I'm thinking about getting a DVR......

[poltr1]

I don't watch that much TV these days. In December of 2010, I cut back from standard cable to basic cable, in order to save some money. Other than recording a few things for a friend (his daughter was a contestant on Jeopardy), I haven't recorded anything off TV in a long time. I think the last series I recorded was "Blood Ties" (when Lifetime aired it), and the Simpsons 20th Anniversary special.

I have software and a hardware dongle to convert a three-jack audio/video signal (video, audio-left, audio-right) to a USB signal. (I use the Honestech VHS-to-DVD 3.0 package.) But I haven't used it much. And I probably should. I have about 500 VHS tapes and 100 Beta tapes I ought to covert to digital format soon, before the tapes degrade.

So I'm thinking....could a digital video recorder (DVR) fill my needs? But first, what do I want it to do?
1) Record shows off the air (for the few times I'd need it)
2) Play back on any of the three TVs I have in the house, preferably without connecting wires to them
3) Accept a video signal from an external device (e.g. a VCR) and record it on DVR, replacing the computer and Honestech software and box
4) Burn DVDs, or at least put it in a format that can be burned to DVD
5) Basic video editing, such as chopping out commercials and creating titles (I may still need software to do this)

Next, whose unit should I buy? I've liked TiVo for years, and they have a decent unit for about $100. I'd prefer to not deal with the cable company (I have Time Warner), they're always trying to sell me services and features I don't need or want. And I want to do this an inexpensively as possible.

Any recommendations?

Comments

[bikergeek.livejournal.com]

TiVO is certainly the solution that Just Works. Plug it in and forget it. Although mine just plugs into my TV with an HDMI cable, since I only have the one TV in the house. And it doesn't have the capability of converting any type of VHS or whatever to digital.

Whatever solution your cable company offers will also likely Just Work, and may work out to be more economical depending on how much they charge to rent the decoder cards required for a TiVO you own to work.

If you really wanna hack around with something, there's always MythTV. I'd consider doing that if someone hadn't given me a third-gen TiVO with a lifetime subscription and a dead hard drive outright. I'm just using it to record a couple of things I watch regularly off the air, and it works fine for that. *shrug*

[billroper]

I've got an older model of this. It might do the job for you.

http://mobile.walmart.com/r/phoenix/index.html#ip/14291489

[billroper]

Here's a refurb.

http://thecheapostore.com/magnavox-500gb-dvr-and-dvd-recorder-mdr515h-refurbished.html

[poltr1]

This is more within my price range. And I'm not adverse to refurbished units. But alas, I won't have the necessary "disposable income" for a Very Long Time.