Sylvania DVR90VE DVD Player/Recorder and Hi-Fi VCR Combo

by Sylvania

Product Details

Product Manual [3.51mb PDF]

• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 3.8 x 17.1 inches ; 8.2 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 11 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• Shipping Advisory: This item must be shipped separately from other items in your order. Additional shipping charges will not apply.
• ASIN: B0001EZN52
• Item model number: DVR90VE
• Batteries: 2 AA batteries required. (included)
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (97 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #51,352 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)
  • #47 in Electronics > Televisions & Video > DVD-VCR Combos
  • #64 in Electronics > Televisions & Video > DVD Players & Recorders > DVD Recorders
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Now you can give as good as you get: Sylvania's DVR90VE dual-recording combination DVD recorder and VCR lets you copy VHS tapes to DVD and DVDs to VHS tapes at the touch of a button (except where prohibited by copy-protection technology). Record your favorite television shows and treasured home videos to either videocassette or high-quality, long-lasting DVD-R (write-once) and DVD-RW (rewriteable) discs. THis unti requires the use of 4x DVD-r discs. The DVR90VE can not ecord to higher speed discs such as 8x discs.

The recorder's built-in NTSC TV tuner and onscreen user interface permits up to eight timer recordings over a one-year period, with its six DVD recording speeds providing between one hour and an amazing 10 hours of content on each single-sided 4.7 GB recordable DVD. You can even select and compile the best footage to commit to disc: the recorder's handy editing features include auto playlist creation, project titling, title deletion and editing, and scene deletion.

The DVR90VE's versatile playback features include progressive-scan video outputs and support of MP3 CDs so you can easily shift your digital music enjoyment from the den to the living room. A variety of video and audio inputs--including front-panel composite- and S-video connections for fast, temporary hookups--grant connection to virtually all televisions and home theater components.

Whether your living room is currently home to an HDTV or you're merely thinking of "someday," the DVR90VE's DVD player stands ready to deliver the full playback potential of your DVDs. 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.

What's in the Box
DVD dual recorder, a remote control, remote batteries, audio/video cables, and a user's manual.

Product Description

SYLVANIA DVR-90VE, DVD RECORDER AND 4-HEAD HI-FI VCR COMBO

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

240 of 243 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Super Value, June 25, 2004

By 

Jim "jimmeyer" (Tucson, AZ USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sylvania DVR90VE DVD Player/Recorder and Hi-Fi VCR Combo (Electronics)

This was one where I was hoping for the best but a bit dubious of what I might end up with at this price. As it turns out I was very pleasantly surprised. Easy to use with clear instructions, I was dubbing home videos to dvd 15-20 minutes out of the box. Easy hook up with digital/HD cable involved. High quality DVD picture, both playing and recording (dubbing from VCR or recording from TV). VCR portion does a nice job too. The copies and recordings I have made using DVD-R media work perfectly on 3 different DVD players in my house (each a different brand at a different price point bought at different times), so compatability doesn't seem to be an issue. I would have to say that the quality I got was much more than I expected for the money.

166 of 169 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Value for the money, June 5, 2004

By 

Roger (San Francisco) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sylvania DVR90VE DVD Player/Recorder and Hi-Fi VCR Combo (Electronics)

Copies tapes with the touch of one button to Disc. I can put up to (5) 2 hour vhs tapes on to one disc and save money and my valuable home movie collection of my children. The menu is easy to use, as I only have to press one of 4 arrow buttons and then hit enter to record and set up timer record programming. The picture on screen display is simple to understand and the record and sound quality are excellent. I was told by a salesperson at a giant electronics retailer this unit is made by the same company making Hitachi , Phillips and Sharp units , selling for much more. Lowest price Ive found. Thanks for the great buy Amazon.

65 of 65 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Firmware upgrade URL for media compatibility problems, November 25, 2005

By 

P. Cariani - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sylvania DVR90VE DVD Player/Recorder and Hi-Fi VCR Combo (Electronics)

I purchased the DVR90VE from Amazon about a year ago (12/2004).
It is a very good unit for the money and relatively easy to use, but it has a
severe media compatibility problem -- difficult to find out which DVD-R & -RW
media will work with it, and since media production has moved to higher speeds,
it is increasingly hard to find the slower media that works (1-4x -R, 1-2x -RW).

I recently ran into these same media compatibility problems that many others have encountered and reported here when I ran out of my original DVD-R spindle that was purchased a while back. Were it not for media incompatibility and the lame customer support for this issue, I would give the unit 5 stars.

These problems appear to be the fault of the original firmware in the machine, which only allows DVD-R 1-4x and DVD-RW 1-2x media to be used for recording. I do not yet understand why they did not then make provisions for using faster and faster media that would become available, but evidently they didn't.

One can go to their US website [...], but there is no information regarding this media compatibility problem. The only information available there is a PDF of the user's manual (which is also not helpful regarding this issue, since it does not stress in any way that the rated speed of the media is critical. There are no media compatibility FAQ pages or firmware update notices, and typing in the machine model DVR90VE gets you nothing. This website is a waste of time outside of contacting them by email.

I emailed them an inquiry and got a response 4 days later advising me to call the customer service number regarding the firmware update, which is supposedly operational 7 days a week. I had tried calling them a few times earlier in the year when I encountered the media compatibility problem, but was never able to reach anyone. Today (11/25/05) the line has a message that they are overloaded with calls and advising customers to call back some other time. This is also clearly a waste of time.

While I had been waiting for an email or phone response from them, I did some online searching through google and found an alternative, Canadian Sylvania support website (viva Canada!) that has software and firmware that can be downloaded -- go to the bottom of the page past manuals to Software/Firmware.

http://www.sylvaniaelectronics.ca/index/screen/sylvania_downloads.html

I downloaded DVR900E.zip (554kb), read the instructions in the PDF file DVR900E.pdf, burned a CD-ROM with the firmware program file NRS0115.mot on it, and successfully (it seems) installed it on my DVR machine. It seems to work -- my unit will now accept 8x DVD-R's, although still only 1-2x DVD-RWs. One caveat is that I do not yet have confirmation from Sylvania/Funai that this is indeed the right firmware file, although on the other hand the download link says "This upgrade is designed for all units. Please download and read instructions carefully."

I have asked them to put this information and firmware download on their main website, since it would save all of us a great deal of frustration and ill-will, and we will see by their response, or lack thereof, what kind of organization they really are. Why they have not done so long before this is a complete mystery to me, but I think it reflects badly on the company (or at least its US division) and certainly does not inspire great confidence in their other products.