Panasonic DMR-EZ47VK DVD Recorder
The panasonic dmr-EZ47VK ($330 Buy Now) can be thought of as a digital video Swiss Army knife. It has a built in ATSC tuner, DVD recording capability, VHS Playback and dubbing, and its an upconverting DVD player (up to 1080p via HDMI) to boot. So with all this capability we were excited when the unit showed up at the home offices of the HT Guys. On paper this device was too good to be true. So how did it fare in the real world?
ATSC Tuner
The unit comes with a built in ATSC tuner which will make your current TV ready for the analog cutoff. That is if over the air is how you are getting your current TV signals. More likely its not but its still nice to know that you can record those beautiful digital signals in their pristine quality. However, while the player is able pick up the digital HDTV signal it has no way to record them in 720p or 1080i. But what you get is a very clean 480p (DVD quality) signal recorded to a DVD. An area of disappointment though is if you are want this device to act as an HDTV source for your HD Ready TV you are out of luck. The player won't pass an HD signal through to the TV. We thought it was odd that the ATSC tuner does not support an Electronic Program Guide. Although the interface is straight forward to use, it makes setting up recordings a bit more like the old VCRs. You really never know you recorded what you want until you see it on the screen.
DVD Playback (Upconverting Performance)
We evaluated the picture with both objective and subjective tests. For the objective tests we used the HQV DVD from Silicon Optix. We connected the player to our Mitsubishi WD-65831 and set the player to output 1080p via the HDMI cable. We found that the player did a great job with the Color Bar test and a decent job with the Jaggies. The jaggies test evaluates the players capabilities of dealing with moving objects. Detail Enhancement, Noise Reduction and Motion Adaptive tests were a bit too difficult for this player but it did a great job with 3:2 detection. Overall the DMR-EZ47VK is a decent upconverting DVD player. Definitely an improvement over a standard DVD player.
Because the HQV disc is set up to stress the DVD players capabilities, we also wanted to take a look at how this player performed with regular movies. Here we pulled out our old standbys, Blackhawk Down and Spiderman 2 Superbit. The player did an excellent job with these movies. The night scope vision scenes did not appear grainy and detail was highly visible in dark scenes. Spiderman 2 looked incredible! We can't wait for the Spiderman 3. Digital audio, both Dolby Digital and DTS, was transmitted via the HDMI cable. So one cable brought both video and audio to the receiver. The whole chain, (Mitsubishi DLP, Panasonic DVD Recorder, and Aperion Speakers) looked and sounded fantastic. We forgot that the player was a DVD Recorder with upconversion capability. Overall, we were very pleased with the playback of DVDs on the panasonic sc.
VHS Playback and Dubbing
If you have boxes of old videos that you recorded of the kids and are looking for a way to transfer and store them in a digital format then this product if for you. Saving your child's school play for future generations is as simple as inserting the video tape and blank DVD-R and hitting a single button. This also works for copying DVDs to a blank VHS Tape. Can you still find those in stores ;-) ? The recorder supports almost all recordable disc formats including dual layer discs.
DVD Recording
The player has four recording modes that come with a good mix of capacity to quality considerations. The highest quality mode (XP) can record one hour of video on a single layer disc. The longest record times are achieved in EP mode with up to 8 hours of recording. Dual-layer discs are supported and almost double these values. The unit also supports SP and LP modes. All recordings can be watched on the player via a "Recordings" menu item that has a thumbnail interface with motion. To watch your recordings on a standard DVD player the disc needs to be finalized which can take up to fifteen minutes. Something to consider when playing back a widescreen recording on the DMR-EZ47VK is the image is displayed in the proper aspect ratio. But when you play it back on another upconverting DVD player the image is squished to a 4:3 aspect ratio. You would then need to adjust your TVs settings to stretch the picture back to 16:9.
Video quality is is a function of the recording mode. In the longest playing mode (EP) the quality is quite degraded as compared to XP mode. Recorded HD looked OK but it was easy to see that the picture was not HD. If you are used to watching HD you will see a definite quality loss in what you are used to watching. But with that said, the digital picture was better than any SD picture we could come up with. Dubbed VHS tapes looked as good as they could considering the source.
Other Considerations
The player has a SD slot but its only good for viewing pictures. The DVD player supports DIVX. From the Panasonic Website: Official DivX Certified product. Plays all versions of DivX video (including DivX6) with standard playback of DivX media files. The player will also playback CD Audio and mp3s. And finally, the unit supports EZ Sync HDAVI Control so you can connect your DVD player to your Panasonic components and control them with one touch of your remote control. The last thing we want to cover is the menu system and remote control. The Menu system is a bit complex and not intuitive to traverse. The remote had allot of buttons and you really had to search for the buttons you needed. But its understandable when you consider how many functions this product does. We just wanted to point out that you will need to spend some time with the player to familiarize yourself with it to get the most out of it.
The good news is now there's a dedicated page on the Redbox website for finding kiosks stocked with $1.50/night rental Blu-ray discs, but the bad news is... we can't find one anywhere near our zip code. Apparently if we did live on such hallowed ground, it would even point out recent Blu-ray movies added to the kiosks making the decision to watch Matt Damon in The Green Zone tonight as easy as possible. Hit the source link to begin your own search for high definition movies, hopefully it turns out better than ours so far.
In keeping with plans to re-release two of its 14 classics each year, trailers on the Blu-ray edition of James & the Giant Peach reveal The Lion King (Diamond Edition) and Alice in Wonderland (Special 60th Anniversary Edition) will arrive in high definition next year. No real word on specs yet, but we'd expect to see the same care taken in remastering and restoring the audio and video to its highest quality that's been seen on previous releases. HighDefDiscNews has plenty of screengrabs and the two trailers (embedded after the break) so now with plenty of advance warning you can get the kids ready (or have them, if necessary) in preparation for 2011's obligatory combo pack purchase.
Nipping at the heels of announcements by Panasonic and Samsung, LG has just revealed that its first batch of 600Hz active-shutter 3D Plasmas, the 50" 50PX950 and 60" 60PX950, will soon be available in Korea for the price of $2500 and $4200, respectively. Measuring a svelte 1.2 inches wide, these sets will feature DLNA support, an USB port, and access web content from sources like YouTube and Picasa. Of course for those who can't stomach the agony of needing a physical ethernet or USB cable to access media, the Art Cinema DP1 WiFi multimedia player also announced in tandem by LG should spare you. Likened to a set-top DivX box minus the wires -- though it looks more like a blade in our opinion, the device will stream online content from the usual suspects as well as a laundry list of video files formats stored on your network, even in 1080p. Pricing and release details on this accessory, however, are still anyone's guess, and by the stern look on that model's face, mum's the word. Check out more images of the gear below. 
Ready to climb Mount Fuji and see what the next top Japanese TV will look like? Toshiba has just outed its trio of flag-bearing displays for this fall: the Cell Regza Slim 55XE2 and 46XE2, and the full-bloodied 55X2. Inch-based dimensions are already given in their model names, but you'll also want to know they offer 240Hz refresh rates, 1,000 nits of brightness and 9,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratios on the chunkier X2 (augmented with local backlight dimming), and a 2D-to-3D conversion technology that'll translate your stale old 2D imagery into bodacious triple dimensionality. You're also keeping the 3 terabytes of storage and the capability of time-shifting up to eight channels at a time from the older model, though you're no longer limited to a hard cap of 26 hours per channel. Connectivity is also rich, with options for DLNA and/or up to eight HDDs, while jacking in a Blu-ray recorder will permit you to record straight to the optical media the same way you can do to the Regzas' own storage. All these goodies won't come cheap, however, as the flagship 55X2 will retail for a well-rounded million Yen ($11,430) in late October, to be preceded by its Slim siblings with prices of ¥700,000 ($8,000) for the 55-inch and ¥600,000 ($6,858) for the 46-inch earlier that month. Full press release after the break.
Panasonic's not letting us know exactly how cheap it's going with the new DMP-BDT100 Blu-ray player, but with an existing lineup that starts at $399 for the DMP-BDT300 it's not hard to see why it would need a mainstream option to compete with Samsung, Sony and the rest. The DMP-BDT100 still promises high quality playback and Viera Cast features including Netflix, Amazon VOD and Pandora access, but it does it in a smaller, energy efficient package as Panasonic's first single-HDMI out 3D Blu-ray player. It will ship in August, but we'll have to wait for any pricing info or possible new Blu-ray 3D pack-in deals (c'mon Avatar.) Press release and one more pic from HDTV.com.pl are after the break.