Hi,

I appear to be lucky in that I can get hold of either the Panasonic DMR-EH55s or the Pioneer 640H. Problem is they both appear to be excellent machines, but they're both expensive enough to make buying both an unaffordable option. So I'm looking for some advice on which is likely the best for my intended uses. I'm based in Canada.

Intended Uses
---------------------

1. Recording from the TV. Presently straight cable - no digital box but a digital box may well be in my future. Some recordings would be view and delete, some would be edit out the commercials and archive on DVD. I know TV Guide does work on the current cable, don't know about digital boxes. TV Guide would be useful for ease of programming but I'm capable of manually scheduling. DVD archiving would vary from high quality for important stuff to acceptable lower quality on less important stuff. Some important stuff e.g. sports, movies could well be over 2 hours

2. Archiving home video cam tape onto DVD. Recent tape is Panasonic DV, older but important stuff, i.e kids when younger, is mainly Sony Hi-8 tapes with some straight VHS tapes. Quality requirements on these DVD's would be very high. Initial intent is to preserve a straight copy of original tapes i.e. 60-120 mins on DVD. After that I may edit for highlight DVD's. I may also look at archiving these tapes through a Canopus ADVC300 via a PC. Either way archiving these tapes in the best possible way is very important.

3. Archiving digital pictures, mostly kids again, onto DVD's suitable for TV viewing. I will also archive the original image files on DVD via PC.

4. Transferring VHS tapes to DVD. My wife has some medical VHS tapes produced by her hospital that really need to be converted to digital format.

5. Short term storage/transfer of TV shows from recorder to DVD-RW for viewing on other TV's in the house, i.e. rapid copy to DVD-RW, view in rec room or whatever and delete.


In general I want the highest quality possible even at the expense of ease of use, but ease of use, particularly in the editing functions, would obviously be a plus.

Both machines seem to have good reviews but there are trade offs and I'm not expert enough to properly evaluate them.

Pluses of the Panasonic
- DV input
- SD card
- TV Guide
- Larger HDD
- Superior LP mode?

Pluses of the Pioneer
- More variable recording rates
- Seems to have good marks for editing flexibility and ease of use
- Seems to be very reliable
- Cheaper ;-) (A factor but not a deal breaker)

This post is getting a bit long, but I think I've got the essentials across. Are there any experts out there who could give me some advice? My time frame on this is pretty short and I have limited knowledge in this area and limited time right now to do my own evaluations, I'd appreciate any advice/recommendations offered. If I've not been clear enough I'll elaborate if necessary.

Thanks.

Hi,

I appear to be lucky in that I can get hold of either the Panasonic DMR-EH55s or the Pioneer 640H. Problem is they both appear to be excellent machines, but they're both expensive enough to make buying both an unaffordable option. So I'm looking for some advice on which is likely the best for my intended uses. I'm based in Canada.

Intended Uses
---------------------

1. Recording from the TV. Presently straight cable - no digital box but a digital box may well be in my future. Some recordings would be view and delete, some would be edit out the commercials and archive on DVD. I know TV Guide does work on the current cable, don't know about digital boxes. TV Guide would be useful for ease of programming but I'm capable of manually scheduling. DVD archiving would vary from high quality for important stuff to acceptable lower quality on less important stuff. Some important stuff e.g. sports, movies could well be over 2 hours

2. Archiving home video cam tape onto DVD. Recent tape is Panasonic DV, older but important stuff, i.e kids when younger, is mainly Sony Hi-8 tapes with some straight VHS tapes. Quality requirements on these DVD's would be very high. Initial intent is to preserve a straight copy of original tapes i.e. 60-120 mins on DVD. After that I may edit for highlight DVD's. I may also look at archiving these tapes through a Canopus ADVC300 via a PC. Either way archiving these tapes in the best possible way is very important.

3. Archiving digital pictures, mostly kids again, onto DVD's suitable for TV viewing. I will also archive the original image files on DVD via PC.

4. Transferring VHS tapes to DVD. My wife has some medical VHS tapes produced by her hospital that really need to be converted to digital format.

5. Short term storage/transfer of TV shows from recorder to DVD-RW for viewing on other TV's in the house, i.e. rapid copy to DVD-RW, view in rec room or whatever and delete.


In general I want the highest quality possible even at the expense of ease of use, but ease of use, particularly in the editing functions, would obviously be a plus.

Both machines seem to have good reviews but there are trade offs and I'm not expert enough to properly evaluate them.

Pluses of the Panasonic
- DV input
- SD card
- TV Guide
- Larger HDD
- Superior LP mode?

Pluses of the Pioneer
- More variable recording rates
- Seems to have good marks for editing flexibility and ease of use
- Seems to be very reliable
- Cheaper ;-) (A factor but not a deal breaker)

This post is getting a bit long, but I think I've got the essentials across. Are there any experts out there who could give me some advice? My time frame on this is pretty short and I have limited knowledge in this area and limited time right now to do my own evaluations, I'd appreciate any advice/recommendations offered. If I've not been clear enough I'll elaborate if necessary.

Thanks.

Hello, and welcome aboard (wow, you must be really committed to HDD/DVR products, considering what you chose as a user name)!

Yes, you are lucky, since these two units have become very hot, now that they're basically unavailable (at least here in the US).
I am quite curious. Where are you able to purchase these? Are they brand new sealed units? What are they costing you (converted to US dollar amount)?
If you prefer, you can send me a private message. I also may have some suggestions for you, so watch for a private message from me.
Sorry, I'm on a very tight schedule today. Both great machines, but would need more time to comment further on features, etc.
I'm sure that our many other nice members will contribute their suggestions and it will make for interesting reading!
GOOD LUCK! :)

As a user of Panasonic E100, E85, and EH55S, with use of a second EH55S at church where we record dv, I am well satisfied with the EH55S and its many options. The EH55 writes to all current formats, and as mentioned, we record the church service with dv input (thru a DataVideo SE-800). DV passes audio, which has been a lifesaver when a musician does not have a microphone in place; we can switch to one of our camera's audio.

The EH55 writes to +-RW, which was my reason for getting my third dvdr. -RAM is used to transfer at high speed (meaning lossless) between machines. The EH55 will copy dvd-r to hdd, but only in real time.

One suggestion-- in tests we have run from the same camera, a Sony VX2100, the difference between dv and s-video was almost impossible to see with component input to a 15" Polaroid HDTV; there was a noticeable difference when we compared to composite (RCA yellow), so when copying tapes to dvd, the advice is to try the different recording inputs to compare for yourself. Some reports are that (some) dvd recorders have circuitry to clean up the tape signal on composite input. Bear in mind, our comparisons were made using the same camera, same optics. Cables were different, but we tried to hold as much constant as we could. When you will be copying vhs, Hi-8, dv tapes, nothing is constant! So try different inputs and decide which works for you.

The Pioneer has a good reputation on this forum, but I have no experience with it. As you are already aware, the Pioneer 640 does not have dv input. Not a super critical factor, but I'm glad we have it on the Panasonic, one cable instead of three. If you are (or may) run your audio thru an audio mxer to even out or clean up the various audio inputs, then the dv input may not matter that much.

Good luck,

Richard