Toshiba D-R1 DVD Recorder

When I was in the market for a DVD-Recorder I narrowed it down to four units, the Toshiba DR-1, Panasonic DMR-E50, Samsung DVD-R4000, and Sharp DVR-W2U. The Toshiba DR-1 is the only one with 2 sets of RCA Outputs and with the ablility to handle all three of the "Minus" media types (DVD-R, DVD-RW, and DVD-Ram).

When I first tried to set it up I was not able to get it to work. Reason being is that I only hooked the coaxial cable through the RF input and output of the unit and I did not also use the RCA connections to hook it up to my TV. Once I used the RCA connections as well, the unit worked just fine with no problems.

Some of the features I like are the ability to dim the display on the front of the unit, and that you can make Menus and Titles on anything that you record. I was able to transfer an old VHS tape that I made from a camcorder to DVD and due to the quality of the VHS tape still having been very good, the DVD came out excellent. One thing I noticed was that you have to "finalize" the DVD so other players can play it, otherwise you can only play it in the recorder that created it. This process does not take long and I don't consider it a "Con".

It also comes with VCR Plus which makes it easy to set it to tape something while you are away, and if you intend to record onto DVD-RW or DVD-Ram you have to "Initialize" the disc first to prepare it for being recorded (with DVD-R, you can just start the recording).

It is so well loaded with all different features from menu creation, setting the speed of the recording to either One Hour, Two, Four, or Six (the higher you go it's supposed to reduce your Video quality, but One and Two hour are as good as when you buy a DVD from the store, and Four and Six hour are still very acceptable in being widely compared to VHS quality) that I feel as though it would be a wonderful addition to anyones Home Theatre.

Now for what I meant by referring to the D-R1 as needing patience to use. I know a few people have reviewed this and said that if they can get it to work, it works for a few minutes and then stops, but there is something they are not doing right...waiting.

You simply can not use this DVD-Recorder just like you would a VCR, where you can turn it on, and then immediately start recording something. I'll tell you how I figured that out. One time I set it to record a show that started at 9:00pm, so I put in a DVD-R well before that time and turned the power off. Well at exactly 8:50pm the unit turned on (at first I thought I did something wrong, but I didn't) and you could see the Zeros for the counter on the front of the unit (00:00.00). Then at exactly 9:00pm they started to count up to indicate that it was recording. Bottom line is that the Toshiba DR-1 needs about 10 minutes to warm up before it records something, otherwise...if you record right away...then you will get the problems that people have talked about. Once I learned to be patient and turn the unit on in advance (like if I am going to copy a VHS tape to DVD, do some cable recording, etc...) I never had a problem with it again.

Oh and by the way, I have used VERY cheap DVD-R's like "Princo", "Ritek", "Optodisc", & "Dup-EZ" (mostly Princo) and they all work fine. Only thing is you should really go with what the manufacturer recommends for DVD-Ram, that being: Panasonic LM-AB120U (for 4.7gb single sided), and Panasonic LM-AD240U (for 9.4gb double sided).

There is one thing I am not crazy about, but I think that it happens to be this way with any DVD-Recorder. You can't do any editing (like cutting out commercials) if you use DVD-R, or DVD-RW (DVD-Ram only). You also can't edit if you are dubbing, like if you are recording from a VHS tape that has commercials in it and you want to pause them out while you make the DVD. It just doesn't work for some reason. But if you are recording a show on TV through the DVD-Recorders tuner, then "pause" will work just fine. I wish you could edit a little better, but I have learned to deal with it.

Lastly the "Timeslip" feature is just amazing (this too only works with DVD-Ram Discs). Let's just put it this way, if you are recording a show that is on from 3:00pm to 4:00pm and you get home early at 3:30pm, you can watch the very DVD-Ram disc that is currently recording from its 3:00pm start time and it will still finish the recording until 4:00pm. If that was a VCR you would either have to watch from 3:30 to 4:00, then at 4:00 rewind and watch the first half hour, or you would just have to wait and watch it all at 4:00. With DVD-Ram technology, you can watch the same disc that is currently recording.

That is amazing, and if you just leave a DVD-Ram disc in the unit while you are watching TV through the recorder, you can pause live TV and rewind it and even fast forward it up to the point where you initially paused it. Then you can finish watching the program whenever you want.

So just have a little patience and you will love this DVD-Recorder from Toshiba.