Pionneer 533H Died! Need a more reliable unit

I've never used a Pioneer but from what I understand the most similar new DVDR would be a international Panasonic, EH-59. It's only available at grey market dealers like B&H Photo and a few others. I have one and I am very happy with it. For you the only issue might be it's slightly(+7.5 IRE) black level if you feed it a standard N. American line output. It's not very noticeable and many probably don't even notice it but if you feed it a true black your recordings will be a little lighter than that.
Another option that doesn't have the black level issue and is available at a more mainstream outlet(Wal-Mart.com) is a Magnavox w/HDD. They will be cheaper than a Panasonic and they've proven to be very reliable, their only issue is editing and general operation may not be what your used to.
If your willing to try and possibly return if you don't care for it then the Magnavox would be good to try first. Grey market Panasonic dealers aren't nearly as happy to return things as Wal-Mart.
I've tried a couple Magnavox DVDRs but continue to use my Panasonics, another member on this board has a couple Maggies but continues to use his Pioneers, others have made the switch to a Magnavox and are more than happy. At this point you don't really have any other choices for a newer HDD DVDR.
Main thread for the Magnavoxes: http://www.avsforum.com/t/940657/magnavox-537-535-533-515-513-2160a-2160-2080-philips-3576-3575/0_100
Panasonic thread with links to a few dealers: http://www.avsforum.com/t/1134909/panasonic-dvd-recorder-us-models-years-produced-and-features/0_100
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/659769-REG/Panasonic_DMR_EH59GA_K_DMR_EH59GA_K_Multi_Zone_250GB_HDD_DVD.html
Edited by jjeff - 9/18/12 at 6:55pm

Here's some info for Canadians buying a Magnavox from Walmart-US.

 

Em-t-wallitt just posted several used Pioneers in Ontario and other Canadian cities.

$27.25 Purolator Ground 2-6 days delivery shipping to P.Q.
$41.60 tax/duty
$330.95 B&H

---

$399.80
Just makes your $400 price
Another Canadian has noted the hassle(basically it can't be done) having Wal-Mart ship to Canada As you said you could have one shipped to the closest US W/M and pick it up in person. If this is the case you may just want to go with the Panasonic and be done with it, I really don't think you'll be unhappy with it.

It is a tough choice for Canadians, between the import hassles of the Magnavox or the price / possible IRE issues of the Panasonic.

Of the two, the Magnavox will have the less troublesome burner. Panasonic burners can last forever, but have a perverse tendency to "play dead" if a stray fingerprint or some grime gets lifted from a DVD and sticks to the clamp inside the burner. The fix requires partial disassembly and cleaning, some owners never have the problem, some need to clean every year or so, while others need a cleaning twice a year. It can get annoying if you're not a Mr. Fix It personality. Over a long period of time, the Magnavox burner may not ultimately be as durable as the Panasonic, but will be less of a hassle. The Magnavox has no problems with either +R or -R blanks, the Panasonic doesn't really like +R and prefers -R. OTOH, the Panasonic can use DVD-RAM and dual-layer blanks, while the Magnavox cannot.

The Magnavox HDD is easily swapped out or replaced if it breaks, your Pioneer 533 is an absolute nightmare of HDD issues, while Panasonic falls somewhere in the middle (not impossible like the Pioneer, but not as idiot-proof as the Magnavox).

The Panasonic remote feel and editing responsiveness will be closer to your Pioneer than the Magnavox, which has a clunky failure-prone remote and even clunkier editing interface. The Magnavox HDD navigation is something out of the stone age compared to a Pioneer 533: you can't choose custom title thumbnails, titling with the remote is a chore, title names "float" instead of being anchored to each thumbnail, and there are no sorting or view options. If you're used to rapid-fire navigation and editing on the Pioneer, the Magnavox will be a difficult adaptation. The Panasonic HDD interface isn't quite as slick as Pioneer's, but its very close. The front panel clock / counter display of the Magnavox is so tiny as to be useless, and its on-screen displays are mostly inscrutable heiroglyphics. The Panasonic will have displays more similar to your Pioneer 533.

If you make a lot of DVDs from the HDD, the inability to pre-select HDD thumbnails on the Magnavox will drive you up the wall in short order: you can choose custom thumbnails for the Magnavox DVD menu only after you copy the titles from HDD, but before finalizing the disc. This is really tricky to remember coming from a Pioneer or Panasonic, where the custom thumbnails selected on the HDD titles copy over directly to DVD in a seamless single step. Also, the Magnavox has only one menu template: three titles per screen with blue background. Panasonic I believe has only an eight-titles-per-screen menu layout. Either way, you lose the choice of 3-up, 4-up, and 6-up menus found in your Pioneer 533.

The Magnavox is the better value if you can come to the States and pick it up personally, because it does include the ATSC tuner at a much lower price than the tunerless Panasonic EH59. WalMart has historically been very liberal about accepting returns and exchanges if a Magnavox breaks, even long after purchase. The import Panasonic is more of a "you bought it, you own it" proposition with essentially no warranty support or repairs available.

If I lived in Canada like you, I might skip both the Panasonic and the Magnavox in favor of a nice clean second-hand Pioneer 450, 550, 460 or 560. These were vast improvements over your 533, much more reliable, with the same interface, added features and ability to still use your really nice 533 remote. You could also look for the Sony RDR-HX780, which was a near-identical clone of the Pioneer DVR-550. These all frequently appear on local Canadian Craig's List at prices ranging from $50 - $150. In USA, the same Pioneers are extremely rare and sell for $300 or more: take advantage of their easy Canadian availability, and buy two for less than the cost of a new Magnavox or Panasonic.
Edited by CitiBear - 9/18/12 at 9:58pm

Would you consider using a PC and a capture card?
If you have the PC, this would be a lower cost (yet high quality) option even including the cost of the editing software. I would be surprised if you could not buy capture cards in Canada.
Edited by Kelson - 9/19/12 at 8:37pm

I've sent you a PM.

As has alreay been said, over and over in this forum for the last few years, there are only three choices: 1) the Magnavox recorders sold by Walmart. 2) The International Panasonics sold by B&Hphotovideo, World-Import and others (including Amazon.com. 3) A computer based solution like the one proposed by Kelson. If you want to stick with a stand-alone box, you have only the first two. There are three Magnavox models with differing HDD size, and two Panasonic models available, again, with the biggest difference being the HDD size. Citibear outlined the pros and cons of each pretty well.

From the original post, you don't use a tuner and you want to edit. Your only reasonable choice then is the Panasonic, EH59 or its bigger brother the EH69 which contains a memory card slot, lacking on the EH59.

The Magnavox is beautiful for recording with its tuner, but has primitive edit capability; divide and delete, from the HDD.

The Panasonic edit capability is as great as Maggie is bad. With the Playlist feature, you can combine scenes (chapters) from any titles on the hdd, activity on the Playlist does not change the file on the hdd. Deletes, Oops, and such on the Playlist are not disasters; you can always start over.

Rarely do I create my chapters on the source (hdd). I bring the title into the Playlist, mark the chapters there and delete what I don't want.

RichardT, I agree with you almost completely. I *DO* chapterize the titles (source on the HDD) before making the playlists. Adding chapter marks is not an issue, and they can be removed in the final playlist. I never (well, almost never) actually edit out information from a title on the HDD. I use the playlists for that, and then delete the title as one chunk from the HDD. This limits disk fragmentation.

To the OP: This is an example of what you can do with the Panasonic, so it isn't entirely off topic.

Luke, I agree with you completely. Deleting titles as complete titles rather than in segments should, in theory at least, minimize disk fragmentation. And if you are going from one tltle to one playlist, what difference does it make?

But, as an example, I have four titles (from four camera tapes) on the hdd and I want to grab parts from these four titles into three separate playlists, it makes much sense to set chapter points in the hdd so that I don't have to set them three times in the three playlists, but only if the chapters are to be the same in the playlist. If the chapters need to be set at different points in each playlist, setting them in the source would just clutter up the playlist job.

Point is, we have the option and flexibility to do the job in the easiest way possible. I'm lazy.

Me too!

Lasted 8 years and you need a more reliable DVDr???. I thought that 8-years is pretty long for a DVDr.

I’m Canadian and I would probably:

1) Look for a lightly used clean second-hand Pioneer 450, 550, 460 560, 660 or the brother Sony 780. (I have a 780 and love it)

2) Try to eventually get off the DVDr and do what Kelson suggested. PC and a capture card. It’s HD and its more widely available then a DVDr.


I have nothing against the Magnavox but man it’s sounds like big, big, big hassle for Canadians. Faking addresses, driving hundreds of miles, voiding warrantee, gees, for a Standard Def deck? I’d rather wait for a refurb- some of the refurb dealers will ship to Canada and will give a limited warrantee.

The gray-market Panasonic sounds pretty good again some dealers will ship to Canada and give a limited warrantee but after the shipping, duty, taxes the price is pretty steep for an old school SD DVDr.

Look for a clean used Pioneer or Sony 780 and eventually get a PC HD capture card. The Sony firmware is a bit different, manual states it only plays RAM (I never tried recording it) but to swap the HDD with the Sony you don’t need the data disc – built into the firmware but still need the service remote.

HDD_ERR? is it possible the hard drive died? If so, there were threads on replacing them back in the day.. Have you considered trying that?

Yes, but the models 531, 533, and 633 were an anomaly: an order of magnitude more difficult to replace the hard drive in those. Unlike all other Pioneer models, they had an extremely buggy interactive TV Guide application buried in their HDD boot area. This software is required to operate the machines, if you install an HDD minus TVGOS the units will flash an ERR alert and refuse to work. Unlike the Service Disc, there is no official TVGOS software installation disc or program: Pioneer itself would swap pre-initialized HDDs or exchange the entire recorder during the original warranty period. Some highly skilled users here on AVS discovered a way to "lift" the TVGOS off of a good Pioneer HDD and install it on a new HDD, but the process is fraught with "gotchas" and not recommended at this late date (the older the unit, the less likely the success of repair). Today, the units should simply be replaced.

In USA, buy a Magnavox MDR533 (scary that it used the same cursed model number) or a Panasonic import EH59. If you can't afford either, you're up a creek: repairing a Pioneer 531, 533 or 633 is an ordeal and a half. Pioneer will not touch them anymore, independent techs won't touch them, if you don't already own the required service tools and a good EIDE hard drive you'll spend at least $100 buying them. Not. Worth. It.

In Canada, things are much easier because Pioneer sold new improved models in Canada for three years after leaving the USA market. You can pick up the fantastic Pioneer DVR-450, 550, 460, 560 or Sony 780 second-hand for about the cost of a replacement hard drive. Given the choice of trying to repair the insanely flaky 533 or replacing it altogether with a nice used 550, I'd toss the 533 under the nearest oncoming bus without a moment's hesitation or regret: its that resistant to repair. Unfortunately, in USA the better Pioneers that came after the notorious 533 are very scarce and command prices approaching a new Panasonic, so we don't have that option here. Anyone living in Canada should take advantage of the easy cheap availability of used late-model Pioneers: they're falling off Canadian Craig's List and Kijiji like ripe fruit, many selling for way under $100. American AVS members view this second-hand recorders thread with a mixture of envy and frustration.

The Pioneer DVR-543 was a Canadian variation of the final (and only) American Pioneer model DVR-640. The DVR-640 was the top 2006 model in both countries, with 160GB HDD and front panel USB connection to import JPEGs or MP3s or video from certain camcorders. It was the first "Type 2" series Pioneer recorder, made in partnership with Sony, rushed into production to replace the infamous 531-533-633 (Pioneer was so overwhelmed by warranty repairs for those units that they began to simply exchange them for the 640).

In Canada, Pioneers were a bit more popular so cheaper additional versions of the 640 were marketed there. The 540 was sold exclusively thru CostCo, it is a 640 with 80GB HDD and no USB connections. The 543 is identical to the 640 but just has the smaller 80GB HDD. The rest of the world mostly saw PAL variants of the 543, and it was very successful. All three units were redesigned from the ground up for 2006, and have nothing at all in common with the troublesome 2005 models. They have been very solid recorders over the years, with an excellent reputation for reliability. The only drawbacks compared to earlier units is slightly softer recording quality, and loss of the DV/FireWire input for dubbing from camcorders. The user interface is the same as for previous models, and you can keep using your silver DVR533 remote control if you prefer it to the chintzy white one that came with the 543. The only trouble you might encounter is the burner being half dead: the 543 is six years old, and while reliable they don't last forever. My personal experience with several 540s and a 640 was that after two-three years the burners all lost ability to burn typical 16x blanks sold in retail stores, but switching to 8x-speed DVD-Rs sold online solved that problem nicely. If you discover burner problems, try using TY/JVC or Verbatim 8x blanks instead of 16x.

The 450-550-650 were the 2007 successors to the 540-543-640. They were 90% similar but added HDMI output for new TVs, a better video encoder, and restored the DV/FireWire input (except on the 450 which has neither USB or DV). The final models were the 2008 460-560-660, identical to the previous units except the low-end 460 included USB/DV inputs and the 660 added a useless ethernet connection that didn't really do anything. Sony Canada marketed the RDR-HX780 during the 2007-2009 period, which was a hybrid of the 640 and 550 (looked like a 640 but had some of the 550 improvements).
Edited by CitiBear - 10/20/12 at 9:16am

The Sony RDR-HX780 came out in the second quarter of 2008 and was marketed until 2010 in Canada and later internationally. The Canadian firmware is dated April 2008.

If your burner has problems burning crap media and you can easily get Verbatim 1x to 16x AZO dye discs – try them. Many of us have absolutely no problem burning these 1x to 16x rated discs in our 640 780 and 550 decks (I have a 780). Some members burned thousands of these discs in their 640 decks without a single hic-up.

It is a misconception to think that 1x to 16x discs are 16x only discs. It is even a bigger misconception to think that burning a 1x to 16x disc at 6x speed will take 16x power. This is simply not true. Truth is that 1x to 16x disc burned at 6x speed will take the same power as burning a 1x to 8x disc at 6x speed. As Verbatim and T-Y both claim their 1x to 16x discs have been designed and tested for recorders that have a firmware to recognize 1x to 16x DVD-R Ver 2.0 and Ver2.1 with CPRM and/or 1x to 16x DVD+R and these discs have been designed to burn the discs at the power that the deck’s firmware tells it to. That’s 6x max with the 533, 640, 780 and 550.

The 16x misconception comes from the old days, before DVD recorders were designed to accept 16x media, prior to the 1x to 16x DVD-R revision. Those older recorders don’t have firmware to deal with 1x to 16x media and may go crazy and even damage the laser diode but any recorder designed after the 1x to 16x revision (any recorder with a firmware to burn DL discs will certainly have the capability to burn quality 1x to 16x rated media at the recorder’s rated speed without any problems or extra laser power. Crappy 1x to 8x discs burned at 6x speed will take more laser power than good quality 1x to 16 discs burned at 6x speed.

To the best of my knowledge every single DVDr that is designed to burn dual-layer discs is perfectly capable of burning single layer discs rated at 1x to 16x as DL DVD-+R is newer then the 1x-to 16x disc specification. If anyone is concerned about laser-power I would recommend staying away fron DL discs as penetrating the second layer at 4x burn speed will certainly draw more laser-power than burning a single-layer 1x to 16x disc at 6x speed.

Do you have an owner’s manual for the 543? If it’s as CitiBear states, a final variation of the 640 then it certainly has a new enough firmware to deal with 1x to 16 discs as well as dual-layer discs. This is clearly stated in the 640, 780 and 550 manuals and in fact the 640 and 780 manuals state the firmware dates and 1x to 16x discs were tested as well as DL discs. In fact Verbatim is a supplier of 1x to 16x SL discs as well as their newest DL discs to Pioneer and Sony for firmware writing compatibility purposes prior to firmware releases. If your Verbatim discs start slipping it’s possible that the spindle needs a good cleaning.

Although the Pioneers and Sony share a lot of the hardware and software (Example Pioneer OS and Sony Burner) in my opinion they do not look similar. I have enclosed pictures.

OK I’m stumped.
Does the DVR-533H-S have a 12x burner?

Looking through the manual it states that the DVR-533H-S is capable of burning parts of a 16x DVD-R disc at up to 12x speed.
The newer 640, 780, 550 and other Pioneer recorders claim of burning parts of a 16x DVD-R at up to 6x speed only.

Another difference I noticed is that the DVR-533H-S will not burn DVD+R DVD+RW. It will do DVD-R DL. So did they just leave out DVD+R +RW out of the firmware or is this a different burner?

Did they just slow-down the later Pioneers and Sony to 6x to save on LD wear or is this a different burner????

Click to enlarge


For reference the manual is here.
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PUSA/Home/Blu-ray-Disc/Pioneer-DVD-Players/DVR-533H-S

EDIT
Never mind.
I think I remember CitiBear saying that these earlier Pioneer models used Pioneer burners. This was before the Sony/Pioneer venture. This explains the lack of DVD+R +RW +RW DL support as Pioneer did not like + as much as Sony likes +.
Hmm 12x burners in a stand-alone back in 2005.
Edited by Super Eye - 10/20/12 at 8:50pm

And once again, Super Eye and I roll the dice of "published specs" vs "how the unit behaves in real life for half the people who own it."

The DVR-533 uses an off-the-shelf Pioneer PC burner, model DVR-109, with a modified controller board containing a CPRM chip and proprietary ribbon connector in place of standard EIDE. That burner is spec'd to operate at 12x, >installed in a PC<, and supposedly can burn DL media, and + media as well as - media, >when installed in a PC<. When installed in a Pioneer 531, 533, or 633 DVD recorder, all bets are off and the 109 burner with crippled controller board performs to bare minimum expectations (a full DVD-R burns at HS lossless in the same 10 minutes as a later 640, 550, 560 or earlier 510 or 520). No practical difference, specs be damned. + media is not supported by the 2005 recorder controller board, and DL media was not initially supported but added to later runs of the recorder as a firmware tweak (which still didn't really work for DL worth squat).

The burner in the 640, 550 and 560 series, as well as the Sony 780, was a one-off Sony proprietary recorder burner, again running off a crippleware controller board. It burns no faster than the initial 2003 Pioneer 810. It does finally support both + and - media in all forms including DL. The version in the Pioneers supports DVD-RAM burning, the Sony 780 does not. All these 2006-2010 recorders are spec'd to accept the 16x media formulation common in 2006, and burn it between 1x and 8x. How long the burner can do this before it craps out is an unresolvable bone of contention between Super Eye and myself. His experience supports the published specs and the claims of a Sony/Pioneer technician he spoke to: his recorder has apparently burned 3000 Verbatim 16x discs without blinking. In my business refurbishing and repairing the same units, roughly 7 out of 10 arrived at my doorstep with the complaint "it won't burn Verbatim 16x media anymore." My own three 540s, a 640, a 450, and a 460 all suffered the same fate: a couple years no problem burning 16x Verbs, then "over n out". Changing to the 8x Verbatims solved the problem immediately, and all those recorders are still burning merrily away with it. Periodically, I or my customers pop in a 16x Verbatim just for the hell of it, and each machine promptly hangs trying to burn it.

Hence, my advice when evaluating a second-hand Pioneer: if you get it home and it won't burn 16x Verbatims, try the 8x and you should be good to go. If you get it home and it does burn 16x Verbatim without an issue, consider that proof the unit hasn't burned many discs yet, and enjoy the retail convenience of Verbatim 16x discs. If or when it ever develops burning issues, try the 8x instead. You can stare at the published specs until your eyes bleed, but if your recorder chokes on 16x, it chokes on 16x. Specs are nice, but reality bites.
Edited by CitiBear - 10/22/12 at 7:27pm

I never seen a DVR-533 in real life nor do I claim to know how it performs in real life.
I can however make two observations with almost certainty.

1) The Pioneer DVR-533, a way-back stand-alone recorder from 2005 has been tested with 1x to 16x media – more than one brand. The firmware will recognize 1x to 16x media and slow down the burn speed to the appropriate speed/strategy.

No one can tell me that Pioneer wrote in the manual…

“”“The table below shows 16x DVD-R disc brands that have been tested for high-speed writing compatibility with this recorder.”””

…without actually testing the discs and writing the speed/power strategy into the firmware.

They did this again with the Sony burner in the 640 and again with the 550 and Sony did it again in April 2008 with the 780. And it should be clear that with the Sony I’m not going by specs alone – I’m going with A) my personal experience B) The experience of many others using their 640 and newer decks and C) what my contact at Sony said.

2) The Pioneer DVR-533 has a laser powerful enough to burn at up to 12x speed. If the controller board can only handle a 6x speed – that burner burning at 6x speed should last for years burning 16x discs at 6x speed. Usually when you use something under-spec it lasts longer. Oh, don’t forget the 12x spec is only for a small part of the burn – not the whole disc.

Seems that it lasted for over 8 yrs for the thread starter and most likely “HDD ERR” means something could be wrong with the HDD and the laser diode could still be good.

I’m not telling anyone not to take Citibear’s advice to try 8x Verbatim AZO or T-Y discs if they have problems burning other media. I am however telling everyone that you will not hurt or prematurely wear out your laser by using 1x to 16x Verbatim AZO discs in a stand-alone deck that has a firmware strategy for burning such discs. That’s any Pioneer since the 2005 DVR-533 including all newer Pioneer decks and of course the 2008 Sony 780. The new available Magnavox decks as well. Although the maggies can’t burn DL discs – you will not hurt your new Magnavox by burning Verbatim AZO or T-Y 16x media. Heck I bet the Funai firmware testers concentrate on the 16x media when writing the firmware – most likely they don’t even check it with 8x media anymore. Why would they when 99 percent of users will stick with the widely available 1x to 16x stuff in it???

It is a known fact that T-Y discs tend to be a little sticky and may not slip after other media starts to slip. I am not convinced that this is a good thing that is why I recommend a spindle cleaning when Verb AZO discs start to slip.

Good to know and as I suspected, Pioneer most likely crippled the +R capability in the 533 firmware just as Sony crippled the RAM-Write capability in the Sony 780 firmware. You can do a lot with firmware but I think DL burning takes a hardware update as the laser has to re-focus the angle to penetrate the second layer.

Oh and let’s face it CitiBear, if you and I didn’t have these friendly back-n-fourth discussions this DVDr forum would be dead, other than the few Magnavox posts.

That’s why I’m starting a new thread called.
Does Taiyo Yuden & Verbatim really use different dyes for their 1x to 8x blanks?