Panasonic DMR-E50M DVD Recorder

I got all hooked up last night & got it all working. Way Cool!! I was able to record from all video input sources: Security cam, Cable TV, Satellite TV, VCR, DVD, & even the radio. I even got the universal remote to operate my TV, even though the manual instructions are not very specific on this.

It has awesome features including a one that calculates the remaining time on the disk & selects the highest resolution video setting for recording time. It lets you create and label play lists & video clips. It has one touch recording in 30 min increments up to 6 hrs. It has auto shut off timer to shut off at a specified time, up to 6 hrs. It lets you pre-program timer recordings. It has auto clock, time zone & daylight savings set which it does automatically by reading the info from the public broadcasting channel. (NO more flashing 12:00!) You can crop & edit video, delete clips all at once or individually. I like the Cable/Sat coax input & outputs. It also has 3 inputs: 2 back, 1 front (nice for recording from camcorder or digital camera) & one output. It plays a wide selection of disks including: CD, CD-R, DVD, MP3, DVD-ram, DVD-R, etc. I thought the on-screen menus were pretty nice. I really like the DVD-ram option which lets you use the same disk over & over (100,000 times, they claim). Let's see...100k divided by 365 days per year, equals 274 years of recording 6 hrs a day, every day. (I guess the disks will outlive the technology...) This will be sweeeet for recording from my security cam, putting my entire mp3 library on 1 rewriteable disk, & definitely good for testing record ability to prevent making coasters. It accepts both the cartridge disks (protects from human contact) and the standard disks. The double sided 9.4 GB disks hold up to 6 hrs video on the lowest resolution setting per side. I guess my only gripes are that there is no digital audio input for Dolby 5.1, user manual is not specific on some instructions, & I had trouble reading some of my DVD R disks created on my PC.

I just need to find a 100-count spindle of cheap DVD-R's & start burning it up. I plan to buy the extended warranty from Panasonic to protect my investment until this technology is obsolete.