Customer Reviews

Sony VRD-MC1 DVDirect External USB 2.0 Multi-Function 16x DVD Recorder

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I just got one of these babies. I am an IT professional and have the PC equipment for burning DVDs and capturing video, but I still felt that I wanted this unit.

The features that appealed to me were:
- 16x write speed
- Sony brand name
- DV input
- Dual Layer burning support
- Stand-alone mode (no PC needed)

I have this hooked up to my home theater. I have an HD setup and a Motorola 6412 Hi-Def DVR. So far I have been able to make excellent copies of kid's shows from Nick and Cartoon Network, etc, in the SLP format (6 hour record time). Those are GREAT for long trips with the portable DVD player.

I have also made excellent DVDs of my home movies shot with our Sony HC30 digital video camcorder. That's where the DV firewire (IEEE-1394) input comes in handy. You will have to buy a firewire cable if you don't already have one. I needed the 4 to 4 cable that has the mini d-shaped connectors on each end and I got that cheap from my favorite online auction site.

Now if you want to copy old VHS tapes that you have, or make backups of DVR'ed material then you may be out of luck as this unit does do a good job of honoring Macrovision copy protection when it detects it. I have been told there are "digital video stabilizer" like the "SIMA CT-2" (do a Google search) that will clean up the video signal and allow backup of your legally owned and obtained materials, so all is not lost in that area should you want to make backups of your old VHS tapes or make a backup of the Sopranos from your DVR.

Lastly, there are three different inputs: RCA composite video/audio (yellow, red, white plugs), S-Video and DV (firewire). I haven't tried S-Video, only the firewire and composite. If you plan to hook this up to a DVR, like the Mot 6412, getting audio into the device can be a challenge because the Mot 6412 seems to only have optical audio out and this device has no optical audio input. If you have a receiver then you can probably run the audio from one of your outputs (VCR, or TAPE) to the Sony unit, and the video directly from the 6412 to the Sony. That's what I did, and other than some lower than expected but acceptable volume levels on the digital channels all was fine.

Lastly, use good quality media. Don't go cheap. Use Memorex or better yet Sony DVDs. I use the DVD-R format because that's what my stand-alone player supports. When setting up the unit plan on burning and finalizing several DVDs each with material a few minutes long until you get all the cabling and quality settings right and the way you want them, especially if hooking up to a DVR.

I found the preview LCD to be very helpful, but you will have to have the unit close to you and not deep on a shelf or a rack to see it as the angle of viewing requires you almost be over top of the LCD to view it...the next model should have a pop-up tilt screen, IMHO.

Initialization and finalization of a DVD doesn't take that long. The unit is a little loud, but not too much so, and does throw some heat when burning. I suggest putting it in a well-ventilated area. I have mine on top of my home theater rack instead of inside it. It's small footprint and attractive finish, coupled with the fact that I will use this frequently for dubbing from my camcorder made that placement make sense for me.

I hope this review was helpful.

First off, I'll admit, $250 for a recorder is a pretty steep commitment, and I wouldn't suggest anyone pay more than that for this one. Now, having admitted that it's a bit excessively pricey, I'll say I am pleased with this burner and feel no remorse in shelling out the bucks. When it comes to electronics, I really do believe the adage "you get what you pay for." But to be fair to it, I need to review it in two parts. The concept of a burner that works with a PC and as a stand-alone recorder is pretty novel still, and admittedly, not perfected. This is the Swiss Army knife of burners, and while it is a lady of high-class and quality, like anything designed for a multi-use function, it isn't able to do everything perfectly with all the bells and whistles. It's important to really examine the technical specs on this product, make sure it does what you are buying it for-don't buy it blind and risk disappointment because it doesn't do exactly what you expected. I wanted this to use as a standard dvd recorder drive with my computer and to archive old VHS tapes and record television shows. I knew it wouldn't be perfect, but I wanted something all in one.

DRIVE MODE: [5 out of 5 stars] Attached to a computer, it's fabulous. It recognizes all the recordable medias out there right now (DVD-R/RW/DL, DVD+R/RW/DL), and it burns 16x discs flawlessly and without error, lightning fast. I've been using it to back up my old movies and so I've been giving it a good workout, and it performs wonderfully-and quietly. It's a great external dvd drive as well, reads quickly and noiselessly. It comes with Nero 6 and the software is jam-packed with great features. You can pretty much convert most any of your video files/and pictures to DVD Video with Nero. The Dvdirect is your fairly standard top-of-the line dvd drive when attached to your PC. I've been using Verbatim and Taiyo Yuden DVD-R's for everything and haven't had a single coaster yet-but I think quality media is as important as the recorder itself.

STANDALONE: [4 out of 5 stars] I wanted this to archive my old, rotting VHS tapes. Not perfect, let's get that out of the way. Is simple, as the process of recording is just a matter of playing your VCR and hitting record on DVDirect. You can even record directly from the TV if you have your cable hooked into your VCR, which is a nice plus if you want to record your favorite shows without the hassle of dubbing from a VHS tape later on. Also nice is you can keep recording on the same disc in multiple sessions without finalizing (you won't be able to play in a dvd player until finalizing). The LCD screen is a nice feature, but it has no sound. There are a few drawbacks, but none of them crippling, and this concept is relatively new so I'm willing to grade Sony on a curve. First, depending on the quality of the original VHS recording, your end product might not be as nice as expected, even pixelated. I can only burn it at "HQ" to get a decent quality copy, which allows me only about an hour of record time on a standard 4.7GB disc. But then again, I am copying old VHS tapes, so what could I expect? Secondly, the dvd menu created for your standalone DVD Video recordings are a set template and you are not able to make changes to them, which is unfortunate because they are functional, but not attractively designed. Also, I have several dvd players and these discs burned straight during the standalone operation behaved erratically in my older dvd player and would not load on my PC's DVD-Video drive (but it did load with DVDirect, of course; I'm still trying to ferret out the why). My solution for all of the above has been to burn my VHS recordings onto a disc with DVDirect then import it into the dvd-video creating/editing program on Nero, making my own menus, titles, and chapters, then re-burning it. I found that this `edited' end product behaves more reliably in the dvd player (less freezing and sneezing of images) and has better compatibility with all my sets. And this way I get a really niftly looking DVD-Video too, with all the bells and whistles. Granted this means you pretty much waste a dvd, but I buy a bunch for about 27 cents a disc and it doesn't seem too bad a sacrifice. Third, recording in standalone mode can be a bit tedious...and I wouldn't feel totally comfortable letting it go by itself for hours. It detects signals automatically and when it doesn't "detect" one, it pauses recording. You could call this rather erratic recording but it hasn't really been a problem yet, just a mild nuissance, sometimes even an advantage.

Despite the quirks, this is a great buy. If it was cheaper, it would be a phenominal buy. It's cool, reliable, and easy to use.

I bought this about a month ago, and by now, I can fairly say this is the best dvd burner out there! It is so simple to burn from vhs, that I was able to burn all my very old home movies without any problem... The 2 inch screen is extremely helpful, since this way you know when to stop it... It is very easy to setup the dvd on diff. quality modes, so if my vhs was very old and the quality wasn?t that good, then I was able to burn about 6 hours on one dvd with the same quality as the old one...

Another plus nobody seems to have mentioned, I can burn directly from my tv! I am going on a long car trip, so I burned for my kids 6 hours of disney channel programming so that they could watch cartoons they hadn?t seen before!

Why didn?t I give 5 stars? Well because the only thing missing is a way to create menus, titles, etc. from movies burned without the computer, maybe, if before finalizing I could do something with it in my computer, then I would give it 10 stars!!

I wanted to make copies of my daughter's basketball games to give to her teammates but using the DVD burner on my PC with the software gave me terrible quality DVDs. I bought this unit and am amazed at how nice the picture quality is. I have it connected to the camcorder directly, no PC connection. I sacrifice the ability to make the fancy menus and titles but that's fine with me.

When I connected it to the PC and used the Nero software it recorded very fast. But with all the motion of the game the images were poor at best (no different than my PC's DVD burner).

So, for me, being able to transfer movies directly to this is perfect. The user interface is simple to use. The 2" display is actually very nice (I wish you could tilt it for a better viewing angle while seated).

I've been using Sony brand disks and so far have made no coasters, no hang-ups, everything has been flawless.

When burning directly from VHS tapes, the DVDs exhibited a stuttering effect, very noticiable during any kind of motion. It would also tend to start pixelating the picture for one frame about once a second after several minutes of recording. This was very annoying and totally unacceptable. It would not always be at the same spot, and once it started it continued until the end.
I upgraded the firmware and entered a problem report with Sony tech support and never got a response. I probably burned 15 DVDs trying different brands and types as well as settings on both the DVDirect and my SVHS VCR until I finally came up with a successful soultion. Instead of wiring directly from the VCR, I hooked the VCR to a DV camcorder in pass-thru mode, and hooked the firewire from the camcorder to the DVDirect. It has worked well for me in this configuration.
I have also used the unit as an external burner with a computer and it worked very well in this capacity as well.

After years of trying to work with VCDs and SVCDs, I finally purchased the Sony VRD-MC1 to burn my analog tapes into DVD. Problem solved! This system works great as a stand-alone - hooked up to my analog camcorder or the VCR. It also works incredibly well connected to the computer via USB 2.0 cable. It has the full functionality of a DVD Drive for the computer and then some. I probably will not use the menu system or photo slide show feature on the burner, opting to do all this through NERO 6.0 instead. But, the versatility of the system is excellent.

The Sony VRD-MC1 worked as advertised for me. Converting my video tapes to DVD without a computer was very straight forward. I was also able to use the device as a regular DVD/CD burner when connecting to the USB port of a computer. Additonal notes:

- This device works under Mac OS X as well! (The Nero software is Windows only.)
- Firewire connection is indeed only for camcorder (can't connect to computer this way)
- DVD movies created will not playback well (if at all) on older DVD players!!!
- Device has NO video/audio out options for connecting directly to a TV monitor
- Device lacks a way of automatically turning on to record a TV show

Got one of these and played with it for a while. As others reviewers said, it does a good job of burning DVDs from various sources.

But do not be surprised to find out that it does NOT play back any of those DVDs! I was. It doesn't say anywhere in the description that it does, so no misrepresentation on Sony's part - but I think a lot of people - obviously I was one of them - might not imagine that a DVD unit for $250 will not actually play DVDs - well, this DOES NOT. After you record those DVDs from your TV, for example, you will have to put them in a different player to play them back.

Also, as with previous generations of Sony recorders, I have had the unit think that a tape I was dubbing was finished, whereas it was just at a scene cut. Unattended dubbing therefore presents the risk that the tape might not get dubbed in its entirety.

I had tried to use my Mac computer to transfer my home movies of the last few years to DVD so the kids could watch. It was so hard to get it to work that I gave up, totally frustrated. Too slow, too many steps...

Then a friend recommended this machine, after I walked into his house and saw him recording HIS old video to DVD. This machine makes it unbelieveably simple. It can transfer all formats: miniDVD tapes, old video tapes - and does so in real time (so you can edit if you choose, or just walk away and go do something else while it transfers). the menus are simple, you hardly need the manual. This is one of the best consumer electronic products I've ever bought, no kidding! All of my old family videos, some of which I haven't seen for years, now reside on DVDs kept near the TV for easy viewing whenever my kiods, or my wife and I , want to review where we've been and where we're going...

Highly, highly recommended!

It works well in its primary role of making the nightmarish job of transfering VCR to DVD fairly easy. But, typically Sony, the interface is quirky--takes a little getting used to and it's very easy to push to wrong button.
It is most important that you use a good VCR with it, with the features and commands that you need. A crummy VCR can easily push this back into the nightmare realm. Not the VRD-MC1's fault, but there it is.