Philips DVDR615 - DVD Recorders and Blu-ray Recorders

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Philips DVDR615

Write
~~CDR~~
~~CDRW~~
~~DVD-R~~
~~DVD-RW~~
~~DVD-R DL~~
DVD+R
DVD+RW
~~DVD+RDL~~
~~DVD-RAM~~

Read*

CDR
CDRW
DVD-R
DVD-RW
~~DVD-R DL~~
DVD+R
DVD+RW
~~DVD+R DL~~
~~DVD-RAM~~

*based on user reports.

Desktop, Firewire

$400

6.9 (7.0)
30 votes
Read 36
comments
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DVD Player features:
Video formats:
~~DivX~~ JPG DVD-JPG
Audio formats:
MP3
Other features:
Progressive Scanning

More information
Region code free hack

DVD Media comments for this DVD Recorder (click on the link to read the comments):
2 Philips 4xDVD+RW (PHILIPS.041) comments, 2 good, 0 mixed, 0 poor.
1 Sony 4xDVD+RW (PHILIPS.041) comments, 1 good, 0 mixed, 0 poor.
1 Verbatim (DataLifePlus) 2.4xDVD+RW (MCC.....A01) comments, 1 good, 0 mixed, 0 poor.
1 Verbatim DigitalMovie 4xDVD+R (MCC.....002) comments, 1 good, 0 mixed, 0 poor.
Add your DVD Media comments here

Comments

36 comments, Showing 26 to 36 comments

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rippel from United States reported June 22, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	150 days	3 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
Hi Keith, have the same Problem,contacted philips but like u say they are not helpfull at all ,their indian customer reps are unfriendly. i think others should stay away. the rippel

werner from Netherlands reported May 08, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	90 days	7 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
I've a Canon MVX20i DV Camcorder and have set it to 16:9 screen format. After connecting this camera with the iLink cable to the DVDR615 all the camera recordings changed from 16:9 to 4:3 screen format. I've checked all the settings on my camera and DVDR615 but no results..still 4:3!! I've sent a mail to Philips and they confirmed that all the recordings with iLink is 4:3!! Does someone had the same experience (tips). Regards werner

Keith from United States reported April 27, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R? DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	30 days	8 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
Has anyone had any luck with the "chapter reminder on-screen" problem reported by Redking on April 15, 2005. I have had this DVDR615/37 for about a month now & I'm impressed with the recording quality, but this chapter marker appearing on-screen is very annoying. I've contacted Philips many times & they are not aware of the problem. I cannot find a f/w upgrade for this unit either. At the moment I'm recording with the 615/37, but playing back in a different unit.

Jeffrey from United States reported April 22, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	30 days	9 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
I purchased this unit for $239.00- not a bad deal. Initial setup was really frustrating (instructions are NOT clear) especially to get an external source to play through the recorder. Once I figured this out- no problems. I have burned about 50 DVD's over the past month and not one coaster. I find both Memorex and Maxell DVD+R's ($18.99 for 50 at Office Max) to work well, although I wish I knew how resistant they are to normal handling, scratches, etc. The 3 hour speed seems to work well when copying most non-critical stuff from old VHS tapes- the one and two hour modes work really well for higher quality sources such as dubbing DVD's. The editing functions take time to get used to and require patience to use to their fullest extent. Overall, I am really pleased with the quality of the recordings, but beware of the instructions, if I had to do it again, I would just call the toll free number for support during setup and to answer the basic questions.

Redking from United States reported April 15, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR CDRW	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3 CVD?	30 days	9 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
Just a few updates. Despite the mono block on the display, all recordings made have been Dolby Digital 2.0. All Dvd+RW's(Sony,Philips)give the user at least 3 minutes extra time beyond the allotted record time of 1hr,2hr, etc, nice for those programs that occassionaly run over. Formatting/erasing a Dvd+Rw on another recorder such as the Lite-On 5005 confuses the Philips and gives a bad disc warning, erase only on the Philips! Still can't find a way to turn off the chapter reminder on-screen, not needed in my opinion. Still testing.

redking from United States reported March 29, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW DVD-R DL?	DVD+R? DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3 CVD?	14 days	8 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
I am still in the testing phases and learning the features. Picture quality is excellent in M1 and M2 and M2x record speeds when recording from Direct tv. Timer recordings are a snap if you remember to make sure of all the settings. The unit does not warn you of no disc present however, a huge oversight on Philips part. The lack of a display button on the remote is disturbing and badly needed. I can't imagine why it wasn't included. Another oddity is the constant mono field on the tv display. All the recordings have been in stereo however. I don't see a way to change this in the setup anywhere. I can play a dvd+rw on my Panasonic Dvd Ra-60 just fine, so nice to be able to zip through those commercials. No vcr could ever come close to the picture quality produced by the 615, grain-free images and razor sharp. Pressed and cdr's sound very good, detailed and a focused mid and top end. I am using SVHS inputs/outputs and the picture is superb. Coaxial out is fed to my Pioneer Cdr recorder and works perfectly. The unit is a bit slow to start up but I can live with that, it's very quiet in operation except for the fan in a quiet room, but since I use headphones it's doesn't matter. Due to the Macrovision, I cannot dub dvds, I need to find out how to disable it somehow. Region-free doesn't matter to me so it isn't an issue. Still testing...

Henryhoehandle from United States reported January 31, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR CDRW	DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3 CVD?	30 days	9 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
Well, this is my first home dvd recorder and I don't know exactly how "good" one is supposed to be, but this one works great. The recordings I have done (using the 4 hour mode) have been as good as the original satellite broadcasts. The remote could have been designed better, but it is ok once you get used to it. I highly this recorder as I have had no problems with it at all. I was especially impressed with the firewire link as this will really be nice transferring all of my camcorder videos to dvd. Got it at Besy Buy for $250.00

Samtron from Finland reported January 24, 2005:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR CDRW	DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD XVCD XSVCD	SVCD SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3 CVD?	7 days	9 of 10
~~DVD-RAM~~
Comments:
:: Philips DVDR615/02 :: I bought this 615 model for 450$ and they said that it's 100% the same as the 616. I went right away to the Philips support site to get a new firmware (software) update. I found it so easily for my DVDR. After that I started opening the box. I found there a DVD recorder that was tightly attached with a plastic coating around it. There was also a remote control and 2 AA batteries separately laying in the box without any plastic package. There was also antenna cable, SCART (EURO) cable and big bundle of manuals with different languages. There was also one blank DVD+RW disc. I updated the firmware right away (with CD-RW) after the DVDR was installed and working. The update process was quite fast (took only under 10 minutes, cool). :: Recording :: I started with settings and they were pretty easy to browse (not quite fast at first). After I was done with the settings I started reading the manual. I found there quite easily the page where are those simply steps how to record and set the recording quality (better quality >> shorter disc recording time). I tested with default settings and with mode 3 (LP =180min). (Smaller value >> better picture quality >> shorter recording time per DVD disc) :: Editing :: After I had a few video clips, I started the editing process. I like the way they have managed to get it working without HDD. So there is no HDD, but you can EDIT clips. I believe the DVDR uses it's internal memory to backup/process video and then burn the video data back to the disc. I wonder what would happen if in that stage there would be a power failure. :-( I hope that never happens to me. You can CUT video clips, but you can't JOIN them together (maybe the fps would go crazy if joining them or something like that). I like the possibility to delete video clip (for example: in the middle of two other video clips) and record to that new "blank" area (it will continue recording after that blank area is used and continue recording over the next videos if you don't stop it manually in time.. bummer!). You can also rename the DVD disc and titles. After the editing process is done you might want to make the DVD compatible with normal DVD-players. There is an option to make the disc compatible with those DVD-players. That process took 15 minutes with my video clips to complete and the recorder's laser/servo sounded like the DVDR was broken (btw, it was a normal sound :-). :: Playing :: When I open the drawer and close it, it will show up a menu that has all the recorded titles for playback with channel names. I also tested with normal Philips DVD-player and the same menu came up. WOHOO! I like that menu and the compatibility. Those video clips names will only show up if the disc is in it's recorder. :: Rating :: I would give this model a rating 10, but the functionality is not so fast as I hoped for (still faster than with than JVC DR-M10). I don't like the new remote control with the colored buttons with no texts. I would also give a minus for the "over-recording-funtion" that was mentioned in my review's "Editing" section.

Fred from United States reported November 03, 2004:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	N/A	No rating
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
I am planning on buying this model due to the fact that it has the capability to extract the original camcorder recording date and time info off of the firewire interface. The extracted date & time info is stored on the DVD as subtitles. Other DVDR vendors do not have this capablity and they recommend using the analog interface to the camcorder displaying the date and time stamp such that the data and time are part of the burned image. I can't see going back to analog and then back to digital to get the the date and time info. Unless you are wathing the entire video (as you are burning to DVD), you'll have to leave the date and time on all of the time. Clearly Phillips has a better way. I think that it would ne a good idea to track this feature on this site (it may be already). An exerpt from the Phillips DVDR615/17 manual... "Best Picture Quality If you are using a Digital Video or Digital 8 camcorder, connect the DV IN IN jack of the DVD Recorder to the corresponding DV OUT jack on the camcorder. When films are transferred, the original recording date and time are stored as DVD subtitles. During playback, you can display this data on the TV screen by using the 'E' function (Subtitle)."

Mahinder from Netherlands reported November 01, 2004:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR CDRW	DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-R DL?	DVD+R DVD+RW DVD+R DL?	VCD XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	14 days	8 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
No comments

Tim Smith from United States reported October 23, 2004:
Read features:						Time used:	Rating:
CDR? CDRW?	DVD-R? DVD-RW? DVD-R DL?	DVD+R? DVD+RW? DVD+R DL?	VCD? XVCD? XSVCD?	SVCD? SVCDSubs? SVCDTracks?	MP3? CVD?	N/A	9 of 10
DVD-RAM?
Comments:
I bought this one impuslively a few days ago from Best Buy and paid the list price of $299, thinking in the back of my mind that I would probably take it back. Well...so far I have fallen in love with this thing once I got past the somewhat cryptic user interface. The one feature that sets this machine apart from some of the other machines is it's ability to split and trim titles before finalizing. I was doing the slow and tedious video capture to PC thing, editing, rendering and burning. I was growing old doing this and thought I would give this a try to at least create a set of raw DVD masters that I could edit at a later date. I also tried the $150 Ilo machine...great recorder but would not split titles. The Phillips DVDR 615 has performed great for me so with one small exception. I changed the chapter markers on a few titles that worked great in the recorder (on +RW), but the original default chapter markers (5 minutes intervals) remained when playing in other players. All discs created did play in my Mintek and Apex machines as well as every PC. After I create and trim my source DVD+RW, title it up, etc., I make an ISO copy in my PC with DVD Shrink and then burn a final to DVD-R with Roxio. Now that I can build a set of raw master before my tapes get any worse and not spend a lot of time. The best thing about the ability to split titles is that I can throw in a tape, it record and come back later to trim it....don't have to babysit it. I'm still looking around for other machines that have title split capabilities but Phillips is the only one so far.

36 comments, Showing 26 to 36 comments

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