Help Me Choose Please...Samsung vs Panasonic

I'm not (hands on) familiar with either of the machines you mention, but based on brand experience, I vote for the Panny. I have both an ES-10 and an ES-15, as well as a Samsung Combo VHS/DVDR. The Panasonics are more versatile and have better PQ. The Samsung is fine for a bedroom unit, but either of the Pannys are much better as main machines.

I would get a Panasonic DMR ES25 which has HQ record plus HDMI.

I had the r135 for a while and it was definitely not a good unit. Never had HDMI hooked up, but people were reporting a very annoying problem - with HDMI audio enabled the digital outs would only pass through PCM and no DD or DTS, with the HDMI audio disabled, it passes DD, but every time you call up the menu, or change titles, or there's any other drop out in the sound a message saying "HDMI audio not supported" appears on the TV screen.

I know this is an old thread, but to anyone out there considering a Samsung DVD-R135: Don't!

I've got one. It started playing everything. Then it would refuse to play an occasional DVD. Now it won't play any commercial DVD although it WILL play copies of those DVDs I've made on my computer. It also flashes that stupid "HDMI Audio not supported" message on the TV screen every now and then.

Most worthless DVD player I've ever had, and I've owned 10 over the years. I have no idea if the recorder part works. When it stopped playing DVDs I took it out of service and replaced it with a Panasonic. The Panasonic has worked perfectly on every DVD I've put in it.

I went with a samsung unit.....a combo vhs.dvd....the dvd-v357. My main reason was the ability to record dual layer. I have some two hour tapes that I want to record onto dvd. I was told the panny breaks up the file into two seperate layers.