I can't believe it, I was watching it steadily and next thing you know...boom!
http://cgi.*********/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270244465532&ru=http%3A%2F%2Fsearch.*********%3A80%2Fsearch%2Fsearch.dll% 3Ffrom%3DR40%26_trksid%3Dm37%26satitle%3D270244465532%26cate gory0%3D%26fvi%3D1

If link don't work, here's the Item number: 270244465532

Here's the item description and winning bid:

This is a used Pioneer PRV-9200 (160 GB HDD) DVD Recorder up for auction with ++NO RESERVE!!++

Overall it is in good condition. There are maybe a couple of lightly visible marks on the body.

Everything is fully functional.

Comes with power cord and a remote control.

WINNING BID: $835.00

Price at Haltnshop.com now: $939.95 Only

MSRP was $1,025 in 2005.

I was watching this one too, just for laughs. (eBay prices on all Pios have been zooming upward since Canadian dealers mysteriously stopped listing overstocks and refurbs a few weeks ago: c'mon, people, wait a month and you'll see a glut of DVR-550s listed that Future Shop couldn't unload after the new 560 was announced!)

For the last two or three years this relatively uncommon model 9200 averaged about $400-500 on eBay, which is inflated enough, $835 is so far beyond ridiculous I can't even imagine the reasoning of the buyer. There is nothing unusual or special about this model, aside from the "pro series" model number it is nothing more than the esteemed DVR-520 with a black faceplate and 160Gb HDD instead of the standard 80Gb.

Arguably the DVR-520 was the most popular recorder ever released by Pioneer, and enthusiasts can be expected to bid it up as there haven't been too many available recently. Problem is, the 2004 burner in these recorders has a severe distaste for the typical cheap media sold in stores today- don't even bother buying TDK, Maxell or Memorex for this thing, even Verbatim is sketchy with it. If you are willing to exclusively feed it TY 8x DVD-R sourced online, and absolutely cannot live without its "mark chapter points as you watch normally" feature, perhaps its worth $400 to you. Just don't expect compatible media for it to be around in two years, and note replacement burners are no longer available. Don't get me wrong, its a beautiful machine, but current blank media has drifted so far from 2004 standards that it will soon be unusable.

Also, there was a used a Panny E500 (500GB) sold for over $700 last week, I mean, outrageous!

That's more than a TiVo HD with Lifetime sub would cost. Add a $50 DVD Recorder...

There is no short of idiots on eBay.

Also, there was a used a Panny E500 (500GB) sold for over $700 last week, I mean, outrageous!

400GB

^^Right, that's what I meant.. my typo.

This is a used Pioneer PRV-9200 (160 GB HDD) DVD Recorder
WINNING BID: $835.00
Price at Haltnshop.com now: $939.95 Only
MSRP was $1,025 in 2005.
If the true value of a piece of equipment is determined by how much people are willing to pay for it, then these things have becme very valuable indeed. On the other hand, maybe some people are just crazy--crazy enough to pay this kind of money for a 9200. World-import has a Pioneer DVR-541H, 160GB HDD for $450. As C3PO said, "Sometimes I just don't understand humans."

(...) maybe some people are just crazy--crazy enough to pay this kind of money for a 9200. World-import has a Pioneer DVR-541H, 160GB HDD for $450. As C3PO said, "Sometimes I just don't understand humans."

To be fair, the more-affluent hard-core Pioneer nuts who want a 520 (aka 9200) are bidding these ridiculous sums because it is a unique model with a combination of operational features some folks love to the point of unhealthy obsession. Its primary selling point is a dedicated chapter marking button on its remote, which allows you to mark out commercials or make reference points while enjoying a recording in normal full-screen view (you don't have to drop into a special chapter editing subscreen, which is the standard with current Pioneers and most other units). While I can understand someone prizing this feature if they've grown used to it, it really is insane to pay upwards of $800 for a five year old recorder. Any of the current Pioneer models will blow the 520 into the weeds in terms of burner reliability and media versatility, at a fraction of the price. The 520/9200 was a phenomenal unit in its day, but its day has passed. DVD recorders are not like vintage Leica cameras: they can't be refurbished and made usable for years on end. Their burners have a finite lifespan, with no repair parts, and increasingly limited media compatibility. At a certain point you have to move on.

I learned awhile back how to repair 'em, and stockpiled some spare burner parts. But the only thing keeping these machines usable is TY 8x media: even with repaired burners, these old machines gag on current 16x media. Once TY drops 8x, all these pre-2005 recorders will become instant boat anchors.

Also, for some, the remedy might just be as simple as a firmware update.

Also, for some, the remedy might just be as simple as a firmware update.

Maybe for a few lucky people, but not for the majority. All of these recorders use burners with custom DRM chips on their controller boards. Because of this they are pretty much never upgradeable with new firmware, even if they're otherwise identical to the same makers PC drives. If you have a Pioneer, Toshiba or JVC from 2003-2005, forget it. The only recorder mfr known to update *some* of its recorders is Panasonic: if you send in a DMR-80H, say, for flat fee repair service, they'll update its 2004 burner firmware to perhaps the 2006 level while they're at it. But this is only on a limited number of models and does not necessarily make the recorder compatible with all the the "iffy" media sold in stores now.

If you want to be able to just go to the all-night Walgreens and use whatever DVDs they have on the shelf, you will need a new recorder every two years that can handle the ever-degrading dye formulas. Unfortunately in the USA, the DVD/HDD machine has vanished except for the Phillips 3576, which we all better pray keeps getting updated over the coming years to 3577, 3578, 3579, etc.

Unfortunately in the USA, the DVD/HDD machine has vanished except for the Phillips 3576, which we all better pray keeps getting updated over the coming years to 3577, 3578, 3579, etc.That may be difficult. Other than silver and black, what other colors can they make it.

...Other than silver and black, what other colors can they make it?

Ask Harley. They make their bikes in a spectrum of colors, even pastel shades. The "traditional" bikers I know barf at this, but it is real! Phillips could do this too. I'd rather they make improvements, and a paint job is not an improvement, functionally speaking.

I'm jumping into this really late, and probably nobody is following the thread any more, but just for the record, here are some details about why the PRV-9200 is special. I own a PRV-9200 (US model) and a DVR-645H (Oceana model, similar to the 640 sold in the U.S.) The 645 can go to a lower manual bitrate setting and still deliver good PQ. It can also handle 16x and DL media. Those are important advantages, but the PRV-9200 has one very important advantage. For editing, the newer machines are a nightmare if you're trying to use High-speed copy. The edits go off by 9-10 frames. The PRV-9200 edits, even in High-speed copy, are usually accurate within 1 or 2 frames. This makes a huge difference if you're doing a lot of editing, which I do. Having said all that, since Pioneer is now reportedly leaving the home video business altogether, this is all probably moot.

I respectfully disagree, I haven't seen much difference in editing accuracy/high speed copy between these models.

I have owned the 9200 (which is merely an "industrial" 520 with a darker cabinet and larger hard drive), and I still have a 510, a 531, a 540, a 450, and two 460s (no, I'm not rich;): I buy and repair cheap broken units for resale and personal use). The 520/9200 "erase section" interface is cruder-looking but operates similarly to the later models. The high speed copy function operates the same across all Pioneers from 2003-2008.

The earlier 510/520/9200 default to a single uniform editing mode which can appear more accurate than later models depending on a variety of factors, especially if you're used to the older machines. Beginning with the 530 series and continuing thru to todays models, Pioneer included two selectable editing modes for creating standard DVD-Rs: "Frame Accurate" mode and "Video Mode". The Frame Accurate mode allows you to cut on a specific frame, but depending on media that accuracy may drift a couple frames when copied to disc. The Video Mode forces your edits to half-second accuracy in an attempt to avoid them drifting significantly when you make the high-speed DVD copy. Overall with an assortment of Pioneers I haven't seen much of a drift in either mode, edits stay where I want during high speed copy. Occasionally if I use Frame Accurate, and try to make a DVD-R from the HDD, one or two edits drift a few frames but rarely enough to cause a problem.

You should be able make edits with your 645 that equal your 9200, if you are seeing really bad drifts after trying both modes your 645 may be out of adjustment. One hidden setting which affects accuracy on some models is the separate "recording mode" of the hard drive itself: this setting is buried in the initial setup menu, under the recording heading, as "HDD Recording Format". The two choices are "video mode on" and "video mode off": if your editing accuracy seems way off, try changing this setting. It isn't supposed to interact with the editing system but on some production runs of some models it does have an effect: it did on a 543 I serviced for a friend, but not on my own 540 or later units. You can change this setting any time, it doesn't harm existing recordings already on the drive.

The one repeatable, hard wired "editing" advantage of the 510, 520 and 9200 is their use of a dedicated chapter marking button on the remote, allowing you to mark chapter points while watching a hard drive recording in normal full screen mode (later models require dropping into a smaller "chapter edit" subscreen). On the other hand, the navigation and editing menus are awkward and clumsy on the older units, the 530 and later have more finesse with their popup submenus. Its a toss-up in that regard.

I respectfully disagree, I haven't seen much difference in editing accuracy/high speed copy between these models.

I should have been more specific. Both machines are about the same if you're editing the actual video file. The edits I'm talking about are the edits you do in the copy list. I don't like to edit the actual video because (1) if I make a mistake I can't undo it, and (2) taking chunks out of the video file runs the risk of fragmenting the disc. I prefer to keep the video as one complete file.

In the copy menu, the frame accurate setting on the 645 does not work. The edit point drifts before your eyes, until it reaches a nearby frame selected by the machine's program. This can be anywhere from a couple of frames to 11 or 12 frames away from the selected point. Sometimes this results in a bit of unwanted video showing up on the final DVD. On the 9200, the frame accurate setting works for both the main video and for a file on the the copy list. If you do the edit on the copy list, which is just a mirror of the main file, the machine accepts the edit points and is pretty good about using them on the final DVD. Sometimes it is a frame or two off, but I've learned to adjust for that. And the main file is not affected in any way. If I make a mistake by cutting something I didn't intend to, I can delete the copy list entry and start over again with a clean copy list entry added from the main video file. This applies for both the "erase section" and "divide" commands.

Having said that, I've never experimented with using VR mode, because I always wanted my DVDs to be playable on normal players. I always use DVD-Video mode. I'll experiment with your suggestions on the 645 and see if they make any difference.

Another big difference about the 9200, which I neglected to mention in my original post, is that you can adjust the audio level on the AV imputs L1, L2, and L3. I always record on one of those inputs, including whenever I record from a cable program; my cable supplier (or the channels it is passing through) has a wild variance in audio levels, so I have a chance of adjusting for those when I make recordings on the 9200. There is no such feature on the 645.

I understand what you mean now- I didn't realize you were referring only to edits made within the copy list subsystem. The "frames rolling before your eyes" is due the the copy list being locked to "Video Mode" when a DVD-R is loaded (this mode nonsense can be a complete pain to explain in writing but once you try the various settings you'll just know what works for you). The copy list auto-detects the media you have in the burner and sets itself accordingly: if you load a DVD-R it assumes you want a DVD player-compatible finalized disc, so it forces each edit point to the nearest half-second of a key frame to avoid them drifting when burned in dvd-compliant mode. I don't know why you're given the option to override this safety lock when editing the original footage but not the copy list, it seems to be a needless "nanny" feature.

The only workaround is to use different media to trick the copy list into frame accurate VR mode. DVD-RAM or R/W can record in VR mode, you have to make the high-speed copy onto one of those, then high-speed copy the material back onto the hard drive as "new" hard drive material (your hard drive will then contain both your original recording and the edited copy). You can erase that "carrier" disc, then insert a DVD-R and select the edited material as your "new" copy list. The frame accurate edits should carry over very closely on your DVD-R: there will be occasional drift of a couple of frames, but most of the edits remain perfect.

Five years ago Pioneers were much more popular than they are now, and the company received a lot of "vocal" feedback on some features. The 520/9200 was their most successful recorder worldwide, but one thing a lot of people complained of was that some edits that seemed frame accurate in the HDD editing window drifted way off on the actual burned DVD. This drift is not precisely repeatable and depends on the individual burner and recording, some people like you are lucky and never notice a drift but others screamed their head off about it. Pioneer had to admit that accuracy to within a frame was difficult to preserve consistently on a finalized DVD, so they withdrew from the semi-pro market and all later models offered the dual editing modes with accompanying warning alerts about "inconsistency" and "no guarantees". In lieu of very complex Toshiba-style authoring firmware, Pioneer opted to force the half-second rollover-to-keyframe mode in the copy list. The frame "rolled over to" may not be the one you wanted, but what you see is what you get- that frame will stay locked and not drift when the DVD is burned.

If your 9200 is always 100% accurate in copying those edits to DVD-R, consider yourself lucky and cherish the recorder: most of them are a little off and don't have the "Video Mode" option of later models to reveal where the edits might actually appear. The only recorders I've seen with consistently frame-accurate editing were the old Toshiba XS models, which had other issues. All these machines force a compromise somewhere, at least in the peak years we could choose which compromise we wanted to live with (today there are no recorders left to choose among). I agree it was rather stupid and pointless for Pioneer to remove the video and audio adjustments from the x40 series. When users complained, the video adjustments were put back into the x50 and x60 series but the audio input levels remain non-adjustable.

CitiBear, that's really useful info. Thanks. I can't honestly say that the 9200 gives me "100%" accuracy in copy edit mode. I've learned to adjust to the 2nd dark frame before the material picks up again (this is assuming there are blank spaces before things like commercials), and that usually does the trick, but sometimes there is a single "ghost" frame left after the DVD is burned. (Another advantage of being able to mark chapters in full-screen mode, by the way; I can use a chapter mark as an edit point. Can't see potential ghost frames in thumbnail mode.) But, depending on the material, I can usually live with that. If I need really precise edits (such as in opera or classical music programs), then I don't even try to author on either Pioneer. I just copy the video over to a DVD without edits, transfer it to the computer, and edit/author the DVD on the computer using VideoReDo for editing, and either VRD or Ulead Movie Factory for authoring, depending on whether I want complex menus or not.

However, the pioneers are good for things like documentaries, political events, news, or sports events, where absolute frame accuracy is not as important to me. And editing and burning on the Pio is a whole lot faster (and saves media) compared to transferring to the computer. So I have to use several different methods, depending on the material.

Having said all that, I do cherish the 9200, to the extent that when I realized the 16x media wave was coming our way I went out and bought a couple thousand 8x DVD-R media, so I'd have enough. Still have about 1300 left. When I run out, I just hope that TY is still making them. If not, I'll just use the 9200 for HD recording and playback, use the 645 for authoring non-critical work, and do the critical work on the computer. If both machines die, by then I should have enough backlog that I can watch for a long time without having to spend the $ for the cable company's HDD box. I'm used to having technology move on, but this is gettng ridiculous.

My E80h always seemed pretty close to frame accurate. I set it to where I want it to be and it always seems to be right there when I do a dub at any speed. The Philips 3575 drifts sometimes way off when I do HS dubs, seems much better in real time though. Maybe I've set the mode wrong or it's just the way the new one works but it's pretty frustrating sometimes, and the new tv shows they like to pack the commercials tight, almost no black space between the beginning and end. Maybe they do it on purpose knowing most recordings will get screwy to try and discourage home dubbing.
I used to use editing vcr's with very good pre roll editing and things to dub my tv stuff and I liked getting my edits just right and clean.
Maybe I just need to sell my Panny and extra Philips and retire if the prices for antiques are going to stay that high. Though with PVR cable boxes and digital changeover the time may be long past now.