Rating: 
Summary: Guys, you'll need to read the manual....
Review: I've had this unit for a year and am very pleased. I haven't recorded anything for permanent storage, but I use it practically every day to watch the evening news. Here's how: my wife and I are usually still eating dinner when the program begins, so I simply turn the Panasonic on when the news starts, and go back to the table. When we are done eating, and the news isn't finished, we start watching from the beginning while the recording continues. This way we don't miss anything and can skip the stories we don't care about. The picture is essentially broadcast (cable) quality. It works!
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent product
Review: I've had this unit for a year and am very pleased. I haven't recorded anything for permanent storage, but I use it practically every day to watch the evening news. Here's how: my wife and I are usually still eating dinner when the program begins, so I simply turn the Panasonic on when the news starts, and go back to the table. When we are done eating, and the news isn't finished, we start watching from the beginning while the recording continues. This way we don't miss anything and can skip the stories we don't care about. The picture is essentially broadcast (cable) quality. It works!
Rating: 
Summary: Not Perfect, Sometimes Great, Sometimes Disappointing
Review: I've recorded over 200 movies on this recorder, and the results are usually excellent, but sometimes there are disasters.This recorder is not for everybody because sometimes it's glitchy, even with Panasonic's disks. If the recording passes the first 111 seconds, it usually will continue, but don't count on it. When it reaches that magic moment, it will sometimes bomb, meaning the laser lens is dirty, or the disk quality is not to the recorder's liking, or the power is too spiky, or it's the wrong day of the week. Maybe this touchy behavior is unique to my recorder, but I missed getting a few treasured movies off the cable. Who knows when those will be aired again. Recordings of broadcast t.v. are not nearly as good as those on digital cable, but sometimes the network presentations have good quality broadcasts almost worthy of DVD recording. Sometimes the recorder mistracks, getting the temporal sequencing out of order. That's annoying. However, if the recording is ripped to the PC, then the re-recording can smooth out this problem and a few others such as stuttering and pixelation madness. It's touchy. Sometimes DVD players have trouble playing the finalized disks. Frequent cleaning of the recorder's laser lens is necessary to prevent the problems given above. I suppose this glitchy nature is because of the power in the laser. Lower power increases the lifetime of the burner, but the disks being burned have to have a perfect surface and disk opacity has to be very high so the low burn power of the laser doesn't pass through the disk but gets concentrated. I'm not sure this is best explanation for the recorder's malfunction with other manufacturer's disks, and occasionally with Panasonic's. The 50-cent disks from other manufacturers will work most of the time, but expect a few failures. When it records timed events, most of the time the final product is excellent. However, it would be nice to have a keyboard to type in the titles. Using the telephone-like keypad is inconvenient. What was Panasonic thinking? An infrared keyboard would be a big help. While the DVD-RAM disks can be edited, using the keypad makes editing inconvenient. In order to make RAM recordings watchable on DVD players, I had to purchase Panasonic's inexpensive and versatile player that can read RAM disks. Playing the RAMs on the player makes DVD mastering possible with the DVD recorder. I wish Panasonic had software that would allow editing of recordings prior to finalizing. That would make things more convenient. When I buy my next recorder, I'm going to be looking for greater ease of use and for features that address the problems I've had. I don't want to mislead anyone, because this unit has many good features. Should people buy this machine? Yes, oh yes! Low price, high quality. It is very good most of the time, but you should know the things I and the other reviewers have to say, so you know what to expect, and so you won't be as disappointed and frustrated as I was initially. Keep the laser clean and most of the time it will behave well. While superb recordings can be made with the SP (standard play setting), the LP (long play)setting is perfect for most recordings. The recording quality of LP is very good. That lowers the cost of recordings, so the more expensive Panasonic DVD-R disks are more affordable. The same cannot be said for EP (extended play), but even EP recordings are remarkably good.
Rating:
Summary: Panasonic's DMR-E50K is a winner!
Review: If you're looking for a DVD Recorder to transfer over non-copyrighted material, Panasonic's DMR-E50K does the job without a hitch! If you're new to DVD, I wouldn't recommend this as your first player. The instruction manual is a little confusing if you're not already familiar with wiring and general setup. Recording a DVD is similar to recording a CD-R in a CD Recorder. You must finalize the DVD-R before it's playable on (most) other DVD Players. If you don't, it won't play on any other machine other than the DMR-E50K. The picture and sound is very good. Recording time varies from 1, 2, 4 or 6 hours on a single sided 4.7 GB DVD. The top two speeds (XP & SP) look great! The two low speeds (LP & EP) really looks like the VHS equivalent. After reading other reviews and specifications with other DVD Recorders, my main concerns were disc and player compatability. The DMR-E50K works with Panasonic's DVD-RAM (playable only in the DMR-E50K), and offers editing and re-recording on the same disc over and over again. As for DVD-Rs, the DMR-E50K has no problems recording with Memorex brand DVD-Rs. I have 3 DVD Players (not including the DMR-E50K) and after finalizing a DVD-R, the finished DVD worked on all of them: Audiovox, Panasonic (different model), and a high end McIntosh. The Panasonic DMR-E50K does exactly what I expected it to do. It offers Progressive Scan, S-Video, Composite video, DTS Output, Dolby Digital 5.1 playback (on pre-recorded discs), and the convenience of recording over and over again on a single DVD-RAM disc. On the negative side, it only records in Dolby Digital two channel stereo (Pro-Logic compatible), and only offers an optical digital output (not coaxial). I wouldn't consider this player to the "causal" viewer. However, if you're into DVD and want recording capability, Panasonic's DMR-E50K may just be what you're looking for.
Rating: 
Summary: This Unit is a nightmare
Review: It works well when it feels like....You Have to be careful what DVDrs you buy.It only works with the most expensive ones!If you buy TDK or something cheaper it will record for 10seconds and shut the unit off....Then to get the damn disc out it is hell.It keeps saying recovery and will not let you stop or eject.Another thing it is not consistent.Only 2\3 of the discs it creates will work on other DVd players???Go figure.If one works why wouldn't they all?One more thing if you record in 6hour mode just throw the disc out.My VCD recorder does a better job at MPEG1 no joke.
Rating:
Summary: Almost perfect
Review: Picture and sound are first rate. I am using the unit for backups of my video tape collection and for dumping programs off my Tivo unit. I am completely satisfied with the results except that I have also had the problems experienced by several of the negative reviewers. The unit worked fine for me on Verbatim, Sony and Panasonic disks but rejected 1 out of 3 of Fujifilm DVD-R. When it locked up on the Fuji disks it went into a "death spiral" where it would attempt to recover, fail but would not allow you to eject the disk. I had good luck unplugging the unit for 10 minutes and then holding the open button during the recover phase. This allowed me to remove the offending disk. Seems to work fine afterwards. Lesson is good disks mean good results. Anything else is at your own risk.
Rating:
Summary: Perfect For Transferring Home Videos
Review: Several years ago I purchased a capture card and video editing software and a cd recorder so that I could transfer my 8mm videos to something close to a DVD. It, in theory, would make mpeg1 videos to put an hour on a cd and format it in Video CD form to play on "most" DVD players. Well, it worked once, though mpeg1 wasn't great, I thought I was off to a good start. The second one I tried failed to play in the DVD player and subsequent ones failed to even finish formatting on the computer and the next I knew, I had about a dozen fouled recordable cds. I gave up, figuring the computer couldn't handle the go between, capturing the video to hard drive and then writing it out without error. All I could do is capture the video and transfer the file to cd to play on my computer. I didn't want that. This machine does exactly what I wanted without the tedious processing of the computer. You hook up your video camera (if you have dv and want a fire wire you have to look elsewhere, I think Panasonics E60S has that. I have analog video.) start playing and hit record with a DVD-R in the machine. I don't want titles or dissolves or whatever, I just want my tapes on DVD that'll play on other DVD players. That's what I have now, plus a great recorder for television with VCR plus. If you've been frustrated by computer manipulation of video files trying to make DVDs or Video CDs to preserve your home videos, you will be thrilled with this machine.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Quite Ready for Prime Time
Review: The machine was easy to set up but did not respond to included remote control, which differed from the manual illustration and instructions. Certain functions were not available on remote. Machine will not work with anything but Panasonic disks which happen to cost 2-6 times most other brands. Since I am planning to transfer literally hundreds of VHS tapes to CD-R, this just did not meet my needs. Finally, no matter which output on the machine I used, it never did show up on the TV except when the VHS was playing a tape through the DVD. So I am returning it and may try the Phillips which, even though it is more expensive, might be more what I want.
Rating:
Summary: Great Value-time to dump your VCR!
Review: The machine worked great right out of the box. The manual leaves a bit to be desired, however. All of the required info is there, but it takes some digging to find the information you want. The machine works fine with all the brands of DVD-RAM disks I have tried, provided they are formated correctly (which the deck can do). The only real disk compatibility problem I have found is with Imation disks, which must be "unlocked" on a computer with a DVD-RAM drive before they can be set up for formating and use. I've settled on TDK DVD-RAM disks and have had no problems. Commercial movie DVD's play great, with great video & DOLBY digital optical pass-through to a decoder, and DVD-R recordings work fine. (I've archived some of my old VHS tapes with no problems.) This one's a keeper!
Rating:
Summary: A great investment!
Review: The wife & I decided to hold off on buying a DVD player until they could record, and those units were more affordable. To the DMR-E50K I can only ask: "Where have you been all my life?!?"
This is a great concept and a wonderful machine.
I currently have 2 VCR's slaved to one another then channeled through this unit, the satellite receiver and either the DVD player from my home theater, my camcorder or my digital camera connected to this machine. It is not an overstatement to say that this device is the workhorse of our Media Center. And it's up to the job.
Until I brought this out of the box, my wife was recording her craft shows to video tapes. Twenty-some of them, to be exact. This means that on a 6 hour tape, there might be 30-40 minutes of stuff she wants to save for future reference. Now, she can use the timer to record the whole show, but edit out the stuff she doesn't want to keep. Also, all those tapes will, someday, have the parts she wants to keep transfered to DVD. As other reviews have noted, I am also transfering my old video tapes to DVD and simply based on the space I'm clearing up, this machine is worth the price.
The only media problem I've ever encountered was when I bought the wrong format. Other than that, all the media I've used have worked well.
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