Panasonic DMR-E80H Progressive-Scan DVD Player/Recorder with Hard Drive , Silver
Great Profits for Panasonic, Ripoff for Users
Bought this a little over 2 years ago.  2 months after one-year warrantee expired, it crashed and had to be rebuilt from scratch (motherboard and harddrive).  Lost 15 items stored on harddrive.  Now, it's acting up again, with jerky picture recording to HD and washed-out picture (b/w or color), which ends watching or saving to disc clear, fluid picture. <br /> <br />Still plays DVDs OK, but am not wasting more money on another new set of inner workings, and I need the HD recording to work properly for massive VHS archiving program (10% done only).   <br /> <br />Incomprehensible user's manual refers you from page to page to complete one process, relies on cartoons combined with tektok, arrows pointing every which way.   <br /> <br />Edit function always poor, clips more sound than picture and is erratic about cutting at exact \\"frame\\" you've positioned to begin or end the edit, thus giving jerky visual cut at times and always unwanted sound fadeouts/word loss.   <br /> <br />Complaints to Panasonic result in the razzberry - caveat emptor - rather than a refund, altho one tech did admit that HD crashing is common.  For $50, this might be OK to play with for a year, but not for over $400 and with major archiving work to use it for.  Positive reviews should be taken as likely from users who've just set it up; when it works, is a fun toy for technokiddies, but it's just not built to work beyond a year.  This complaint echo'd here, at epinions.com, and elsewhere.   <br /> <br />I'm thru with Panasonic altogether after this one; out around $900 with repairs (insides rebuilding) included and it only feels like they've taken the money and thumbed their corporate nose at me.