Liteon DVD Recorder - Buyer Beware!
Written: Mar 28 '06 (Updated May 24 '08)
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Pros: Cheap! Does both + and - format DVD's. Easy to use.
Cons: It's now started re-formating my non-finalized in-progress DVDs --- Aghhh!!!!
The Bottom Line: This was such a great idea -- and then it started screwing up my half-finished non-finalized DVDs! Aghhh!!!
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| graphics_guy's Full Review: Lite On LVW-1107HC1 DVD Recorder |
See my most recent update at the bottom!
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I had been waiting/watching for an inexpensive DVD recorder, that supported both the + and - formats, to archive my favorite shows & music videos from my Tivo.
This seems to be the perfect unit for me :)
I bought it at BestBuy on sale for $99 - it is a very small compact unit, it does both the + and - formats, and it has the inputs & outputs I wanted.
Here's exactly how I'm using it...
My directv Tivo has 2 sets of the 3-rca-plug outputs (red & white stereo sound, and yellow for video). I ran one set of outputs directly to my TV, and the other set of outputs to my DVD Recorder (DVDR), and then I ran my DVDR's outputs to my TV (one thing to note here is that this input is not the DVDR's default - you have to press the 'source' button on the remote to have it use this input rather than the default one ... you only have to do this once, and it remembers). Now I can watch Tivo directly on my TV without having to power up the DVDR, or I can watch what's playing on my DVDR and/or monitor what the DVDR is recording.
There are a lot of VCR-like features I don't use on the VCR (such as the stuff that lets you tune in channels, and set it up to record certain channels at certain times - I use my Tivo to do all that, so no need to use the DVDR for that).
So, first I record all my shows onto my Tivo.
Then, I insert a recordable DVD into the DVDR, and it prepares/formats it pretty quickly the first time I insert a new disk, and is ready to go. I press the button on the DVDR remote to turn on the little status bar at the top edge of the screen so I can see what mode it's in (don't worry - this only shows up on the screen, and not in the recordings).
Then I start playing what I want to record on my Tivo,
and press the red "record" button on the DVDR remote.
At the end of the show, I press the square "stop" button
on the DVDR remote.
At this point you're basically done :)
You can remove the disk, and put it back in later and record more stuff, or play what you've already recorded. If you want to play it on another DVD player, then you'll probably have to "finalize" the disk (once you do this, then you can't record anything else onto it).
If you're like me, and like to put lots of different things on a DVD, then you'll want to input some short names for each thing you record... Just press the "menu" button, and you'll see numbered thumbnails for each thing you recorded (the thumbnail picture is just the first frame of the recording). Use the arrows to navigate to the thumbnail you want to rename, and press the 'edit' button, and select 'rename' on the screen. Then enter a short name using the on-screen keyboard, and then save/finish out of that screen.
Let me re-iterate - I was very happy that it allows me to eject a DVD before finishing it, and I can put it back in later and play it, or add more to it. (This works out *very* well for me, because I have a half-dozen DVD's I'm compiling my favorite music videos on, one DVD for each kind of music :)
This unit is cheap and bare-bones (aka easy to use).
The only limitations I have seen so far are that you can't change the thumbnail picture (it's always the first frame of the video), and you can't re-order the thumbnails. Of course, if it let you do that, then it would have to have a more complex user-interface, and would therefore be harder to use :)
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Easter 2006 Update:
I'm still happy with the unit, but after using this dvd recorder for a while, I've bumped into a few problems I wanted to share...
1 - After spending several days picking-choosing-recording about 30 of my favorite music videos from TV (each one as a separate start/stop, and getting it's own thumbnail in the menu), and recording them onto dvd, I wasn't paying close attention and the dvd ran out of space. It gave me the message that the final video I was recording couldn't be recorded - that was fine. I then went back and started putting titles on the 30-or-so music videos that were on the dvd. Sometime in here, the dvd recorder "froze up". I waited a long time, and it was totally unresponsive, and I finally had to power off the dvd recorder to be able to eject the dvd. After that, the Liteon could not read this dvd anymore - 3 days of work lost! :\
2 - The "thumbnail/menu" system on these dvd's seems to be some "non-standard" thing, and it seems to confuse the dvd players on my computer (the menu's work fine when played in a "real" dvd player, but the menu's don't work on the computer). My computer is a Sony VAIO RC210G (brand new, latest/greatest). When I try to play these Liteon-created dvd's with Windows Media Player, I can play the dvd, and I can click on the tracks by number, but the menu/thumbnail/title stuff does not work. WinDVD is a little worse - the menu does not work, and also I can't use the "next" button - (I can only use the "fast forward" button).
3 - These Liteon-created dvd's are *very difficult* to copy! I tried Easy CD & DVD creator 6, and it "hung" every time, towards the end of copying the dvd. I tried Easy CD & DVD creator 7, and about 10 minutes into the copy it gets a non-descript 'error'. I finally got a copy of DVD-Cloner III (typically used to make a backup copy of store-bought movies), and when I tried the default copy it only got the thumbnail/menu stuff - when I tried doing a custom cd, all my music videos show up twice(?) - I can select the first copy of them and make a dvd copy, but it is only the music videos (no menu/thumbnails). Quite frustrating (after "losing" 3 days of work, I definitely want to make a backup copy of the dvd's I make, but that's proving very difficult).
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May 2006 Update:
Well, I've finally figured out the "trick" to copying
these DVD's on my Windows XP Media Center Edition computer.
Although this Sony Vaio is supposed to support both
DVD+R and DVD-R, I was trying to use DVD-R and running
into all these troubles copying these DVD's created in
the Lite-on.
A friend of mine was able to copy the DVD's with no problem
on her very similar computer -- I noticed that she was
using DVD+R's. So, I bought a pack of DVD+R's and my pc
is able to copy the Lite-on-created DVD's just fine.
So, all the trouble/headache I was having seems to be
with the Sony Vaio (or more likely the Windows XP Media
Center Edition operating system), rather than the
Lite-on. (After knowing what to look for, I did some
web searches and found that others were having similar
problems with DVD-R's on Windows XP MCE).
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August 2006 Update:
Most of my previous recordings were music videos, which
didn't really show the person's mouth moving a lot (mostly
artsy video stuff), so I hadn't noticed this problem until
just now, but after recording some comedy sketches that
have a lot of talking, and show the actor's mouth, I
notice that the sound and video is slightly off.
Once you notice this problem, and start looking for it,
it becomes quite annoying! ;) Therefore, bumping the
sound quality down 1 from what I had it previously set
(although not sure whether to call this the sound, or
the video problem, eh!?)
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July 2007 update: This dvd recorder is still working well.
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Spring 2008 update:
Aghhh!!! I've got several DVD's that I've been working on
for many many months (recording various 4-minute music
video, and comedy clips), and now every time I put one of
these non-finalized DVDs into this unit, it *reformats*
them! All that work ... *lost*!
I can start a new DVD, and it works fine - but these that
I've been working on for a long time (some over a year)
the unit just reformats them.
Now I definitely no longer recommend this unit.
Stay away from it - aghhh!!!
Recommended:
No
Amount Paid (US$): 99
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Epinions.com ID:
graphics_guy
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Reviews written: 35
Trusted by: 3 members
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