excellent, especially when connecting with the 3 component video system. I would definitely recommend this unit!

We had initially purchased an open-box Samsung (different model) from BestBuy - but the power button on the remote wouldn't turn the unit on or off. So I returned the unit to BestBuy and purchased this unit online.

Very pleased with the performance - remote control layout is not that intuitive, and, guess what - after a few months, the power button has stopped working on this unit, too. Don't know if it's the remote not working, or the unit refusing to recognize the power on/off commands, but now I find myself being lazy and leaving the DVD player turned on, which I'm sure won't be great for the lifetime of the unit.

Otherwise, pretty pleased with it.

I purchased three of these several months ago. Two of them work fine. They're inexpensive units, & reasonably easy to use. They're no frills machines, but worth the money. The third unit has stopped recognizing many major studio released DVDs that the other two units play. With the third unit, I have to load & reload, jiggle the DVD in the holder, & turn the power off & on, to get it to sometimes work. After 15 minutes of fiddling with it, I usually give up & move on to something else. I'll soon be getting rid of the third unit because it's aggravating & wasting my time. The two units that work get a rating of 3* from me, & the other one gets a 1* rating. My next DVD/VCR combo will probably be a Panasonic.

I've had this unit for about 4 months now and it's played fine. Was easy to set up and use. Don't know yet how it will hold up over time, but so far so good. Given that I wanted both a DVD and VCR player, but didn't want to spend much more than $100, I'm happy with the choice.

I have noticed that when I am recording a tv show or playing a vhs tape, there is a steady "click" that is annoying. I have since read other reviews and I read that someone else was also having the same problem. Otherwise, the equipment is user friendly and I do like it, but simply cannot stand the clicking noise. I understand that I cannot return or exchange it with your company. I have called tech support 2 times and they told me to contact me. What in the world should i do now??????