RCA SCENIUM Digital Media Recorder with DVD Player (DRS7000N)
Not as bad an experience as other reviewers
I bought this to replace a Phillips DVD/VCR combination that wasn't even playing Disney discs properly.  I am much happier with the Scenium than I was with the Phillips.  The picture it records off my satellite dish is very crisp and it plays all my DVDs, even the ones that the Philips unit wouldn't touch. It also handles them more quickly. I am happy with the way it plays MP3s burned to a CD, especially audio books.  I like the way I can show my digital pictures on the screen in a slideshow format too, as that was something I had hoped to do with a DVD player someday.<br />I have DirectTV like many of the other reviewers.  I too went to Scenium technical support, and they were very willing to help me. They thought the problem was with Direct TV but didn't know the details, and steered me in that direction. Direct TV admitted that the features on the Scenium like channel changing and recording while watching another channel(as well as using the PIP feature on your TV) requires their additional service (I forget the name of it) for $9.99 per month.  Since I believe I should only have to pay for a signal once, I declined. I can record what I want if I leave the Direct TV box on and set it to the channel that I want to record.  That isn't any different than I was doing with the Phillips, but the recorded picture is so superior that I feel like it's an improvement. I suspect any DVD recorder I might have gotten instead of this unit would have created the same issues, because the problem is with Direct TV. I understand that a person could easily argue that one should not have to live with these limitations, but I've decided it's okay with me.