Panasonic DMR-ES35V Video Recorder.

Manufacturer: Panasonic Consumer Electronics, One Panasonic Way, Secaucus, NJ 07094

Price: Purchased for $246

Source: Reviewer Purchase

Reviewer: Howard Ferstler

OK, a while back I told the editor that I was retiring from audio journalism, and I suppose I meant it. However, this does not mean that I will not submit an occasional review of an interesting product. The item reviewed here is an interesting one because it is not only a DVD recorder but is also a video-cassette recorder, DVD video player, and CD player. This arrangement works well for a lot of people, because those with VHS tape collections can own a device that fits onto a single shell plays back existing tapes (and records new ones), and also records and plays back DVD style. As noted, the unit can play prerecorded DVD materials (with component and progressive-scan output abilities, as well as S-Video and composite connections) and can also play back compact discs with audible perfection equal to what we would have with any upscale CD player. Yep, this is one nifty device that can put onto one shelf space what would ordinarily take up three spaces.

I picked this unit up at Best Buy for $246, and only had to slightly twist my wife's arm to pull off the purchase. She actually was happy to get the unit, because the Panasonic VCR she has been using for more than 15 years had finally started to give her problems. We hope this new Panasonic model will serve for the same length of time; it is now happily installed in my small living room AV system, the smallest of three such installations at my house.

The unit is fairly simple up front, with a slot to the left for VCR tapes and a tray on the right for DVD and CD materials. It has the usual array of controls, as well as front-panel hookups for conventional camcorders (or dubbing connections from other DVD devices) and even a front-panel hookup for a DV camcorder. The remote is kind of a combo item, with various buttons for both DVD and VHS recording (including one that you push to select which format you want to use), and also a few buttons that can be assigned to do simple TV set operations.

The back panel has outputs that are common to both DVD and VHS (including the typical, 75 ohm RF video in/out connectors), as well as those that are dedicated to just DVD. The latter includes component (with interlaced and progressive options), S-Video, and composite jacks, as well as a fiber-optic digital-audio output that can deal with both Dolby Digital and DTS. Note that the unit cannot handle a fiber-optic digital input, nor can it digitally output or input using a coaxial (RCA jack) feed. Any digital-audio receiver that you use with this device should be able to handle a fiber-optic input for DVD sound.

The DMR-ES35V can handle quite a few recording formats, including DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-R DL (dual layer), DVD+R DL, and DVD-RAM. (Yeah, I know this is a maddening number of format options, but each does have its advantages.) It can also record and play back any VHS video tape, including playback of Super VHS, although it will not record at the latter's high resolution and playback of materials recorded on S-VHS units will also not have that format's full resolution. Interestingly, it will also play back DVD-Audio discs, although only in two-channel form. The center and surround channel sound is folded into the stereo mix. Some DVD-A discs will not allow the fold-down process, however.

I have found that the DVD+RW and DVD-RAM formats are the most useful for our (well, my wife's) particular life style, because she loves to record assorted PBS and other educational network drama shows for watching at later times. She rarely keeps those recordings for long periods of time and so those two formats, being rewriteable, suit her just fine. The -R and +R formats are also very nice, particularly if one want so record something that will be kept on hand for a longer stretch. However, one has to remember that if one wants to play those discs on a different player they have to be "finalized" by the DMR-ES35V to do so. (Finalizing involves making the recorded material permanent and not erasable.) Finalizing is not necessary (or even possible) with the +RW and RAM discs, although, unfortunately, the latter format is not usually playable on most other players.

Note that DVD-RW discs are also rewriteable. However, the problem with that format is that if you want to play a recorded program on another player the material has to be "finalized," essentially turning it into a DVD-R disc. While DVD+RW has a flexibility edge (no finalizing is required to play it on certain other players), if you are planning to obtain this recorder and hope to play some of the discs it makes on your existing DVD players in other parts of the house, be sure to check their owner's manuals first. Often those players will not handle the discs and some players will not handle DVD recorded discs of any kind.

One interesting thing about the DVD-RAM format is the ability to watch a program from the beginning of the disc while it is still being recorded, even if the program is well along. Another interesting feature is that DVD-RAM allows you to erase program material at any point on the disc and then fit new programs smoothly into the gaps, just like with a computer hard drive. This is not possible with the -RW and +RW formats. You can erase material from these, of course (if the -RW version has not been finalized), but removing programs from anywhere but the tail end of the group of programs on the disc will not increase the available recording space. The only way you can do that is to erase the last item recorded. Well, nothing is perfect.

The main advantage of the +RW and -RW (the latter after finalizing) formats, compared to the more esoteric DVD-RAM item, are that they should be playable on a variety of other players, including conventional, play-only types. Unfortunately, players that can deal with that are going to be the more modern versions available (that are also specifically configured to handle DVD recorded materials), and I discovered that virtually no other player I have in my home-theater systems would deal with recordings made on the DMR-ES35V. I was hoping that one of my newer Panasonic or JVC players would do the job, but they would not, nor would my THX-Ultra certified Onkyo player or my Pioneer DVD/LD combi player.

Note that I did not try to play discs recorded with the new unit on these players. This is because the owner's manuals of some of them tended to indicate that playing DVD recorder produced discs on their machines might result in the player or the disc being damaged. Being timid, I am not one to take chances with warnings like that staring me in the face, even though is possible that some of my players might play such discs with no problems. Indeed, some of the older ones made no mention of recordable DVD compatibility at all. Consequently, my next move will be to convince my wife to replace the aged VHS recorder in my middle-sized AV system with a second DMR-ES35V. That should solve some cross-pollination problems.

I tried both the tape and DVD recording abilities of the DMR-ES35V and found the performance to be admirable. VHS tapes made from broadcast sources looked fine at the SP speed (although typically resolution limited) and the slower EP speed was OK. There is also a very slow VP speed (gives you five times the length of SP), but its picture quality was limited. Note that tapes made at the VP speed may not be playable on other VCR units.

DVD copies of the same broadcast sources looked identical to the originals. The DVD abilities of the unit include four different recording speeds: XP, SP, LP, and EP. The two latter speeds get you a lot of time (4 and 8 hours on a single-sided disc and almost twice as much on DL discs) but at the expense of what I would call a decent picture. SP gets you two hours of very fine performance and XP gets you one hour of superb performance.

However, I think it is gilding the lily to go for XP with broadcast source material, so those with serious recording/playback, time-shifting intentions would do just fine with SP. The unit also has an "FR" (flexible recording) speed option, which is nifty in that it adjusts the recording speed to accommodate the space left on a disc and fills it out right to the end. It might be as fast as SP at the beginning, with a slowdown to, say, LP for some sections near the end. This would be fine if you wanted to put a 90-minute program on a disc that had I hour of space left at the SP speed and 2 hours left at the LP speed. It would split the difference and give you a high quality picture for most of the program, with a downgrade to the slower speed for only part of it.

Actually, given the low price of DVD+RW discs (we bought a 10-pack for $13 at Best Buy), it would be easiest to simply reformat a disc you were done with, so that the full disc space was available. With a bunch of discs on hand, it makes no sense for a typical time shifter to sweat details like the space available on a partially filled disc. Go get a blank disc from your stack. Heck, even if you have only a couple of discs to use, a part-filled +RW or RAM DVD can be reformatted to full-empty status in a minute.

Interestingly, regarding CD performance, I gave this player a tryout with the CD Check disc used to evaluate the error-correcting abilities of a number of other CD and DVD players I have auditioned and reviewed in the past. Many of those units could only cleanly get to level two of the five levels the disc contains, and some even had problems with level two. Some of the better players could cleanly track to level three, but virtually all ran into at least some trouble at level four. The DMR-ES35V set a new standard, however, by being able to cleanly track level four and handle even level five with only few mistracking "buzzes." Impressive, to say the least.

My wife and I are enjoying this recording and playback device. Its on-screen menu system is excellent, and it is almost impossible to do something wrong when making either a DVD recording or VHS recording, provided you pay attention to the screen prompts. It has way, way more flexibility than we require, but I suppose that some users will get a huge amount of pleasure in exercising all the video functions available.

Do I have any gripes? Well, yes. The unit's front-panel finish is a mix of black plastic and brushed aluminum that does not fit in with the decor of the all-black audio equipment and short, black-colored rack and black-chassis TV in my living-room system. Fortunately, at least the unit is not 100 % aluminum shaded on its front panel, and to tell the truth, it is actually nicely styled.

Much worse, the owner's manual is perhaps the worst-written I have ever encountered. Yes, I realize that this is a multi-dimensional device that has a plethora of user options, but the manual is loaded with scads of near-incoherent large- and small-print sidebars, inserts, and footnotes. It manages to make the simple operations of the unit look much more arcane and complex than they are. It also makes the complex procedures nearly impossible to master without an ultra-careful reading of the more straightforward instructions, provided that you have the ability to ignore some of the idiotic sidebars and fine-print commentaries.

Well, that is not fully true. Sometimes, the only way you can figure out a function is to carefully read those fine-print commentaries and then apply the information in such a way that you discover that the procedure you wanted to do was actually quite easy. Still, I recommend the device to anyone who wants the options it offers and wants to save some shelf space.

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