Manufacturer's Description What is DIGA? Panasonic’s award-winning and industry-leading range of DIGA DVD Recorders have set the benchmark for DVD Recorders ever since they were release several years ago. In testament to their popularity, in Europe alone we have sold over 3 million DIGAs! And it doesn’t end there, our DIGAs do a lot more than just record and play DVDs....In the HDTV age, you’ll have a variety of AV components in your Living Room - and that means a lot of remote control units. VIERA Link takes all the confusion out of the operation. With VIERA Link function you can control all your components using only your VIERA’s remote control. Operation is easy, and there’s no more hunting around for separate remote controls.Also in the HDTV age, different kinds of a AV media come together. For example, you can view pictures taken with your digital camera or video camera on a large-screen TV. DIGA has the kind of network connectivity you need to enjoy it all. You can load a large amount of AV data from cameras and other components into a DIGA recorder, and enjoy easy playback, editing or storage. You don’t even need to use your PC.The Panasonic range of DIGA DVD recorders enables you to watch your favourite films, making it an essential part of your entertainment hub. With the simple sophistication that is the hallmark of Panasonic products, DIGA offers you the platform to store and playback all of your films, photos and music.Camcorder and Digital Still Camera LinkingTo store movie data from your digital video camera (HDD model or SD Memory Card model), simply connect it to the USB terminal of your compatible DIGA recorder and movie data can be transferred and stored directly on to the hard disc drive.Besides the USB Terminal connection DIGA models equipped with an SD Card slot let you copy and view movies (MPEG2 data) recorded on an SD Memory Card of your SD Card Camcorder.You do not own an HDD or SD Memory Card Camcorder? No problem, just use a DV cable and simply connect your digital video camera to the DV input terminal of your DIGA. There is no easier way to store and enjoy your home movies on a big screen! Similarly, as almost all DIGA models are now equipped with an SD Memory Card or USB terminal, any digital camera that uses an SD Memory Card or comes with a USB cable can be easily connected to your recorder to store or play a dazzling display of photos through a personalised, big screen-slide show from the comfort of your home.Jukebox with gracenote®* (CD Database) As a jukebox, your DIGA DVD recorder can store all your CDs and MP3s onto its hard drive and through the pre-installed ‘Gracenote’ database with 350,000 albums, will automatically store the track information as well. DIGA also supports the ID3Tag information that is embedded in MP3 music data, so whether your music collection is physical or digital, you can enjoy browsing through or quickly finding the right song for the moment.As DIGA can handle a wide number of different formats, such as JPEG, MP3 and DivX - all through the built-in USB terminal - you or friends can playback images or music straight from USB memory onto the big screen and speakers of your home entertainment system.Integrated Digital Tuner Sound and pictures are converted into a digital format and compressed, using as few bits as possible to convey the information on a digital signal. This technique enables several television channels to be carried in the space used by the current analogue signals to carry only one channel. Digital signals can be received by standard aerials, satellite dishes or via cable but have to be decoded and turned back into sound and pictures by using a separate set-top box, or a decoder built into your television.However, Panasonic top-of-the-range DIGAs come equipped with Integrated Digital Tuners so there is no need to purchase any set-top boxes. What is more, thanks to new technology, the ability of new DIGA digital tuners to compensate for poor broadcast signal conditions is approximately twice as high as conventional types. It provides stable reception and prevents block noise even when signals are reflected by surrounding buildings. This ensures stable digital programme broadcasts and superb picture and sound quality for you!.VIERA Link - Bringing control of all your AV Devices to just one fingertip So what is VIERA link? Well, before we explain what it is, lets look at how people currently have to operate their AV products. Suppose you want to watch the latest film on Blu-ray disc - to do that, first you would have to power up the Blu-ray player with your Blu-ray remote control, then turn on your TV and select the correct AV channel input using your TV remote. After that you would need to switch back to the Blu-ray player remote control and press 'Play'.Oh, wait! What if you have have a Home Cinema Surround system too? Then you need to search for the Home Cinema remote in order to to switch on your AV Amplifier too. Therefore before you can do something seemingly simple like settle back to watch a film, you are forced to use three completely different remote controls! Sounds like a lot of bother, right? Well, Viera Link allows you to do all of this with just one remote control!
T**Y
Usual top notch quality from Panasonic..
Having previously owned a Panny, I was looking to replace my previous disc-only recorder with a HDD version.Having looked at several brands, I was tempted to go with something other than a Panny, but in the end I decided to stick with Panasonic simply because of previous good experience with the brand.Set up was very easy - plug the unit in, let it go through it's start-up procedure and five minutes you're set up and ready to go.. no problems.I notice that from some other reviews, that the freeview TV guide is causing some gripes. Frankly, I don't know what the fuss is about..Despite a portion of the screen being taken up by adverts (approx 1/3 I would guess), the guide is perfectly readable and is by no means difficult to see (incidently, if you don't bother to put your postcode in, you won't get any adverts!)In any case, the TV guide has two different ways to view, so you certainly don't need to squint.So far operation has been smooth and I have encountered no problems with manual or timer recording.Timer recording is a simple affair, go to the TV guide, find your programme, then choose the appropriate recording mode (View-Now, Single-Timer recording, Series- Recording), and that's it!Recording quality is predictably good, even on the lowest quality setting.. (I prefer LP for most of my recordings - a good balance between quality and HDD space)If you pre-set a recording, the unit will show a prompt on whichever channel you're watching, shortly before the timer-recording begins, giving you time to cancel the recording if you wish.Some nice touches that have been added to this recorder over my previous one - automatic chapter breaks at ad breaks (easier to edit the ads out), also the ability to divide recordings (eg. two programmes recorded back-to-back can now be divided into separate programmes)Any complaints? - well just some minor ones:The unit's display shows the channel number, rather than the channel name.. a bit strange, but you get used to it.Doesn't auto-detect NTSC recorded discs - My previous disc-only unit would happily accept NTSC discs without any problem. This unit requires me to go into setup and manually change the PAL/NTSC option everytime I want to watch a NTSC disc.** WARNING ** If you do change the option to NTSC, this will also change the recording format for everything you record onto the hard-drive.. I suggest that any NTSC discs are watched when you are not recording to hard-disk - Oh.. and remember to change the setting back to PAL, or you will have a hard drive full of NTSC recordings!Also, the unit's colour.. sure I like black, but my TV is Silver.. oh well, time to get a matching new TV...*update*Having used the recorder for the last year or so, I can report that it is still performing well.However there are some things that have come to light:Occasionally the unit will freeze and will display a message on my TV along the lines of 'There may be an error with your disc - the unit will shut down'I have no idea what is happening here, but I have to wait whilst the unit goes through it's shutdown procedure and then start it up again.Thankfully there appears to be nothing wrong with the disc, as the unit has happily carried on recording/playing many, many hours of programmes - all without any fault.I suspect that this is more of a software glitch and is nothing more than an annoyance.I think that the Direct Navigator guide (what programmes have been recorded) could actually be a little more organised.Programmes are shown by the date they were recorded, which is fine, but it would have been nice if you could sub-categorize them eg: comedy, movies, soaps etc..This would certainly save time scrolling through several pages of recordings.
J**M
Excellent for transfering old VHS to DVD
I bought this mainly to transfer some old VHS-C camcorder tapes to the digital realm, and this it does extremely well. The unit features noise reduction which is adjustable to three settings, it is not intrusive and does a fine job to cut out some of the noise inherent on old VHS tapes. I used a decent old Sony VHS deck to play back the tapes and piped the output from that via a SCART block and A/V leads (yellow, red, white) to the AV3 input on the front of the Panasonic. The resulting recordings are first saved to the internal hard drive where they can be edited, cut, chaptered, etc before being recorded onto DVD. Editing can be done very precisely on this unit, something which I found to be quite impressive.The Panasonic is however quite picky about which DVDs it will record to, I had to go and buy some Panasonic DVD-RW discs online but they're not too expensive. Haven't tried any DVD-R discs yet but I would go and buy some Panasonic branded ones just to be on the safe side.There doesn't appear to be much choice for DVD menus on DVDs you record yourself - just the same layout of squares with a few different coloured backgrounds. OK for basic stuff, but once on DVD it's not too difficult to rip the DVD contents to a computer and drop the footage into your favourite DVD creation software. Note that the Panasonic will not record from a VHS tape or DVD that has protection on it (which many commercial pre-recorded ones do).My main criticism of this unit is that it's a pretty poor DVD player, this almost seems like an after thought as it's not a patch on my old Pioneer DVD player, the thing I miss most is the memory - the Pioneer DVD player would remember the precise moment that I last stopped a disc and would resume playback from that point even if the disc was removed and the unit shut down (it had memory for quite a few discs too); the Panasonic doesn't remember anything, if a disc is in the unit it will start playing at chapter one, scene one when the unit is switched on in DVD mode, which is annoying if I am on chapter 4, or episode 4 of a series, as I have to stop it, go through the initial main menu animation (which cannot be skipped), scroll to episode 4 and then finally click on play episode. It makes the unit a poor replacement for my old player, I am considering re-instating my old player and using the Panasonic only for recording.I've given it four stars because of the excellent recording ability this unit has, one star is knocked off for the poor DVD playback features (or lack thereof). If you just watch films all the way through it won't be a problem, likewise if you just want to record Freeview programmes the unit does an admirable job of this too (the HDD previews and menu system for recorded programmes works very well). Also it integrates well with my Panasonic TV and allows me to use another of my HDMI ports instead of SCART, giving me a slightly crisper image from old VHS recordings and such.Overall a very good unit, let down only by the DVD playback portion.
A**D
Panasonic 160gb Hard Drive DVD Recorder
I bought this unit to replace my 5 year old equivalent which has served me well. I've always bought Sony as a brand for Tvs etc, but, at the time, the Panasonic was less expensive and offered more features.I certainly haven't regretted the decision as the Panasonic controls are simple to use and the resulting picture on screen is identical to the original broadcast. It is also an easy process to edit out commercials, which, upon playback, proves seamless.I can't comment on the Freeview aspect as I record from Sky and the latest version, apart from this, is virtually identical in basic features.I have no hesitation in recommending this product as the last five years use of the older model can testify. (It was the CD rewriter feature that gave up the ghost, not the hard drive)To Panasonic's credit, the unit comes with a full manual (as opposed to a cut down version that you tend to find these days ( with the remainder on a PDF, which uses most of your printer ink to print off) and, even as a bloke, I eventually got down to actually reading it and found it worthwhile.You will find there are many different features to this unit, but, personally, after playing around for a while, I tend to stick to what I know & what I want from it ie recording programmes on the hard drive and either watching them from the hard drive & deleting, or copying to DVD-R (after editing when necessary). "Simple" works and you will be rewarded with many excellent quality DVDs. There is now the added bonus of 1080p playback, which is welcome.In all, good quality product that keeps it's promises and is still my favourite gadget!
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