Need a new machine to read my -R discs

Have you thought about a Panasonic DVD recorder?

Sorry couldn't resist. You might like to consider the Panasonic S35 or Panasonic S75. They got good reviews but, significantly given your upcoming purchase of a DVDR, will play back DVD-RAM disks.

The S35 can be got for ?4 MR (?5 Region 2 Only):
http://www.rgbwap.co.uk/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=1459
...or the S75 for ?15 MR:
http://www.rgbwap.co.uk/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=1653

Actually you might want to ignore that as I've just seen your budget is ?000 and not ?00 :blush:

The Pioneer DV-868AVi would be a good option IMHO (although I'm only 90% sure it can handle VCDs):
http://www.avland.co.uk/pioneer/dv868avi/index.htm

Hi Rasczak. Been reading lots of your posts, it's thanks to you that I'll be buying an E60 so thank you for the advice.

I edited my post, as I meant ?00, sorry :-(

I wasn't aware that you could get a DVD player that would play RAM for under ?00 so I'll check them out.

Thanks again for all your posts in these forums. I've heard that you are off to Japan? Good luck with future ventures mate.

Regards

Dude

I wasn't aware that you could get a DVD player that would play RAM for under ?00 so I'll check them out
The reviews for the two players are online on the What Video (and whatever they are calling themselves this month) site.

The S35 review is here:
http://www.whatvideotv.com/testbench/frame.html?http://www.whatvideotv.com/cgi-bin/displayreview.php?reviewid=2991

The S75 review is here:
http://www.whatvideotv.com/testbench/frame.html?http://www.whatvideotv.com/cgi-bin/displayreview.php?reviewid=2954

I've heard that you are off to Japan?
Yes - for six months (or thereabouts) on work. Over Christmas as well :( But I will be back :grin:

Blimey, I thought it was only me that got up this early :-0

Thanks for saving me the time to hunt down those reviews, I can get on with some work :-)

Regards

Dude

p.s. By the time you return, you can convince us all to get Blu Ray!

Will both these machines take caddied DVD-Ram discs?

Will both these machines take caddied DVD-Ram discs?
Afraid not. You can't get a UK standalone DVD player that will play caddied DVD-RAMs :( You can take caddied media out of it's caddy though (at least Type II media anyway)

But isn't the point of the caddy to protect them? And Type II is 'formulated for specialist commercial applications' according to www.cd-r media.co.uk so I was looking at Type I for 'more general use'. But if Type II is the one that can be opened then so be it.

As if it wasn't confusing enough...

The S75 is ?15 at Richer Sounds, will be getting one at the weekend (if the missus is in a good mood...)

But isn't the point of the caddy to protect them?
Yes - in an ideal world (IMHO) all media would be caddied. Panasonic, JVC and Toshiba disagree.

And Type II is 'formulated for specialist commercial applications' according to www.cd-r media.co.uk
No it's not. A Type II disk can just be taken out the caddy. Sometimes such disks can be 'protected' for non-caddied use (such as the Panasonic non-caddied disks) but it's not a requirement of it being a "Type 2" disk.

As if it wasn't confusing enough...
We haven't even started talking about DVD-RAM Types 5 through to 9 yet! :grin:

So, as I will be buying the E60 primarily to record my camcorder footage, I need to be sure about this. I can dump my entire camcorder footage onto a Type II DVD-Ram disk. I then play it back on a S75 and edit it on another Type II DVD-Ram disk. Once I'm happy with it, I play that disk on my S75 and finalise it to a DVD-R disk.

Does that make sense? Do I make sense?

And yes, I could buy an HS2 to do all that but let's not go down that road :-#

So, as I will be buying the E60 primarily to record my camcorder footage, I need to be sure about this. I can dump my entire camcorder footage onto a Type II DVD-Ram disk. I then play it back on a S75 and edit it on another Type II DVD-Ram disk. Once I'm happy with it, I play that disk on my S75 and finalise it to a DVD-R disk.
Well yes you could do it that way or you could do it in stages. One example:

Say you have 2 hours of footage but you want to edit and only archive say 1.5 hours. The edits you want to make are equally spaced throughout the recording.

You copy 1 hour of your camcorder footage to DVD-RAM in XP mode. You edit (using "Partial Erase") taking the recording down to 45mins. You put the disk in the S75 and set the recording mode to Flexible Record set at 1hr 30mins and copy the recording onto DVD-R. Do not finalise the disk at this stage. Remove the DVD-R from the E60.

Now record the final 1 hour of camcorder footage onto the DVD-RAM disk in XP mode. Edit as required (again taking it down to 45 minutes). Play in the S75 with the E60 recording onto DVD-R in FR set to 45 minutes. Finalise the DVD-R.

With regard to the DVD-RAM disks you buy - as you'll be using them with the S75 I suggest you go primarily for non-caddied disks as these have a 'protection layer' that caddied disks do not have (at least major brand ones do).

dude1971 - I hope my post above makes some sort of sense to you. Believe me it will once you've used the E60 a bit!

I've copied this into a Word document for future use, I'll let you know how I get on. I'm sure it will make sense when I do my first edit.

Thanks again Rasczak

Regards

Dude

p.s. Noticed a very similar conversation you are having on another thread, so it seems I'm not the only one thinking about doing it this way!

Noticed a very similar conversation you are having on another thread, so it seems I'm not the only one thinking about doing it this way!
No your not the only one doing this. I've had a couple of dozen people ask me how to do this.

Just to point out the obvious I suggest when you get the machine you do a number of test recordings - play a RAM on your S75 and recording onto another RAM on your E60. This will avoid you wasting any DVD-Rs until your happy how the machine works etc.

1 final question, as I'll be calling Richer Sounds when they open this morning, what cables do I use to connect the 2 machines? A quality scart or something else?

Cheers

Dude

what cables do I use to connect the 2 machines?
Yes a good quality Scart will ensure you get the most out of it. QED offers a good compromise between quality and cost. The RGB Scart output on the S35/75 can then be connected to the RGB input (AV2) on the E50/60.

Some people who go this route prefer to just connect the S35/75 to the E50/60 when copying DVD-RAMs, others prefer a permament connection. A system setup for the latter would be:

Sky TV Out > 2Into1 Switcher > AV2 E50
S35/75 Out > 2Into1 Switcher > AV2 E50

This would obviously involve purchase of a 2 Into 1 Switch box from a place such as Lektropacks:
http://www.lektropacks.co.uk/