Boy, is ghost gonna be pissed!

[ghostjmf]

I bought my DTVPal converter boxes in Sears, wherein there were also VCRs on the shelves. Not a lot, & they all were also DVD players, but not DVD recorders.

I'm trying to figure out why you think a DVR would be better than a VCR for making a temporary recording of a show. I'm taping most of this stuff over after I've watched it (every so often there is a keeper, usually on PBS, although I've got the whole of Da Vinci's Inquest on various media; my tapes, my sister's DVD discs, the official disks of year 1 from the show itself, back when I thought they would never be broadcast in the US).


I mean, a recording is a recording is a recording, is it not? And if you're going to record over it, you'd better have recordable-over media, like tape. The reusable discs, & machines to go with them, cost more. Well, maybe not the discs by now, but the machines sure do.

I finally figured out through various web-sites that I don't need new VCRs as long as I'm buying converter boxes. Which I've bought. I will just plug each converter box into its own VCR. When the Change Happens in February (I am beginning to think of this as an event programmed by Ursula LeGuin, not the US Govt; who wrote "When It Changed", anyway; think it was Joanna Russ) my VCRs will be useless as tuners; the converter boxes have built in tuners, & you have to be using them to tune in converted-to-analog stuff. That wasn't clear to me until I read up on the subject. The VCRs will only be recorders.

There are DVD recorders that have converter boxes built into them, with better timers than the DTVPal converter boxes piddling 7-day timers, too. But they cost maybe $280.00.

I figure if by February there is ever a night where I want to be recording 2 programs & watching one "live" (like tonight; L&O-SVU, PBS's Silent Witness & Without a Trace are all going on opposite each other & running new episodes [yeah, I know SVU will rerun on Sat, but I just don't trust the wait]) I will have to have a 3rd converter box, hooked up directly to the TV itself. I guess I will buy one full price at that time. I'm kind of hoping there will be at least one box with a 30-day timer available by then.

[ghostjmf]

And oh yeah; if you mean by DVR instead of DVD recorder, my sister has one that does both; records onto disc (this would be its DVD function) or into memory. It was very expensive about 4 years about, around $700.00. You can also pull stuff out of memory & cut discs.

Unless one of these has dual programming, so that you can pull one program into the disc-cutter while another goes into the memory, what use would it be to me? I don't think even my sister's expensive machine has dual tuners. I should ask.

Also, we found out the hard way that DVRs have a huge drawback:

Say you want to record House tonight at 8:00pm, then record CBS's new show "The Mentalist" at 9:00pm. You only need one recorder for that job, right? Well, if you're using a DVR, it will write the 1st program when that program is over. This takes about 2 minutes. You miss the 1st 2 minutes of the 2nd program, for which it has to tuner-switch to another channel.

If you wanted a 2 hour block of time on one channel, it would wait to write 'til the end, & you wouldn't miss anything. At least that's how my sister's works.

With VCRs, you don't have that "wait while I write what is in the buffer" time lag. I'm told that for some reason (lots of buffering? Smarter design to begin with?) you don't with TiVO you get from your cable co, either. But as far as I know, TiVO is only available to those who have cable. Well, maybe not. I think I saw some standalone TiVO machines, with memory cards, at Sears too.

But if I want to loan someone a copy of a program, I'm sure not going to want to loan them a memory card that they don't have a slot for anywhere on their own equipment. And I would want a guarantee that the TiVO I bought didn't have that "wait while I write from the buffer" lag, either.

[ghostjmf]

I thought the same thing when I bought VCR #2; I thought "why do I need a 2nd DVD player?". So I hunted out a VCR that didn't have one; Sony like the other one, just about $20.00 cheaper. Its a crummier machine, it turns out. Doesn't have a tracking control on the remote, only on the machine itself. Makes wobblier tapes, that need tracking to straighten them out.

When you do find a VCR, you might as well bite the bullet & get one with yet another DVD player. Who knows when you will actually find you need yet another DVD player.

Meanwhile, I have a couple really unreliable VCRs under my couch I would give you for the shipping fee. Even though you have become yet another WWTBAMer who has disparaged me.

[mom2five]

In my case, the DVR I have from Dishnetwork, has 2 channels. so it can record on one or both at the same time. There are no discs, things get saved on the "memory drive" and ours holds 100 hours of programming. I don't have the ability to put things onto a disc for loan to someone else.

I pay a $5 per month fee to use the DVR for recording, it also serves as my receiver for the satelite programming. (It's about the size of a VCR.) I didn't have to buy any equipment.

The main reason I love having the DVR is the ease of recording! I just scan through the onscreen menu for shows I want to record and click a button. Then a screen comes up and gives the option of recording the show just the one time, or every time it comes on, or just new episodes.

Also, when it comes to watching the recording, you can fast forward through the program at different speeds and you can see the content while you're zooming through!

With the DVR also, I can pause "live" TV. If I'm watching something, and the phone rings or ??? I just hit the pause button and my show will wait for me.

I guess that's the end of my commercial! I really don't get paid for promoting this stuff, I just think that you try it you will never go back to "taping"!

[ghostjmf]

But how much does DishNet charge you per month for the satellite feed? After the low-price introductory period wore off?

That's the catch.

Also, $5.00/month is $60.00/year. So in about a year & 3/4, I've exceeded the price of my higher-priced VCR, which does let me make tapes I can lend. Also, I'd need at the very least a system with the capacity to record 2 simultaneous channels while I watch a 3rd. With the "2 VCRs & a set I can watch through its own tuner" I have that now, at no added expense.

[Here's Fanny!]

Thank you all for your great suggestions (and your kind offer, jbg). I have never bothered to check out Craig's List and freecycle, but I might have to do that sometimes.

I think my dilemma is solved. Last night I just took the VCR from downstairs and hooked it up to the upstairs (i.e. taping) television. Which didn't solve the problem of wanting to watch the recorded programs downstairs without a bunch of moving around. But when I was talking to my bro about the hookups he asked me why I didn't just use my double decker one. "Because you told me it was broken." "No, just the upper deck, the lower one still works." Huh. After I finish taping tonight, I'll have to check that out. Although nice little compact player would have been nice, this will accomplish my mission.

PS to Luuucy. Don't you just love estate auctions? I haven't been to one in several years, but I would actually plan my trips to Nebraska around estate auctions.

[Here's Fanny!]

ghost, yes I was speaking of a DVR, not a DVD recorder. The machine your sister has is antiquated and/or much more than just a DVR. For the cost of your two VCR/DVD combos and rickrack, you could get a DVR plus several months of service. But, I'm not going to bother to go into reasoning because it wouldn't matter anyway and mom2five has hit the high points.

When you do find a VCR, you might as well bite the bullet & get one with yet another DVD player. Who knows when you will actually find you need yet another DVD player.

There is no dearth of combo players, but that's not what I wanted.

Meanwhile, I have a couple really unreliable VCRs under my couch I would give you for the shipping fee. Even though you have become yet another WWTBAMer who has disparaged me.

Whatever.

I was merely stating the reason for my title, as I had previously read that you wanted to get two new VCR players along with a bunch of other items to Rube Goldberg a system that would fit your needs. And that I did not question your methods, because you would just give 48506033 reasons why you had to have it that way. And you have filled three or four posts here with some of those reasons, even though I did not solicit them. So how is that disparaging?

That last question was rhetorical.

[mom2five]

But how much does DishNet charge you per month for the satellite feed? After the low-price introductory period wore off?

My DishNetwork bill is about $50 per month, we have service to 3 TV's, but just the basic channels (like 50 of them). It may seem like a lot of $$$ to some people, but it's a good option for us. My mom lives with me, she is 80 years old and disabled, and pretty much confined to a couple of rooms in the house. TV is her "life". She HAS to watch her soaps during the day and she loves WWF, and with DISH we get wrestling many days per week on different channels! (too many IMO!). Plus, stations like TVLand give her some old favorites.

For us it's a necessary luxury.

[secondchance]

I haven't entered the DVR/Tivo world yet. I'm sure that once I do, will never want to go back... but right now I'm happy having the good ol' VCR's hooked up in several rooms; the master bedroom and family room have the VCR/DVD combos.

The main drawback that keeps me from jumping in, is that many nights there are 2 or 3 shows on at the same time, that I wouldn't be able to record simultaneously otherwise. AND, then I have the option of carting the tape to whatever room I'd like to watch it when I find the time to do so... in the den, in bed, in the kitchen while cooking... Sometimes I'll join one of the kids in their room to watch something I've taped for them.

Being tied down to only being able to watch the DVR's shows in the room in which it was recorded keeps me from diving in.

In addition, not looking forward to the added expense of another service.

[Estonut]

I tried to find a DVR but the guy at Future Shop didn't even know what a DVR was! He finally found 2 and explained in broken English I couldn't understand all about how I could put this on my hard drive and a bunch of other stuff. How can I do that when my computer is upstairs and my DVR would be downstairs in the family room?

When I most recently purchased recorders in January, 2007, I got Pioneer DVRs that have a hard-drive in them. You record to the hard drive (like a TiVo), but they also have built-in DVR burners, so you can offload shows to DVD+R. Once I finalize those discs, they will play in any DVD player. Perhaps this is what Mr. Broken English was trying to tell you/sell you.

[secondchance]

I tried to find a DVR but the guy at Future Shop didn't even know what a DVR was! He finally found 2 and explained in broken English I couldn't understand all about how I could put this on my hard drive and a bunch of other stuff. How can I do that when my computer is upstairs and my DVR would be downstairs in the family room?

When I most recently purchased recorders in January, 2007, I got Pioneer DVRs that have a hard-drive in them. You record to the hard drive (like a TiVo), but they also have built-in DVR burners, so you can offload shows to DVD+R. Once I finalize those discs, they will play in any DVD player. Perhaps this is what Mr. Broken English was trying to tell you/sell you.

That sounds like what may be an interesting option for me one day, Esto- I wonder how complicated it would be for a techno-dummy to figure out and manage this type of system, and how long it takes to "burn" each disk?

Will this type of operation work with a cable co-supplied DVR? That would probably be the next step I'd take, if I were to graduate from the VCR...

[mom2five]

Being tied down to only being able to watch the DVR's shows in the room in which it was recorded keeps me from diving in.

That's not true in my case because 2 TV's are hooked up to one DISH receiver/dvr. One on the main floor and one in the basement and both have access to the "menu" of programs that have been saved.

[littlebeast13]

But how much does DishNet charge you per month for the satellite feed? After the low-price introductory period wore off?

My DishNetwork bill is about $50 per month, we have service to 3 TV's, but just the basic channels (like 50 of them). It may seem like a lot of $$$ to some people, but it's a good option for us. My mom lives with me, she is 80 years old and disabled, and pretty much confined to a couple of rooms in the house. TV is her "life". She HAS to watch her soaps during the day and she loves WWF, and with DISH we get wrestling many days per week on different channels! (too many IMO!). Plus, stations like TVLand give her some old favorites.

For us it's a necessary luxury.

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

lb13

[ulysses5019]

But how much does DishNet charge you per month for the satellite feed? After the low-price introductory period wore off?

My DishNetwork bill is about $50 per month, we have service to 3 TV's, but just the basic channels (like 50 of them). It may seem like a lot of $$$ to some people, but it's a good option for us. My mom lives with me, she is 80 years old and disabled, and pretty much confined to a couple of rooms in the house. TV is her "life". She HAS to watch her soaps during the day and she loves WWF, and with DISH we get wrestling many days per week on different channels! (too many IMO!). Plus, stations like TVLand give her some old favorites.

For us it's a necessary luxury.

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

lb13

I don't know but I bet Bigmouth Billy Mays is.

[Rexer25]

My DishNetwork bill is about $50 per month, we have service to 3 TV's, but just the basic channels (like 50 of them). It may seem like a lot of $$$ to some people, but it's a good option for us. My mom lives with me, she is 80 years old and disabled, and pretty much confined to a couple of rooms in the house. TV is her "life". She HAS to watch her soaps during the day and she loves WWF, and with DISH we get wrestling many days per week on different channels! (too many IMO!). Plus, stations like TVLand give her some old favorites.

For us it's a necessary luxury.

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

lb13

I don't know but I bet Bigmouth Billy Mays is.

He's on all of them, and I hear rumors he's started doing internet ads as well.

[ghostjmf]

My sister has the Panasonic combo of hard drive/DVD recorder. It has that drawback I mentioned of writing a show to memory when you switch channels during a recording session; while this is taking place, you lose a few minutes of the show on the new channel. If, of course, you have a VCR also attached to the cable, you can avoid this by recording your show on the new channel via the VCR.

I know these have come down in price, but not far enough.

If you do go for DVR instead of some form of DVD, remember that you can't make discs with it unless it is also in some way hooked up to a disc burner. And you wind up with a little flash drive card instead of a hard drive. Flash card are the in thing these days; I just hope their life is comparable to that of stuff written to discs, because I am about to start archiving computer stuff, & everyone tells me getting it onto flash drives will be easier that on to discs; for one thing, flash drives these days have a lot more storage than do individual discs.

One reluctance I also feel about DVR, above & beyond the "can't cut a disc" feature & the "machine costs around $280.00 if you buy it, instead of renting it from a cable company, which you can't do if you don't want to pay for cable" feature, is that I really don't want some stupid company monitoring what I watch (unless its a ratings service, whereon I could give my favorite shows a vote). However, if cable & DVRs were free, I'd probably take the bait, no matter how hard Big Brother was watching.

[mom2five]

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

Actually I was given the Animaniacs First Season DVD set and I have a 5 disc dvd player so I can put them all in the machine at the same time, hit play and have hours of joy!

My family groans and says "not again"

"Wheel of morality turn, turn, turn, tell us the lesson we must learn..."

[ulysses5019]

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

lb13

I don't know but I bet Bigmouth Billy Mays is.

He's on all of them, and I hear rumors he's started doing internet ads as well.

thats where i bought my avatar genie with a few modifications

[littlebeast13]

Is Animaniacs on any of those channels....?

Actually I was given the Animaniacs First Season DVD set and I have a 5 disc dvd player so I can put them all in the machine at the same time, hit play and have hours of joy!

My family groans and says "not again"

"Wheel of morality turn, turn, turn, tell us the lesson we must learn..."

I loved that show!

Wanna take a guess who my favorite character was..... and that was long before I met Annie on this Bored......

Spoiler

lb13

[mom2five]

I loved that show!
Wanna take a guess who my favorite character was..... and that was long before I met Annie on this Bored......
lb13

Well I'm still pretty new here and I'm not sure how I would know this, but if I had to take a wild guess I'd probably just say...

Slappy Squirrel!

This guess is totally random, I have nothing to base it on!

[ulysses5019]

I loved that show!
Wanna take a guess who my favorite character was..... and that was long before I met Annie on this Bored......
lb13

Well I'm still pretty new here and I'm not sure how I would know this, but if I had to take a wild guess I'd probably just say...

Slappy Squirrel!

This guess is totally random, I have nothing to base it on!

they call that profiling where i come from

[littlebeast13]

I loved that show!
Wanna take a guess who my favorite character was..... and that was long before I met Annie on this Bored......
lb13

Well I'm still pretty new here and I'm not sure how I would know this, but if I had to take a wild guess I'd probably just say...

Slappy Squirrel!

This guess is totally random, I have nothing to base it on!

That would be who is in the Spoiler box!

What's funnier than a cranky old squirrel? Even Annie would have to laugh at her antics.....

lb13

[AnnieCamaro]

What's funnier than a cranky old squirrel? Even Annie would have to laugh at her antics.....

"Cranky squirrel" is redundant.

/:P\

[Evil Squirrel]

What's funnier than a cranky old squirrel? Even Annie would have to laugh at her antics.....

"Cranky squirrel" is redundant.

/:P\

I am not cranky! You do not see me barking at you all the time, or launching federal investigations of how all the junk got in your backyard. I am quite the merry and joyous little creature, and it is not my fault you do not find the humor in the ways in which I entertain myself.....

I'll bet you get even crankier when all my Texas relatives show up. You may be in need of the padded cell down at Stalag Pet Hotel....

[AnnieCamaro]

I am quite the merry and joyous little creature, and it is not my fault you do not find the humor in the ways in which I entertain myself.....

I'll give you this much credit. That sentence is very funny!

/:P\