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Questions about dvr's- Newbee, very confused!

508 Views 2 Replies 3 Participants Last post by  rgazzara, 
C
I have a panny 50" plasma and use a cable card to receive hi def channels but no premium channels like HBO, Pay Per View, etc. What I would like to buy is a Panasonic dmr-eh55s to record TV shows (like I used to do with my old VCR), occasionally make a dvd (to keep) from some of the shows I recorded, and also

play commercial dvd's I rent.


Questions: Will I be able to watch a hi def channel and record another hi def channel at the same time or can I only record a hi def channel if I'm watching it. I understand the hi def channel will not be able to be played back in true hi def (I don't care about that). The confusing part is what I will or will not be able to watch and record at the same time.


Can someone explain it to me in easy to understand terms. Also, is the dmr-eh55s the best choice for my purpose or is there another hard drive model that is better? What about a model without the hard drive such as the Panasonic dmr-es25s? Thanks for helping the technically challenged.
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If the Cable Card is the only way you can receive programming then your TV must have an A/V output for the DVD Recorder to record it. And you will only be able to watch what you are recording since only the TV can receive anything. And an additional constraint is that the A/V output must be 480i for it to be recordable by the DVD Recorder.


By A/V output I mean Yellow/White/Red RCA, or perhaps S-Video instead of Yellow RCA (which is called Composite Video).


Yours is an awkward situation in that even changing the TV input to watch what is coming out of the DVD Recorder screws up the recording, since the input to the DVD Recorder is coming from the output of the TV. A second, smaller perhaps, monitor TV would be appropriate for that situation, to be able to see what the DVD Recorder sees without disturbing the DVD Recorder's input.
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R
You would need a HD cable box from the cable company to record 1 channel and watch another.
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