Pioneer DVR-533H-S Slim Design DVD Recorder with 80 GB Hard Disk Drive
A good DVR but a few design flaws
This is the first DVR I've ever bought and I'm definitely glad I got a DVR unit with a hard drive instead of just a DVR.  Although this unit has some impressive features, I do have some mixed feelings about it.   <br /> <br />The main drawback is that it downloads TV Guide data very slowly and therefore the hard drive clatters away 20 hours a day, every day.  I was so irritated with the incessant noise that I almost returned it.  What's frustrating is that there's no way to deactivate the TV Guide feature so that you can eliminate the constant hard drive chatter (albeit requiring you to record all shows manually) - a baffling omission.  As I learned on the web, though, there's a workaround for this problem:  input a fictitious Canadian Zip Code during setup and then always have the recording timer set.  This eliminates the TV Guide feature so there's no more disk chatter -- problem solved.   <br /> <br />I do a lot of video editing and my main concern isn't features but picture quality.  This DVR allows you to vary the video quality, and thus, recording capacity, over a very wide range.  The highest quality setting is known as \\"XP+\\" which I use exclusively.  With its 80GB capacity, the hard drive's capacity is about 11 hours at the XP+ setting.  On a scale of 1 to 10, with VHS (SP) = 4, SVHS/Hi8 = 6, and the source video = 10, I'd give the XP+ quality an 8. There's little noise but a fair bit of digital noise reduction, even at the lowest NR setting.  I wish this unit offered a higher video quality setting, even at the expense of a shorter recording capacity.  Video copied from the HD to a DVD is a bit degraded from the original HD video, even at the highest quality setting.  But not to be an alarmist, and to put it in perspective, if you think VHS, SVHS or Hi8 video quality is very good, then you'll think that the video quality of this unit is outstanding - it's not perfect, but it's very close. <br /> <br />Two other minor quibbles:  There's no apparent way to stop a timed recording that's in progress.  Second, while I'm glad this unit has a firewire jack, allowing you to copy digital camcorder video to the HD, I wish the jack offered output as well as input.  This would allow you to capture TV video through the unit to a computer hard drive, if desired, allowing a higher quality of video capture than what this unit offers. <br /> <br />It's a good unit and I'm glad I got it, but I'm looking forward to the next version with the suggested fixes above.  With these caveats in mind, I'd recommend it. <br />