I'm a bit confused, so straighten me out.

A 'DVR' (e.g. like Tivo) records onto a hard-drive (in real-time).

Whereas, a 'DVD-recorder' is similar to a DVD-player (e.g. in a home-
theater system)
but is one that can also record (onto DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, and DVD-
RAM), right?

So, such a 'DVD-recorder' unit is (exactly?) like the 'DVD-burner' in
my computer, right?

The final bottom line question is: Is such a 'DVD-recorder' (and DVD-
burner in computer)
capable of burning fast enough to capture a live TV-broadcast in real-
time (just like I
might do using an old VHS (tape) recorder?)

TIA...

Dave

On 3/05/2007, David H. Cook posted this:
:-)

Partly. You left out DVD+RW. However, most devices can not record onto
all five of these modes. Be sure to know what is listed for the device
you choose...

No. The record/playback deck itself is much like the burner in your
computer, but the rest of the box provides the infrastructure to enable
the functions that the particular device supports. So the device is
more like a computer with a burner than just a burner.

Well, yes, of course (unless it lacks a tuner). That is, after all,
what they are sold (and advertised) to do :-)

Some devices also have a hard drive, adding flexibility and complexity
to the equation. Those can record on either the HD or the optical
media, and can also in some measure copy stuff from optical to magnetic
disks and vice versa.

Download and read the manual for anything you are thinking of buying.
It'll scare you out of a year's growth, unless you find better manuals
than I ever have, but it should answer all your questions (and you
should do a bit of research yourself, after all).

--
Gene E. Bloch (Gino)
letters617blochg3251
(replace the numbers by "at" and "dotcom")

"David H. Cook" wrote:
Dvd recorders record in real time.

--
Paul (Please dont take a picture)
-------------------------------------------------------
Stop and Look
http://www.geocities.com/dreamst8me/

Paul Heslop wrote:
hard drive too. Not all dvd recorder are capable of recording to all
formats of discs, though, so if you wish to burn to all formats you'll
have to check that its recording capabilities fulfil your wishes.



--
Paul (Please dont take a picture)
-------------------------------------------------------
Stop and Look
http://www.geocities.com/dreamst8me/

On Mar 5, 6:33 pm, Paul Heslop <paul.hes...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
Yes, I guess I was not as confused as I thought...those answers were
consistent with my expected answers (just my phrasing suffered).

I also found some good info on this subject at 'wikipedia', which
explains
the technology very well.

I've got another related question, but I'll start a new thread for
that.
Thanks for the answers.

Dave

"David H. Cook" wrote:
I was the same way when I first started thinking about dvd recording,
you assume as it is such a process on a computer that it would be
awkward on a stand alone.
--
Paul (Please dont take a picture)
-------------------------------------------------------
Stop and Look
http://www.geocities.com/dreamst8me/

"David H. Cook" <David.Hubert.Cook@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1173133149.687426.181150@64g2000cwx.googlegro ups.com...
To add to the other responses.....
A dvd-recorder it functionally equivalent to a vhs recorder, but with a few
added features

There are multiple quality ( think 'speed') settings, allowing usually
1,2,3,6,8 hours per dvd disc.
1,2,and 3 hour cannot normally be distinguished from good quality broadcast.

You can copy your home vhs/8mm tapes directly to dvd, you can not (legally
or easily) copy commercial material

dvd-recorder had built in software and fixed settings, so there is not the
flexibility of a dvd-burner and good authoring programs

dvd-recorder uses a single pass compression system which gives poorer
quality and less compression than good authoring software

You can not guarantee that a two hour program will fit onto a single dvd in
two hour mode - it depends on the 'compressability' or the material. Action
movies and sports compress less well then drama. I use 3 hour mode for
recording 2 hour events, and there is no real loss of quality.

My dvd recorder writes only to dvd+r and dvd+rw, others do both.

dvd recorders will play commercial dvd's, commercial cd's, home burned mp3
cd's, photo dvd's, etc

Stuart

On Thu, 08 Mar 2007 03:01:39 GMT, "Stuart Miller"
<stuart_miller@shaw.ca> wrote:

Depends on the actual model. My Philips reduces the horizontal number
of pixels to half when selecting 3 hours and above.
I would say that there is a significant quality reduction from this.
But it has also a 2 1/2 hour mode that is more useful.

....
Might be different between models, then.
My Philips adds 4-5 minutes recording capability to the specified 2
hours (much the same as was done on VHS-tapes).
It uses VBR so the exact recording time might vary perhaps a minute.
My understanding is that it adjusts continously the compression in
order to get the selected recording time (i.e. the selected average
bit rate). I have never observed a shorter recording time than the
selected.

Yes, but on my recorder that influences the achieved quality rather
than recording time.
Noisy material also compress worse than a clean signal, because
altough it tries to reduce the noise, more bits are spent on coding
noise which otherwise would encode picture elements.

I use mostly 2 hour mode and with difficult material 1 hour mode.

That varies between models.
The features in post editing on disc also vary between models and
there are some principle differences between recorders for the '+' or
the '-' types.
/Jan