Electronics Toshiba DR560 1080p Upconverting DVD Recorder with Built-in Tuner
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Rating: - Smooth operator, with excellent future upgradability!
My Story - :-)

I bought the D-R560 before the Olympics to replace my Goldstar VCR, which had served me well for over 16 years of frequent usage. The VCR's clutch went out, then the belt, and when the encoder went bad, I figured it would be too expensive to fix it. Besides, digital broadcasting was about to replace the traditional analog broadcasting, and my Sharp TV, also another workhorse entering its 11th year, was still as good as when I bought it. When I bought the Toshiba D-R560 from Amazon.com, I was looking for another workhorse to serve me for at least the next decade, while being compatible with the new standards. I certainly found what I was looking for.

The Connections -

My input/output requirements were a minimum of 1 S-video input, to connect with my computer's video card, and a set of composite outputs to connect to my TV, as back then, composite video (RCA video) input/outputs were the most common. My requirements were quite simple then, but I did not realize how many more high-quality features the D-R560 actually contained until I bought the HDTV. Anyway, for the time, my little ingeneous master-plan of connecting the TV and the computer worked well. Muahahahaha!

Anyway, let's get back to the connection features. Just recently, I bought a SONY 720p HDTV. No, I didn't buy it to show off. I am not that type. :-P Those crystal clear images of super-models on a flat-screen HDTV must have somehow influenced me or something. Kidding, kidding! But I certainly appreciate the clarity of HDTVs. BTW, the 11-year-old SHARP TV is working well as the backup/bedroom TV, hooked up to a digital video converter. Getting back to my story, again, :-). The D-R560 offers four alternative TV connections to composite video (the yellow RCA jack). In the order of good to better quality, they are antenna-out, S-Video, component (red, green, and blue split into individual signals), and HDMI (digital audio/video interface). For component-out, it offerred the progressive scan output options. At the time of this posting, I am using its component output set-up with progressive scan on the HDTV. The picture quality is excellent. Since my SONY TV also comes with HDMI inputs, I am looking forward to trying out the HDMI option when I receive the HDMI cable I ordered from a seller at Amazon.com. Not only would using the HDMI cable provide better quality images, it would also take care of the audio, which means, I can get away with using only one cable for both audio and video instead of five (three RCAs for the component video and two RCAs for the left and right audio). Besides, the D-R560's HDMI interface also offers the amazing Dolby digital dts output. Nice!

The Recording -

In my VCR days, I had three video recording options. The short play, SP, the long play, LP, and the Extended Play, EP. If you are not familiar with VCR recording speeds, here is the skinny on it. On a standard two-hour VHS tape, SP lets you record up to two hours of recording with the best video and audio your VCR can provide. LP lets you record up to four hours, and EP - up to six hours on a similar VHS tape. When I bought my D-R560, I wanted to have the same flexibility as the VHS tape, but with the DVD R/RW disc instead. To my pleasant surprise, the D-R560 comes with a comparable feature. In fact, the D-R560 actually offers five-modes of recording, two more than my belated VCR. Better yet, the worst quality (NTSC quality) it can record is actually the best quality the VCR was able to record. The modes are as follows.

XP: Maximum recording time is about an hour on a 4-GB DVD R/RW. Supports Dolby digital audio, and provides the highest recording quality.
SP: Maximum recording time is about two-hours on a similar disc.
LP: Maximum recording time is about four-hours on a similar disc.
EP: Maximum recording time is about six-hours on a similar disc.
SLP: Maximum recording time is about eight-hours on a similar disc. This modes provides the lowest video recording quality out of the five. This is the same quality as the NTSC quality to which we have been quite satisfied all this time until recently when all of us got spoilt with high-definition.

Here is my favorite part about the D-R560. I can use a regular single-layer 4-gigabyte (4-GB) DVD rewritable disc for my everyday recordings, over and over and over again to record my favorite shows for viewing at a later time. When the disc gets full, I can either erase the disc which is as easy as a few quick menu steps, or I can erase only the shows that I no longer want. The selective deletion option is quite nice. Not to go too far into it, here is how it basically works. Whenever the D-R560 completes a recording operation, it creates a title, with a little preview in the top menu, which allows you to easily access the partilular recording and play it back without having to fast-forward or rewind through the entire disc. It does it on both timer recordings and manual recordings. The new title with its little preview appends to the existing title and its preview. Each title can be deleted separately in any order to make room on the disc without affecting the other existing titles. The D-R560 also lets the user rename the titles. As long as the rewritable disc has not been finalized, the editing is possible. If the disc has been finalized, it doesn't mean that it is the end of that precious rewritable disc. The D-R560 lets you format it and use it again. Of course, that is if the disc is still physically capable.

The Verdict -

Anyway, this has been my review of the Toshiba D-R560. I hope that this information has been helpful in doing your research in shopping for DVD recorders and such. I am very happy with my D-R560. I recommend this product to anyone, who is looking for a well engineered, easy-to-use, good-quality product, with future upgradability in mind. Toshiba has done a very good job on this particular model.

Useful Advise -

By the way, to hook it up in accordance with what seems to be the latest factory recommended configurations, accross many brands, I would recommend to also purchase an antenna splitter and an extra TV antenna coaxial cable to split the antenna/cable input into two identical coaxial lines. This way one can be connected to the TV and the other to the D-R560. After that, connect the TV to the D-R560 using one of the five available (actually four, since the TV's antenna input would not be available anymore) options that I previously mentioned, somewhere in my story.

Happy Shopping!

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Rating: - Why not more units like this?
In Feb., millions of VCR's in homes with over-the-air reception will become useless. Am I wrong to think that the electronics industry is missing huge market for DVR's or DVD recorders (like this one) or even VCR's with digital tuners? I bought this unit to be able time shift and archive programs and, after a month, I am pretty happy with it. It has functioned flawlessly and offers a lot of options. Visually, the unit is non-intrusive. The instruction manual is one of the best I've seen in my 50+ years of buying electronics.

Here are some gripes, primarily regarding the remote:
- You can't de-select subsidiary channels (ie, 44-3) from the scanner list while leaving other sub-channels in place (ie, 44-1, 44-2);
- You have to go into a multi-step menu to accomplish some simple tasks, such as switching closed-captions on & off and setting the sleep timer;
- The commercial-skip button feels like it's in the wrong place, should be right of 'Play';
- the presence of an analog tuner is just going to be a nuisance;

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Rating: - my rating of this fine Toshiba product.
This Toshiba dvd player has high quality with an excellent picture. I would recommend it as a buy item. Joe Ozeck-Pa.

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Rating: - Toshiba DR560 DVD Recorder Review (with tuner)
Toshiba DR560 1080p Upconverting DVD Recorder with Built-in TunerGreat value for the money; reasonable price for a dvd recorder with a tuner. Good performance so far, and the menu is easy to navigate. However, any programming will be lost if there's a power outage although the time and date will resume. I recommend the rewritable CD's as it is easy to record over what was previously recorded. There are too many steps to take to accomplish basic functions of the unit; it could have been made simplier. However, overall this is an excellent product.