Panasonic DMRE85HS Recorder

Panasonic's top-of-the line, fifth-generation DMR-E85HS DVD recorder packs a built-in 120 GB hard drive capable of storing up to 284 hours--more than 11 straight days--of audio/video programming in EP mode. So whether you're seeking the time-shifted TV viewing abilities of a VCR-like DVR or you want to archive your home movies to long-lasting DVD-RAM and DVD-R discs, this is the recorder for you.

But it doesn't just slice and dice. The DMR-E85HS is also a progressive-scan DVD player for use with standard and high-definition or HD-ready TVs. It handles your DVDs, CDs, and homemade MP3 discs, as well as high-resolution DVD-Audio discs, which specialize in multichannel music mixes with quality surpassing that found on commercial CDs. Amazon.com Product Description

The DMR-E85HS offers the flexibility of recording on both DVD-RAM--perfect for instant chapter access and for multiple rerecordings--as well as DVD-R, generally regarded as the most widely compatible of the many DVD formats. DVD-RAM offers high storage capacity, high-speed data transmission, exceptional picture and sound quality, fast random-access memory, and rewritability up to 100,000 times. DVD-RAM recording time extends to 16 hours per disc in EP mode on 9.4 GB double-sided media.
You can program the recorder for daily or one-time broadcasts much as you would a VCR. To simplify programming, the DMR-E85HS includes the TV Guide On Screen Electronic Programming Guide. With DVD-RAM, you can even perform simple nonlinear video editing, such as rearranging the order of scenes, skipping over unwanted scenes, and creating custom play lists of favorite scenes on a disc.

One touch of a button is all it takes to record data from the DMR-E85HS's hard disk drive to a DVD-RAM or DVD-R disc at high speeds. You can blaze along at a quick 12x normal speed when writing to DVD-RAM, or 24x normal speed when going from the hard disk to DVD-R (in EP mode, both cases). For example, you can burn a one-hour program to DVD-RAM in just 5 minutes, or to DVD-R in just 2.5 minutes.
Panasonic's Time Slip feature lets you use your DVD recorder like a personal video recorder, or PVR. Because of DVD-RAM's extremely fast transfer rate, you can view the recorded portion of an ongoing program from the beginning, while still recording the program in progress.
With Chasing Playback, you can view the recorded portion of a live program, from the beginning, while continuing to record that program until its completion. Simultaneous record & play lets you view a previously recorded program on either a DVD-RAM disc or the hard disk drive while simultaneously recording a different program.



Relief Recording automatically checks the remaining disc space when recording to DVD-RAM or DVD-R. If there's not enough space, the video recorder shifts the balance of the recording to the hard drive.

The Chasing Playback feature lets you watch the program you're recording from the beginning while it's still in progress.In addition to recording new video content, the DMR-E85HS lets you transfer your favorite VHS recordings to durable, space-saving discs. You can archive, preserve, and easily catalog and accessed your personal movie libraries and family videos.The recorder comes with a new Direct Navigator that simplifies the process of previewing recorded programs, letting you access recorded material from an onscreen menu that lists recording dates, times, channels, and titles. Finding and viewing recorded material is simple because there's no need to search, fast-forward, or rewind.

DVD-Audio offers super high-fidelity (192 kHz/24-bit) sound. DVD-Audio discs providemultichannel and stereo sound, incredible storage capacity, and unique bonus materials not available on regular audio CDs.

What's in the Box
DVD player/recorder, a remote control, remote batteries, an RF audio/video in a stereo analog audio/composite-video interconnect, an AC power cord, a user's manual, and a registration card.

Product Description
The next generation of digital video recorders starts with Panasonic's DMR-E85H. It combines a full-featured DVD recorder and a DVR (digital video recorder) with extraordinary capacity -- it can hold over 200 hours of video on its hard drive! And for easy, goof-proof recording of your favorite TV shows, the real must-have feature is the free TV Guide® On Screen program guide. TV Guide On Screen's polished, colorful on-screen listings show you what's on at a glance. You can sort through up to 7 full days of over-the-air broadcast or cable TV listings using the handy search tools. The on-screen display includes channel logos and TV Guide's brief program descriptions for easy browsing (click on "More Photos" above, for a screen shot). When you find a show you want to watch or record, just highlight the listing and press a button on the remote! The best news is that all of this convenience comes with no monthly fee, and requires no phone line connection! (TV Guide On Screen information is embedded in the TV signal.)

Panasonic DMRE85HS Recorder

Test report

Old Style better, tvguide navigator is crap, April 27, 2005 Reviewer: Kathym (NH, USA) - I have an older version, DMR-E80H, 80gig, with the old navigator (pre-TV guide), which I love.
I bought the DMR-E95H, 160 gig, tvguide navigator, mainly because I wanted more disk space. I was going to sell my older one. Unfortunately, this is so unreliable that I have kept my old one to use, and I'm stuck with this very expensive lemon. I wouldn't feel right trying to sell this to someone else.

There is a lot of good ideas and potential here, but most of it doesn't work reliably, and what does is poorly done. Many nice features in the original navigator are gone.

What do I miss about the original navigator? I works like a VCR with some cool features. You program in a show (date, time, speed, repeat, etc), you can also add a title so you always know what you recorded. You can also set it for `renew' which means it records over the old space each day, good for things like the news, it won't fill up the disk and you don't have delete things to make space. You can go in and edit any of this, say a show is on a different time one week, just go change the time, and then change it back. And if one show overlapped another, you could select the one with priority, but the other would record the rest of the alotted time.

On the new navigator, you can manually set it to record instead of using the tv guide functionality, but you can't edit after the fact. If you make a mistake, you have to start over, if the time changes, you have to delete it, set a new record program with all the info, and then do it again to put it back to the normal time after. If you just want to change the record speed, you have to redo everything. If you want it start late, because the ABC shows are all running late these days, you can't edit it, you have to start over.There is no longer a renew feature. And if the first show overlapps with the second, you only get the first and nothing of the second.

Why do I use the timer record instead of tvguide, because it's a good idea but a useless unreliable piece of junk. The booklet tells you that you can't start a show the same time another show is ending, ie if a show ends at 9Pm and another starts at 9PM, the second won't record. On occasion it does, usually it doesn't, no rhyme or reason. So I set everything to end one minute early, requiring the timer setting.

Now, if you forget to turn the recorder off at night, or you're up late watching it, it doesn't pull down the programing and when you record something you get no title. But you can't just set the title you want when you set up the recording like on the old navigator. But the tvguide system doesn't even have all the main channels... it's missing some of the HBOs, SHOtimes, Starz, etc.

The tvguide interface is crap. I have hundreds of channels, and if I were to use that to see what was on it would take all day. You can't page through the channels, you can't hold the down button and just cruise through the channels. No! You have to repeatedly hit the down or up button to go through the guide. Talk about carpal tunnel syndrome. And to make matters worse, each time you go to a new channel it changes the station being viewed and freezes up while doing so, making the whole process take longer and making it impossible to view one show while looking to see what else is on. Sometimes if you hit the buttons real fast you can go over 4-5 channels before it happens, but it still happens. They should talk to Comcast about how to do an online shedule viewer. Even their worst versions where better than this. There is no search function. You can go to the alphabetical sort screen, but if you want something at the end of the Ms, you have to go through it one item at a time, over and over and over.

All that would be bearable if the system was reliable, it is not. My old system has only crashed a couple of times in 2 years, and went into "self check" as soon as it came on. This new system (less than a year old) crashes at least once a week, and I have to force it into "self check" to repair itself, usually twice, and then turn it off and on again, in order to get it to work right for awhile. It freezes for no apparent reason, not recording but on. You can't change the channel, cause it thinks it's recording, but it's not, and it's on the wrong channel anyways. They only way out is to go through the process of holding the on (on the recorder) down for at least 20 seconds so it shuts off. Then turn it on so it starts system check fixing what ever is wrong, again. I went away for a week, and came back to find it had frozen on the second show it was to record and had done nothing after that.

I bought this for more disk space, and I've discovered it acts the most unrealiable if I use more than 100gig, which is a little more than half the disk. It also acts up more if I record and watch and delete a lot of shows, the reason you'd have it to begin with. It also tends to crash/freeze more often if I leave a disk in the dvd tray. For a couple of months I could reliably make it crash by putting a ram disk in the system, and then it did it only every other time, but it looks like it's moving into every time again.

I wrote to Panasonic, who said to take it to an authorized repair dealer, but there are none around here. I bought it through Amazon, but through one of their third parties who doesn't take returns. So it looks like I'm stuck with this crap.

I regret having recommended Panasonics to so many people I know, but that was the old style of course. To say I'm dissapointed in the system is to say the least. To say I'm disgusted that panasonic won't replace it or refund, is really disgusting.




Very Nice Machine, April 25, 2005 Reviewer: Boston Buddy "bostonbuddy" (Boston, MA) - See all my reviewsI read through all the reviews on here and other websites. I wanted a Panasonic since my VCR, which I got in the 80's is still working well. I did all the stuff it said to do and I had a few problems in the beginning. However, it has made up for the minor issues I had in the beginning for what it is capable of. I got some help by reading the reviews here on some of the operations. Some good hints:

Turn off the TV guide so it doesn't appear as soon as the machine boots up. I think this was causing a problem and since it tended to freeze before I did this. You can still active the TV guide by pressing the "TV guide" button on the remote.

Go into setup to make sure you can copy in the high speed mode. Another reviewer explained it very well so I won't repeat it here.

While it says that it can't record on spindle disks I have had luck in recording on them. You have to be careful that you do not bend the disk at all before recording on it. I made the mistake of recording on the disk and then wrote on the disk what it was. When I put it back into the machine to write a name of the disk the machine freezed up. It did allow me to finalize it. Lesson: If you are recording on a disk, record and finalize in the same step. Don't write on the disk until it's finalized.

I get great quality at the EP mode (6 hours) and have been able to play it on my Sony Playstation and my Sony DVD player.

I just bought a Panasonic DMR E10S for my living room. This way I can record programs on a DVD-ram and view them in the living room and then record over them.



A downgrade from the E80H, April 24, 2005 Reviewer: Michael Nella (Flushing, New York United States) - The good things about this recorder is that it can burn a DVD in up to 8x faster than real speed and that the database can hold 54 and a half hours in the SP mode as compared to 36 and a half the E80H model did. The bad things about this recorder which makes this a terrible purchase is that the TV Guide listings have never worked even after shutting off my recorder for 36 hours, since the TV listings they had were incompatible with my cable service. Also the machine frequently freezes making this machine idle. You can not record two programs back to back since the second program will never record since the machine records the first program for a minute extra which overlaps the second program and cancels the recording. A best bet is to hunt down the E80H and buy that and buy the E85 if you want an expensive time piece.


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Great in the beginning, but you will end up unhappy, April 20, 2005 Reviewer: AV Geek (Connecticut) - From the minute we setup this unit, we fell in love with it. The progressive scan playback was supurb, the remote was well made and functional and the TV guide worked fine for us after the 24 hr wait time per the manual.

After a couple of weeks, we noticed that you could not exit the TV guide as it would be "stuck" on the screen. As others said, you had to unplug the unit even to get it to work. Well this continued to the point where it was not usable anymore.

I tried calling Panasonic, but didn't want to wait the time on the phone. I'm VERY glad I bought it from Amazon because they took it back with no questions asked and are refunding my money.

It's really too bad that this unit has issues. Since most of these components are integrated, I would not risk getting one of these and "hope" it works since repair of the unit isn't really an option. Either it works or it doesn't.



Great when it works, April 14, 2005 Reviewer: Andy (Boston, MA) - I purchased my unit in December and had relatively no problems until March. It turns out there are some known problems Panasonic is addressing. My unit has been at the repair shop for about a month. Very responsive Customer service when you speak to the right person. It appears the TV Guide/Gemstar had done a patch on their software that caused all sorts of problems for this unit. Supposedly this has been addressed and is fixed/being fixed. My units TV Guide would not activate each morning unless I physically unplugged the unit. There was an upgraded firmware as well as some of the units would not completely reset (pressing power button for several seconds) Another way to reset (soft reset) is to press channel up and down at the same time. These are some of the things I have learned with this unit. My unit is due back on Friday and I will update this review once I get to thoroughly test the unit.


Great machine, easy to use and worth the money., September 30, 2004 Reviewer: Marvin W. Dease (NC USA) - You should read the manual to get all the best features of this machine.
You can high speed burn a 2hr show recorded in SP mode in 20 min or less on a 4X DVD-R disc.
You have to turn this feature on before recording the show.
That is so the show is recorded onto the hard drive in a format that can be high speed burned.
You can record 29 hours of shows onto the hard drive in SP mode.
The only two recording modes that have good picture quality are XP and SP. It is recommended to record the show in SP if you want to burn to a DVD because it has a better chance of being playable on other DVD players after it is FINALIZED.
The DVDs I have made have played fine on my Playstation 2 and the DVD player on my computer.
Some great features of this machine are DIVIDE TITLE and SHORTEN
DIVIDE TITLE lets you take shows that were recorded together at the same time and divide them into individual pieces so you can burn them to separate discs.
SHORTEN allows you to cut out commercials. It is easy to use.
There is screen that the show plays on that you can fast forward, rewind and pause.
When the show goes to a commercial you press Pause and and then press Enter.
This selects the start time.
Fast forward through the commercials til right before the show is back on.
Press Pause and press Enter .
This selects the end time.
Press Enter to SHORTEN.
This cuts out the segment between the start point and the end point, removing the commercials.
Continue to do this till all the commercials are removed.

You can name each episode of a show and also name your DVDs too.
You can watch a show you have recorded while the machine records another show.
You can watch a DVD while the machine records a show.
You can watch a show from the beginning while it is being recorded.
If you don't want a show any more just delete it. This increases the memory so you can record more shows on the hard drive. Cutting commercials out also increases your recording time.
You can connect a VCR to the machine and record shows to the hard drive if the tape isn't copyright protected.
You can record shows from a DVD if the DVD isn't copyright protected

The TV guides only works if you leave the machine off for 24 hours so it can download the program guide.
This isn't a real problem if you MANUALLY PROGRAM in the shows you want to record during that time.
The machine will record these shows even when it is off.
You can only program 8 days in advance if you use the TV Guide.
Manually programming your shows works best.
I have 13 shows programmed to record on my machine.
There is no limit to how many shows you can program in manually.
Just made sure there is enough room on the hard drive to record them all.

LIMITATIONS OF THIS MACHINE:
You can only burn to DVD-R and DVD-RAM discs.
DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+RAM WILL NOT WORK.
The TV guide system will not work with TV Guide On Screen Systems broadcast by Satelite.


If you program in 2 shows where one show starts at the same time the other show ends the machine will stop recording 15 seconds before the first show ends and will start recording 15 seconds after the other show begins. This is on page 21 of the manual.
If the 2 shows come on the same channel, programming the show in manually will bypass this problem.
Here is an example:
You have 2 shows that come on channel 10 from 8PM-9PM and from 9PM-10PM.
Programming the machine to record from 8PM-10PM solves this problem.

If the shows come on different channels you can record the shows yourself by pressing record when the show starts and stop when the show ends. Then switching to the other channel and pressing record.

You can not burn a show to a disc when the machine is recording a show.
You can not edit a show when the machine is recording a show.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION
If the power goes out at your home due to lighting or the machine displays a error message.
You will have to press and HOLD the POWER button on the machine itself for 10 seconds.
The machine will test itself and restart.

If you have a CABLE BOX the machine come with a IR BLASTER it plugs into the back of the machine.
The other end has a electronic eye that is placed in front of the cable boxes electronic eye.
Follow the instructions when you set up the machine and the IR BLASTER will make your cable box change to the channel you want when you use the DVD RECORDER REMOTE or when you have a show programmed to record.

If you have a TV that only has coaxial hookup in the back and no red, white and yellow plugs you will have to buy a RF Modulator to use this machine.

Even with these limitations this machine is a great buy.
I have burned 75 DVDs with this machine and haven't had any problems yet.


Terrible Implementation!, September 3, 2004 Reviewer: Sanford White "the_digital_dude" (Denver, CO USA) - Wow, did the Panasonic DMR-E85HS unit ever spark my ire! As others have pointed out, the TV Guide integration is highly problematic, and it has to be active in order to control the cable box. There are many highly annoying idiosyncracies that reveal themselves when using this unit. The list is long, but other reviewers have already covered them in detail, so see below. Yes, the TV Guide data downloaded overnight, but not for all stations, and things only got worse from there. We returned this DVD/DVR recorder the next day after much swearing and frustration.

The unit we now have and love is the Pioneer DVR-520H-S. It's very easy to use and it is exceptionally well designed, except for the Sharp TV tuner card inside, which has somewhat mediocre picture quality and introduces a bit of interference on several stations. A proper cable box control would have been nice, as the auto-on function didn't work with our Comcast Motorola DCT5100. Everything else is pretty much terrific about the box. The remote is MUCH better than the Panasonic's, and editing programs and burning them to DVD-R(W) is a breeze compared to using the Panasonic.

Note that the Pioneer TIVO and Panasonic TV Guide DVR's have not had the best implementations, so going with the Pioneer DVR-520H-S is probably the best bet at the moment. I doubt there's a better DVR on the market!




Great potential but flawed by TV listings, October 30, 2004

Reviewer:

skyshark (New Jersey, USA) -Although purchased elsewhere, here are my notes on the device so people can decide if it's for them. My observations should also apply to similar Panasonic Hard Disk Drive DVD Recording units.

GOOD
* Programs can be recorded to hard drive at best quality for MANY times longer than allowed by a tape-based VCR. Although promoted as being able to record for 213 hours (in EP mode), 26hr. (XP) and 52hr. (SP) modes have the most acceptable quality. Anything with lots of detail or motion recorded below SP mode has noticeable distortion (blurry, blocky images.)
* Material can be edited out of a recording (shorten) and recordings can be split into separate segments.
* Programs recorded to hard drive can be edited and transfered to DVD while maintaining original quality (using high speed mode dubbing and using 4X DVD-R media)
* TV guide listings are free (but come with a BIG tradeoff, see BAD below.) When it does work, however, selecting a program to record from the listing is very easy.
* TV listings can be sorted by type, alphabetically, genre, etc. and then chosen for recording.
* A program can be watched from the beginning while it is still being recorded (time slip), or watch previously recorded programs while the unit is recording.
* Some customization is offered in making DVD-Rs: set index points, chapters, image thumbnails, several standard menu looks (the latter is chosen when "finishing" a disc.)
* The unit can record to rewritable discs, DVR-RAM media, although they can be hard to find.

Summation: the unit has long recording times, good editing features, and the ability to transfer to DVD-R or DVD-RAM without losing quality.


BAD
* The TV guide listings are free, but implemented so it is uncertain the listings will actually feed in. Put another way, actual use of the product prevents the TV listings feature from working. Here is why: The listing is taken from the broadcast signal twice a day at unknown times (depending on your zipcode, the actual station and its feed-in time varies greatly.) The unit must be OFF and NOT RECORDING during those times. If it is, then "No Listing" will appear in the schedule for days until the programming info is collected. Using the unit makes it questionable if the listings will feed in (and again, the feed in times are unknown.)
* The TV listings information is only as accurate as the listings service (the service used is from Gemstar/TV Guide.) The unit can't follow programs which change their time or have incorrectly listed times. You will sometimes need to visit a TV station's website for the most up to date program schedule, then set a manual recording so you won't miss it.
* It's not obvious how to back out of certain situations, like totally canceling out of the direct navigator or disc setting (try the TV Guide button there.)
* Some tasks, like manually recording or modifying programming info for a scheduled recording, have lots of steps and use arbitrarily chosen buttons. As an example of the latter, the functions for buttons named "blue" and "green" are not self explanatory!
* The manual is detailed but not put together well. You must thoroughly read it several times to understand how to do things: again, lots of steps, arbitrarily chosen and named buttons.

Summation: Be prepared for the TV listings not to work at times, manually set program recordings at times, and read the manual many times (keep it handy for a month or so at the beginning.)


NOTES
* DVD-R discs must be "finished" before they can work in other players.
* It takes about 15 minutes to transfer an hour of material from the hard drive to DVD-R (using high speed mode dubbing and 4X DVD-R media)
* To use high speed mode dubbing, enable that option before recording anything.
* When making DVD-R discs, only titles (not chapters) will have thumbnails in the main menu.
* A DVD-RAM disc acts like a smaller, removable version of the built-in hard disk drive.
* Manual recordings can only be named after they have finished recording, not beforehand when setting a manual recording.


CLOSING THOUGHTS
Only buy this unit if you are prepared for the TV listings not working at times, accept that manual recordings will have to be made, and double-check a TV station's Website to be sure the listing information is correct.

If you are not OK with this, hold off purchasing this model (and similar ones) to buy future models which CAN load TV listings when the unit is on or currently recording.




Not as good as the older DMR-HS2., December 4, 2004 Reviewer: Merton Guin "Themerty" (San Diego/Phoenix) - I bought my unit because I needed a second for my other home and wanted a DVD-RAM compatible machine. I thought about buying another HS2 as I have found it to be almost perfect and easy to use. I can even describe to my non-techie wife how to program it over the phone, it is so intuitive. And, I thought such a sharp company as Panasonic would make nice impropvements to the HS2 in the current models. WRONG!!!

The aforementioned intuitive programming was trashed, replaced with a goofy TV Guide screen that is useless and requires many more steps to program a show. 8 days of programming is woefully innadequate. I have shows set up 30 days in advance so TV Guide is an empty suit for me. In addition, I greatly resent the innability to hold down the button to scroll quickly. Also, you cannot input the name of a show when programming it. Am I missing something here?? TV Guide appears to name it after it is recorded. Also, if you make an error in the programming steps, you cannot simply correct it, as with my older unit, but have to delete and redo it. Also, after programming a month's 15 or 20 shows, you have to hit the up arrow 15 or 20 times to get back to the window to set the next show. It would be so nice, like my old DMR-HS2, to simply hold down the up arrow and rapidly scroll back to the top. Aggravating.

Conclusion: I would like it to record HD and exile the obsolete TV Guide interface to Siberia. I like Panasonic and am about to get one of their new Plasma TV's with cable card. Without the programming/TV Guide issues, it's a 10, or 5 stars.


Easy to use DVD recorder, December 1, 2004 Reviewer: Chris Lee (USA) - This Panasonic DVD recorder is very easy to use. The only prerequisite is you know how to use a VCR. Just pop in a DVD-R blank, pick the source, and hit record. It's also a piece of cake to dub between the DVD and the hard drive. I bought this after seeing a very positive review on cnn and I'm glad I bought a high quality namebrand.



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Panasonic DMRE85HS Recorder

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