In the middle of all the fuss around Blu-ray disc players and hard disk PVRs, Panasonic presents the DMR EX-78 which in many ways become one of the best buys in 2008. One of the result of years of experience in DVD recorder development.
Once installed, the DMR-EX78's image quality amazes ... Read review
Advantages: easy set up, excellent picture quality, remarkable tuner/reception, support all AV in and out Disadvantages: a little bit clumsy menu
...players and hard disk PVRs, Panasonic presents the DMR EX-78 which in many ways become one of the best buys in 2008. One of the result of years of experience in DVD recorder development.
Once installed, the DMR-EX78's image quality amazes its viewers. Being equipped with an HDMI video output, coupled to 1080p video upscaling if needed, plus the excellent TV tuner, resulting in terrific broadcast pictures.
The DMR EX-78 ... ...onto every recordable DVD format. Panasonic DMR-EX78 is also one of the first Freeview Playback compatible DVD/HDD combination having a complete range of Freeview recording features. This includes series and split recording plus onscreen alerts to warn a schedule clash. However, to compensate the Freeview digital TV tuner, DMR EX-78 excludes the analogue alternative.
With that amount of internal storage, DMR EX-78 can hold up to 441 ... more
In the middle of all the fuss around Blu-ray disc players and hard disk PVRs, Panasonic presents the DMR EX-78 which in many ways become one of the best buys in 2008. One of the result of years of experience in DVD recorder development.
Once installed, the DMR-EX78's image quality amazes its viewers. Being equipped with an HDMI video output, coupled to 1080p video upscaling if needed, plus the excellent TV tuner, resulting in terrific broadcast pictures.
The DMR EX-78 is equipped with a 250GB hard disk drive and allows you to record onto every recordable DVD format. Panasonic DMR-EX78 is also one of the first Freeview Playback compatible DVD/HDD combination having a complete range of Freeview recording features. This includes series and split recording plus onscreen alerts to warn a schedule clash. However, to compensate the Freeview digital TV tuner, DMR EX-78 excludes the analogue alternative.
With that amount of internal storage, DMR EX-78 can hold up to 441 hours of TV programmes from the built-in digital tuner. This is varied by the quality of the recording modes. The higher the quality, the more storage space it takes.
There are four recording modes available with DMR EX-78. They are XP - which is the best quality and takes either 55 hours maximum on the hard disk or almost two hours on a double layer DVD. Another one is SP - 110 hours hard disk and 3 hours 55 minutes on DVD, LP - 221 hours hard disk, 7 hours on DVD and EP, 441 hours hard disk, over 140 hours on DVD.
In additional, DMR EX-78 also features Flexible Recording that fits a recording exactly into the remaining space on the disc. Recordings can be written directly onto DVD-RAM, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-R and DVD+R discs, and also you can copy hard disk recordings onto dual-layer DVD+R and DVD-R discs.
DMR-EX78's ability doesn't stop there. More than a digital TV recorder, it can store music and rip CDs internally in LCPM at 384kbps. It also comes pre-loaded with Gracenote database which allows information retrieval about the loaded CD from a list of about 350,000 albums to automatically display the artist, title and album information. Soon, the Panasonic's website should offer free updates as well and the latest albums can be transferred via the USB port. Playing DivX files from a USB device or disc is also possible but you can't transfer them to the hard disk however.
Additionally, a front-mounted USB port allows for easy connection to an MP3 player or digital storage vault for digital transfer of MP3 music and JPEG photo files, and there's even a Firewire input for digital camcorder users.
Advantages: high picture quality, many DVD formats Disadvantages: loses settings on power outage / unplugging, toslink only digital audio
The DMR ex78 (UK model) is easy to use but suffers for a major design defect, the settings are not stored so that if there is a power outage all settings are lost. If dvb-t input is present, the box automatically regenerates its tuning settings, but any custom settings such as type of input, output signals are lost after a power outage. The UK model has no "country" setting option on startup, the continental one does (and also has VHS DVB-T channels ... ...21. Manual tuning is not possible unless there is a DVB-T signal. Since the box will most commonly use the hard drive for recording and playback, you need to tell it to use the optical drive if you want to do simple things like playing a CD or DVD.
It is a pain to have to use optical fibre for digital audio. I find coax less demanding and any length of cable is easily available.Short Toslink cables can be easily obtained but long ones which I need ...
porkyandbess 04.02.2009
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of Panasonic DMR-EX78
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Advantages: well-built, good enough picture and sound quality, easy to use Disadvantages: Ethernet on VISTA only (not on XP), rather expensive for what it is
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Advantages: Easy to use, Great recording and editing options, Can archive VHS videos! Disadvantages: Only 1 digital TV tuner means you cannot watch other Freeview channels while you are recording.
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So enough was enough ? no more telly hell. I treated myself to this PanasonicDMR-EX78EB-K Freeview+ 250GB HDD DVD Recorder for Christmas. I therefore bought this product ultimately to satisfy my two main requirements: to record programmes on Freeview onto the its hard disc drive or onto DVD, and to use it as a DVD player! I was also impressed with some of its other features, which I will also discuss in my review.
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1 x IEEE 1394 (FireWire/i.LINK) ( 4 PIN FireWire ) - front
1 x composite video/audio input ( RCA phono x 3 ) - front
1 x S-Video input ( 4 PIN mini-DIN ) - front
2 x SCART ( 21 PIN SCART ) - rear
1 x component video output ( RCA phono x 3 ) - rear
1 x composite video/audio output ( RCA phono x 3 ) - rear
1 x S-Video output ( 4 PIN mini-DIN ) - rear
1 x SPDIF output ( TOS Link ) - rear
1 x HDMI output ( 19 pin HDMI Type A ) - rear
1 x USB ( 4 PIN USB Type A ) - front
Manufacturer's product description
Panasonic has developed the DMR-EX78 with even higher image quality. Picture quality is better. DVB-T adaptive noise reduction detects and removes the block noise that often occurs in digital broadcasts, to produce beautiful images with minimal noise. And the enhanced quality of 1080p up-conversion and rich color gradation of deep color compatibility are seen in deeper, higher-resolution images. The diagonal processing automatically detects diagonal lines in motion images, and converts them to sharp lines. The VIERA Link function of the DMR-EX78 is more advanced. Auto preset download does away with the need to make channel and other initial the DMR-EX78 settings. Direct TV Rec. lets the user start recording the TV program that is currently being watched by simply pressing the VIERA Link button on the VIERA remote and selecting Direct TV Rec. Pause live TV pauses a TV program with the same ease as pausing a DVD disc. The rest of the program can then be watched at a later time, right from the point where it was paused. The DMR-EX78 is equipped with a USB terminal, so images from a digital still camera can be easily transferred. A large-capacity hard disk drive lets users store music data and turns the DMR-EX78 into a virtual jukebox. It supports gracenote, in short, the DMR-EX78 goes far beyond the point of easy video entertainment to function as a personal digital media server.
