Sony RDR-HX900 DVD Recorder with 160 GB Hard Disk Recorder
Great For A Large VHS to DVD Conversion Project!
About a year and a half ago, I purchased Sony's first DVD recorder, the GX7.  I have been very satisfied with it and it has let me burn about 200+ discs with almost no problems (see my review of the GX7).  However, the GX7 does not have a hard drive and when I wanted to eliminate commercials from programs for archival purposes, I had to actually watch the program and hit the pause button at the breaks.  I was hoping Sony would come out with a recorder with a hard drive which would allow me to edit out commercials without having to watch the entire program (this primarily relates to old sporting events and shows I have on VHS tapes).  With its new HX900 model, I have gotten my wish. <br /> <br /> The HX900 has a massive 160GB hard drive which will allow me to record a lot of programs.  It also has six recording qualities (1, 1.5, 2, 3, 4 and 6 hour).  I usually use the 1, 1.5 and 2 hour modes depending on the program I want to record, but I have actually used and been satisfied with the 3 hour mode as well (but not with the 4 hour mode, picture quality degrades significantly and I assume is even worse in 6 hour mode).  For my VHS to DVD conversion, I'll pop in a tape in my VCR and set the HX900 timer to record for however long the program is on the VHS tape (with usually a little extra time).  Then I'll step away from the machine and let the show record to the hard drive.  Later, I'll use the editing function (the \\"A - B Erase\\" function) to eliminate unwanted elements of the programs (i.e. commercials, halftime shows for football games).  I'd say it takes about 10 minutes of editing for every hour of programming, which I hope to reduce with experience.  After I'm done editing, I'll dub to DVD+R discs (the unit accepts DVD+RW, DVD-R and DVD-RW, as well) at the same quality as I recorded the program to the hard drive.  This allows for a \\"Fast\\" dubbing where a 2 hour program can be burned to disk in about 10 minutes.  If you try to mix recording qualities, it takes much longer to dub.  I've already converted about 15 of my 175 tape VHS collection to DVD since I got the unit at Christmas and hope to be done converting all of them by the end of the year, something I wouldn't have been able to do with the GX7 (I wouldn't have the patience).  The time saved justifies the premium price of the unit in my book. <br /> <br /> I do have some gripes.  Unless you use the \\"VR\\" recording mode, all edits must be made on the original program on the hard drive (in other words, you can't record a program on the hard drive and then make edits without affecting that program).  So if you've been editing a program and then you make a mistake and accidentally edit something out you didn't want to, you are out of luck.  You'll either have to rerecord the program to the hard drive (assuming the source was a VHS program or a Tivo program you had saved).  But if it is recorded directly from cable to the hard disk and you make an error, sorry, you'll have to hope for the program to come on again.  I have decided that if I have a program that I know I want to archive, I'll record it to the hard drive, but I'll also record it to my Tivo unit, so I have a backup just in case I screw up in editing the hard drive copy (the quality is better with a direct record to the hard drive than recording from Tivo, but at least I'll have something).  \\"VR\\" mode allows you to keep the original program on disk and to make the edits on DVD, but discs burned this way cannot be played on other DVD players whereas disks I create my way can be played on other players after they are finalized.  I think this makes VR mode implausible for archiving purposes (what if your HX900 breaks, there is no guarantee that you'll be able to play your discs again). <br /> <br /> I also don't care for the TV Guide programming guide that is built into the program because the DVD recorder has to be shut off in order to download the guide (I route all my electronics through it to get to the TV, so turning it off makes it impractical (I just use Tivo as my guide and manually record to the DVD recorder).  If you do get the guide downloaded, it only shows two half-hour blocks on the screen, plus only about  of my cable channels, so there is lots of scrolling.  Not a big selling point for me. <br /> <br /> All-in-all, I'm happy with the HX900.  Yeah, it would be great if it were $200 to $300 cheaper, but that's still some time away.  I think the time I'll save in converting stuff to DVD will be great. <br />