Review by Barry for Panasonic DMR-EZ48VK 1080p Upconverting VHS DVD Recorder with Built In Tuner
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The auto scan flawlessly found all the analog and unscrambled digital channels offered by Comcast in my area. It does not have an HD tuner but does capture the widescreen 16:9 signals. If you record on DVD-RAM (not -R, -RW, +R, or +RW) it will record the widescreen picture. Three added bonuses for using DVD-RAM are “Chasing Playback,” which allows you to watch a program from the beginning while the machine continues to record the remainder of it; more editing options; and the ability to selectively erase individual programs from the disc and then record new shows in the deleted space. You can find 10-packs of Panasonic DVD-RAMs online (item #LM-AF120LU10) for about $19; Amazon has a 5-pack (LM-AF120LU5) for about $10. The discs are rated for 100,000 re-recording cycles, versus about 1,000 for R/RW! Don’t expect to find them in stores (which baffles me).

I found the menus and remote control to be quite intuitive. This is also the quietest DVD recorder I have used. The machine is loaded with features, including upconversion all the way to 1080p if you use the HDMI connection. One of its best capabilities is that Panasonic engineered the 4-hour LP recording speed of the DVD drive to provide the same playback quality as the 2-hour SP speed! No, the VHS recorder does not record digital broadcasts, but who cares with the great playback quality of the DVD drive? I’m using the VHS to dub my old tapes over to DVD.

We interrupt this review for a helpful note…a couple years ago I learned from personal experience (and a Comcast technician) that digital signals are more “fragile” than analog ones. My first lesson occurred when I was connecting my new Panasonic HDTV. Some of the digital channels were very unstable and would cycle between displaying and going to black, or showed significant digital artifacts. That problem was caused by my brand new high end surge suppressor, which included f-jacks for cable protection. The suppressor’s internal cable protection circuitry altered the signal slightly, causing the problem. The tech connected the TV directly to the cable wall outlet, bypassing the suppressor, and the signal was perfect. (Note: always plug your AC power cords into a surge suppressor!) I had to recall my second lesson when hooking up my DMR-EZ48V. At first, a couple of the digital sub-channels in my area (21.1, 33.3) could not be received. I remembered that I had used an existing push-on type coax for my cable connection from the wall outlet to the machine. My bad. I replaced it with one of the cables the Comcast tech had made for me for future use, with screw on f-connectors, and all reception was perfect! We return now to my review of the DMR-EZ48V…

I have not seen any digital artifacts during playback on my Panasonic HDTV. The instruction manual gives you details for tweaking the machine and fixing many possible problems (I had none) by using the large array of accessible menu options. This machine may not be right for a technophobic individual, but for an enthusiast it is great!

Review by Careful Reviewer for Panasonic DMR-EZ48VK 1080p Upconverting VHS DVD Recorder with Built In Tuner
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I purchased this mainly to transfer home movies. Unfortunately, Panasonic has decided that it knows better than you do. They have programmed the machine to divide recordings whenever a break in the video occurs. This means that your two-hour home video is going to be automatically divided into about 16 parts and there is no option to disable it. Each division causes a loss in the beginning of the next part.

You will have to plug a separate VCR into the unit to be certain of uninterrupted recording. Of course, you might as well buy any DVD recorder if you are going to do that and pay much less. The DVD recording quality is good – as good as just about any other recorder.

Too bad: Panasonic built a good concept, but they forgot to give the consumer the freedom to decide how to record.

Review by nagappa for Panasonic DMR-EZ48VK 1080p Upconverting VHS DVD Recorder with Built In Tuner
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Pansonic introduced this DVD recorder a year after its predecessor, the EZ47VK. The EZ47VK had almost the same feature set, but suffered from overheating problems. So Panasnic added a cooling fan with the EZ48VK.

I bought this recorder to transfer VHS tapes to DVD and to record programs off cable TV. In both these respects this player works just perfect, with one flaw which I will touch on below.

The auto-tune feature tuned all the standard (non-pay and non-premium) channels from my cable company and even set the clock time based on the local PBS station. The ATSC tuner picks up over-the-air HDTV and DTV programs. I am using this player with an Antennas Direct DB2 Multi Directional HDTV Antenna. It picked up local HD channels and some from as far as 40 miles away. A minor annoyance is that when you switch between antenna and cable (I use an external A/B switch) you need to auto tune the channels all over again.

Transferring VHS to DVD is a cinch. The resulting DVD is often better than the source VHS tape due to the noise reduction. I’ve also had excellent results recording my favorite TV programs (particularly movies from AMC and TCM). In the two months I’ve had this player, I’ve recorded just over 40 movies for personal use.

As others have suggested, DVD-RAM disks are a must-have for this player, particularly for recording TV programs you want to later delete. DVD-RAM disks give you a Tivo-like experience, and you can pause and rewind the program while the rest of the program is being recorded. And DVD-RAM disks allow you record over and over thousands of times.

Caution about dual-layer DVD+R disks:

The only problem I had with this player is with dual-layer DVD+R disks. When recording multiple programs in sequence, the player can get “confused” with the layer change in the dual layer disk. It corrupted two disks, making them unreadable. And it required me to power off and power on in order to eject the corrupted disks.

Anyway, I found that that recording dual layer DVD+R disks works perfectly when I recorded a single long program that spans both layers.

Overall, I have high praise for this player!