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A guide to the best digital recorders
Digital TV is coming. Well, it’s already here. And, judging by the numbers of heads being scratched in electrical departments around the UK, there are few who understand it, writes Neil Davey
The thing is, it’s not as complicated as the official Government publications might suggest. An unclear Government publication? Good heavens, you never saw that coming, did you?
The plan is to switch every broadcast to digital between 2008 and 2012, ITV region by ITV region. Border is first, so we’re assuming they then head south. While this sounds like you need to upgrade every bit of kit in the house, you probably don’t. Most current TVs can handle the signals – assuming it’s not a Bakelite set – and most recently fitted aerials can cope. Clearly the revolution is already underway. After all, Freeview is a digital service and, currently, around 72% of households are already switched on to that, either via assorted Sky boxes or one of those little gadgets even the BBC have advertised. If you’re already wired for BBC4 and more shopping channels than you thought could possibly survive, congratulations: you’re part of the way there.
One of the more interesting problems associated with Freeview is how do you record? The addition of that little box – that simple, innocent looking box – has probably resulted in more frustrations than anything. Hugely intelligent people such as, er, freelance writers have been left staring at aerial sockets and SCART leads and trying to work out what goes where and what bit do we have to leave on again? One professional couple I know – intelligent, responsible types who work away from home a lot – have resorted to two videos, a couple of Freeview boxes and a complicated systems of mirrors so that they don’t accidentally change the channel of the one they want to tape. There must, we figured, be an easier way… and, while we’re at it, it would be nice not to have so many leads everywhere.
There is now a selection of answers at hand. You could go the Sky route and the Sky + box is a thing of simple beauty: turn TV on, press programme guide button, find programme you want, press record, watch later at your leisure. Sky, though, requires an ugly dish and also means the lining of Rupert Murdoch’s already well-lined pockets. But the same basic process is now available with a selection of digital recorders.
Rather than record to tape – the manufacturers may claim they have a 20 year life but we all know the truth by now – these use either a computer style hard disk or recordable DVDs to store recordings.
A good basic starting point is the Sharp TU-R160H. Retailing at around £149, this actually features two digital tuners which means you can record one programme and watch another. Memory size is a whopping 160GB which equates to around 80 hours of TV – or the equivalent of 10 cassettes on long play. Programming is simple too.
The downside of hard disk drives is that you can’t record for other people. Well, you can, but then they have to come round to your place to watch it and they’ll drink your wine, you see if they don’t. You can get around this with Sony’s entry level RDRGXD360. This retails at around £199 and combines a Freeview box with a DVD recorder. You can get around 16 hours of programmes on a standard DVD. Programming’s easy, the recorder can also double as a DVD player, of course, and the ‘chasing playback’ function allows you to watch the beginning of a programme while it’s still being recorded which is quite handy sometimes.
One of the big confusions at the moment is HDD and HD. HDD is hard disk drive, like the Sharp above. HD stands for high definition, a new, highly detailed TV and DVD format: a much improved picture, basically. The Panasonic DMR-EZ27 DVD combines the benefits of the Sony but can also upscale standard definition material to high definition quality, a perfect partner for the new HD televisions. If you do have to replace that old Bakelite model, HD is constantly coming down in price and does look amazing.
If the need to transfer VHS is important or you’ve got home videos of great sentimental value that you’d like to store on DVD, Panasonic also have the DMREX95V. This weighs in at £549 but packs a lot of tricks into its relatively small frame. It’s got all the bits – DVD, VHS and a Freeview tuner – plus a breathtaking 250Gb of hard disk space which Panasonic claim can take 443 hours of footage. You can also plug your digital camera memory card in and store the photos. The best bit though is the archiving facility. It features ‘Time Based Corrector’ and ‘3D DNR’ technology, Good huh? What do you mean you don’t know what it means…? It’s typical manufacturer speak for two actually quite useful tools. The Time Based Corrector reduces jitter – a common problem on ageing VHS tapes – while the 3D DNR bit eliminates picture noise and colour irregularities. And does it rather efficiently.
* The above models are available from John Lewis stores. For further info, call 08456 049 049 or visit www.johnlewis.com
This article was created: 1 June 2007.
This article was last edited: 4 June 2007.
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