DVD Recorders - Need Tech Help

[Zoom-boing]

Our dvd player/vcr recorder that the kids use is on the fritz. It's not loading many dvds (both purchased and ones we record on a different machine) and it skips on many that it does load. So, I'm looking to replace it. I'm looking for a dvd recorder but need it to have rf coaxial in and out.

My questions:

1. If the dvd recorder has an astc tuner, does that automatically mean it has the rf coaxial in and out connections?

2. Is a digital tuner the same thing as an astc tuner?

3. I'm having trouble determining if the dvd recorders I'm looking at on-line have the rf coaxial in and out connections. One recorder I found gives this in the description:

Jackpacks:

Component Outputs (1)
HDMI® Out
Front S-Video Input (1)
Rear S-Video Input/Output 1 /1
Rear RCA-Video Input/Output 1 /1
Front Audio Input (1)
Rear Analog Audio Input / Output 1/1
Coaxial Outputs (1)
Front DV Input (1)

In a review of this same machine on Amazon, one reviewer said:

It has coaxial in and out jacks.

My question is, how do I tell from the product description that it has coaxial in and out? If I hadn't seen the Amazon review I would not have known.

4. Last question . . . is it worth buying a 'factory refurbished' product that is less expensive than a 'new' one? I bought refurbished ipods from Apple and have never had a problem . . . was just wondering if anyone has had any experience with refurbished dvd recorders.

Thanks for any input anyone can give.

 

[José]

DVD players are almost a thing of the past, Zoom.

I I were you I'd buy a media player if you don't have one already (I have a Western Digital Live). You'll have almost no compatibility problems with the files you download.

But I gather you have a good DVD collection and don't want to keep it merely as backup...

Sorry... not an answer to your technical questions but my two cents anyway : )

 

[ConHog]

To answer your questions.

What do you need a tuner for? If you have either cable or satelite you will have that tuner to use, so the tuner that your dvd burner has would be irrelevant. Of course that is another story if you are watching over the air tv. But of course analog tuners are a thing of the past since all tv is now digital.

Coaxial in and out? Why do you need that? Every TV built within the last 20 years has the little white yellow and red inputs at minimum, as does any dvd players etc etc.

WHy the HDMI output UNLESS you are looking for a blue ray player?

What do you intend to do with this hardware? Just watch movies?

 

[Ringel05]

Our dvd player/vcr recorder that the kids use is on the fritz. It's not loading many dvds (both purchased and ones we record on a different machine) and it skips on many that it does load. So, I'm looking to replace it. I'm looking for a dvd recorder but need it to have rf coaxial in and out.

My questions:

1. If the dvd recorder has an astc tuner, does that automatically mean it has the rf coaxial in and out connections?

2. Is a digital tuner the same thing as an astc tuner?

3. I'm having trouble determining if the dvd recorders I'm looking at on-line have the rf coaxial in and out connections. One recorder I found gives this in the description:

Jackpacks:

Component Outputs (1)
HDMI® Out
Front S-Video Input (1)
Rear S-Video Input/Output 1 /1
Rear RCA-Video Input/Output 1 /1
Front Audio Input (1)
Rear Analog Audio Input / Output 1/1
Coaxial Outputs (1)
Front DV Input (1)

In a review of this same machine on Amazon, one reviewer said:

It has coaxial in and out jacks.

My question is, how do I tell from the product description that it has coaxial in and out? If I hadn't seen the Amazon review I would not have known.

4. Last question . . . is it worth buying a 'factory refurbished' product that is less expensive than a 'new' one? I bought refurbished ipods from Apple and have never had a problem . . . was just wondering if anyone has had any experience with refurbished dvd recorders.

Thanks for any input anyone can give.

Do you have an language translator program for that?

 

[Zoom-boing]

To answer your questions.

What do you need a tuner for? If you have either cable or satelite you will have that tuner to use, so the tuner that your dvd burner has would be irrelevant. Of course that is another story if you are watching over the air tv. But of course analog tuners are a thing of the past since all tv is now digital.

Coaxial in and out? Why do you need that? Every TV built within the last 20 years has the little white yellow and red inputs at minimum, as does any dvd players etc etc.

WHy the HDMI output UNLESS you are looking for a blue ray player?

What do you intend to do with this hardware? Just watch movies?

I don't need a tuner but I do need the coaxial in and out and my impression was that I would only find them on a player with a tuner. The sample model I used (above) comes with HDMI even though I don't need/use it.

My son, 17 special needs, is totally into action movies. Which is fine (depending on the movie) except that so many of them are just filled with really nasty language. I'm not a prude or anything and if he was a 'regular' kid . . . but he isn't. Anyway, there's a device called the TV Guardian that filters out the language via the closed caption codes. They don't make them anymore but I found one on ebay. But I use it on the dvd player not the tv and in order to make that work, I need the coaxial in and out connections on the dvd player. I run the cable out of the dvd player (Comcast box is run in to the player) and into an a/b video switch with two inputs and one output that goes to the tv. The other input is for the TV Guardian. When the dvd player is on and you flip the switch, viola! the language is filtered out.

This whole digital thing is great for the quality of the pics but sucky for folks like me who like to record stuff and watch it later. Yeah, yeah I do Sidereel and all but . . . . sometimes I don't want to watch it on the computer, you know? We have Comcast On Demand box and a dvd recorder. Guess what? Now I can't record one channel while watching another channel. So I rigged up the Comcast box utilizing a splitter, a dta box (from Comcast), and an a/b video switch. Problem fixed!

So anywayyyy .. . . how do I know from the description if the unit has coaxial in and out? I've spent a good portion of the day scouring the internet . . .not a lot out there. I'm ending up hunting down the manuals on line to see if they provide a pic of the back of the unit. Oy. I did find the player we have in our family room (Toshiba dr560) for about $110 but it's factory refurbished and was wondering if anyone had ever bought a factory refurbished dvd recorder.

 

[Zoom-boing]

our dvd player/vcr recorder that the kids use is on the fritz. It's not loading many dvds (both purchased and ones we record on a different machine) and it skips on many that it does load. So, i'm looking to replace it. I'm looking for a dvd recorder but need it to have rf coaxial in and out.

My questions:

1. If the dvd recorder has an astc tuner, does that automatically mean it has the rf coaxial in and out connections?

2. Is a digital tuner the same thing as an astc tuner?

3. I'm having trouble determining if the dvd recorders i'm looking at on-line have the rf coaxial in and out connections. One recorder i found gives this in the description:

jackpacks:

Component outputs (1)
hdmi® out
front s-video input (1)
rear s-video input/output 1 /1
rear rca-video input/output 1 /1
front audio input (1)
rear analog audio input / output 1/1
coaxial outputs (1)
front dv input (1)

in a review of this same machine on amazon, one reviewer said:

it has coaxial in and out jacks.

my question is, how do i tell from the product description that it has coaxial in and out? If i hadn't seen the amazon review i would not have known.

4. Last question . . . Is it worth buying a 'factory refurbished' product that is less expensive than a 'new' one? I bought refurbished ipods from apple and have never had a problem . . . Was just wondering if anyone has had any experience with refurbished dvd recorders.

Thanks for any input anyone can give.

do you have an language translator program for that?

25!

 

[ConHog]

To answer your questions.

What do you need a tuner for? If you have either cable or satelite you will have that tuner to use, so the tuner that your dvd burner has would be irrelevant. Of course that is another story if you are watching over the air tv. But of course analog tuners are a thing of the past since all tv is now digital.

Coaxial in and out? Why do you need that? Every TV built within the last 20 years has the little white yellow and red inputs at minimum, as does any dvd players etc etc.

WHy the HDMI output UNLESS you are looking for a blue ray player?

What do you intend to do with this hardware? Just watch movies?

I don't need a tuner but I do need the coaxial in and out and my impression was that I would only find them on a player with a tuner. The sample model I used (above) comes with HDMI even though I don't need/use it.

My son, 17 special needs, is totally into action movies. Which is fine (depending on the movie) except that so many of them are just filled with really nasty language. I'm not a prude or anything and if he was a 'regular' kid . . . but he isn't. Anyway, there's a device called the TV Guardian that filters out the language via the closed caption codes. They don't make them anymore but I found one on ebay. But I use it on the dvd player not the tv and in order to make that work, I need the coaxial in and out connections on the dvd player. I run the cable out of the dvd player (Comcast box is run in to the player) and into an a/b video switch with two inputs and one output that goes to the tv. The other input is for the TV Guardian. When the dvd player is on and you flip the switch, viola! the language is filtered out.

This whole digital thing is great for the quality of the pics but sucky for folks like me who like to record stuff and watch it later. Yeah, yeah I do Sidereel and all but . . . . sometimes I don't want to watch it on the computer, you know? We have Comcast On Demand box and a dvd recorder. Guess what? Now I can't record one channel while watching another channel. So I rigged up the Comcast box utilizing a splitter, a dta box (from Comcast), and an a/b video switch. Problem fixed!

So anywayyyy .. . . how do I know from the description if the unit has coaxial in and out? I've spent a good portion of the day scouring the internet . . .not a lot out there. I'm ending up hunting down the manuals on line to see if they provide a pic of the back of the unit. Oy. I did find the player we have in our family room (Toshiba dr560) for about $110 but it's factory refurbished and was wondering if anyone had ever bought a factory refurbished dvd recorder.

Hmmm, Odd. I just looked on there website and they show the tvguardian as having COMPOSITE cables , not coaxial , are they yellow, red.white? three wires? or one old style round plug type?

in EITHER case, just buy the dvd burner you want and if you need to you can buy a coaxial to composite converter, and ALL dvd burners have composite cables at a minimum. Any decent radio shack will be able to help you out there if need be, but my local wal mart actually stocks the converter.

 

[Zoom-boing]

To answer your questions.

What do you need a tuner for? If you have either cable or satelite you will have that tuner to use, so the tuner that your dvd burner has would be irrelevant. Of course that is another story if you are watching over the air tv. But of course analog tuners are a thing of the past since all tv is now digital.

Coaxial in and out? Why do you need that? Every TV built within the last 20 years has the little white yellow and red inputs at minimum, as does any dvd players etc etc.

WHy the HDMI output UNLESS you are looking for a blue ray player?

What do you intend to do with this hardware? Just watch movies?

I don't need a tuner but I do need the coaxial in and out and my impression was that I would only find them on a player with a tuner. The sample model I used (above) comes with HDMI even though I don't need/use it.

My son, 17 special needs, is totally into action movies. Which is fine (depending on the movie) except that so many of them are just filled with really nasty language. I'm not a prude or anything and if he was a 'regular' kid . . . but he isn't. Anyway, there's a device called the TV Guardian that filters out the language via the closed caption codes. They don't make them anymore but I found one on ebay. But I use it on the dvd player not the tv and in order to make that work, I need the coaxial in and out connections on the dvd player. I run the cable out of the dvd player (Comcast box is run in to the player) and into an a/b video switch with two inputs and one output that goes to the tv. The other input is for the TV Guardian. When the dvd player is on and you flip the switch, viola! the language is filtered out.

This whole digital thing is great for the quality of the pics but sucky for folks like me who like to record stuff and watch it later. Yeah, yeah I do Sidereel and all but . . . . sometimes I don't want to watch it on the computer, you know? We have Comcast On Demand box and a dvd recorder. Guess what? Now I can't record one channel while watching another channel. So I rigged up the Comcast box utilizing a splitter, a dta box (from Comcast), and an a/b video switch. Problem fixed!

So anywayyyy .. . . how do I know from the description if the unit has coaxial in and out? I've spent a good portion of the day scouring the internet . . .not a lot out there. I'm ending up hunting down the manuals on line to see if they provide a pic of the back of the unit. Oy. I did find the player we have in our family room (Toshiba dr560) for about $110 but it's factory refurbished and was wondering if anyone had ever bought a factory refurbished dvd recorder.

Hmmm, Odd. I just looked on there website and they show the tvguardian as having COMPOSITE cables , not coaxial , are they yellow, red.white? three wires? or one old style round plug type?

in EITHER case, just buy the dvd burner you want and if you need to you can buy a coaxial to composite converter, and ALL dvd burners have composite cables at a minimum. Any decent radio shack will be able to help you out there if need be, but my local wal mart actually stocks the converter.

The model I have has the RCA cables -- red, white, yellow (are they also called composite cables?) and a coaxial out. I bought this a couple of years ago off of ebay. The RCA cables hook into the dvd player and the coaxial cable hooks into the a/b video switch. I got the idea for the a/b video switch from rigging up the family room system. Honestly, I just guessed in hooking the TVG up and it works. What I really wish is for Comcast to incorporate the TVG into their parental controls. That would solve everything.

I didn't know that they made a coaxial to composite converter . . . or is that the same thing as an RF modulator? If I can figure out how to hook the TVG up to the dvd player in a different way I might look into this.

 

[ConHog]

I don't need a tuner but I do need the coaxial in and out and my impression was that I would only find them on a player with a tuner. The sample model I used (above) comes with HDMI even though I don't need/use it.

My son, 17 special needs, is totally into action movies. Which is fine (depending on the movie) except that so many of them are just filled with really nasty language. I'm not a prude or anything and if he was a 'regular' kid . . . but he isn't. Anyway, there's a device called the TV Guardian that filters out the language via the closed caption codes. They don't make them anymore but I found one on ebay. But I use it on the dvd player not the tv and in order to make that work, I need the coaxial in and out connections on the dvd player. I run the cable out of the dvd player (Comcast box is run in to the player) and into an a/b video switch with two inputs and one output that goes to the tv. The other input is for the TV Guardian. When the dvd player is on and you flip the switch, viola! the language is filtered out.

This whole digital thing is great for the quality of the pics but sucky for folks like me who like to record stuff and watch it later. Yeah, yeah I do Sidereel and all but . . . . sometimes I don't want to watch it on the computer, you know? We have Comcast On Demand box and a dvd recorder. Guess what? Now I can't record one channel while watching another channel. So I rigged up the Comcast box utilizing a splitter, a dta box (from Comcast), and an a/b video switch. Problem fixed!

So anywayyyy .. . . how do I know from the description if the unit has coaxial in and out? I've spent a good portion of the day scouring the internet . . .not a lot out there. I'm ending up hunting down the manuals on line to see if they provide a pic of the back of the unit. Oy. I did find the player we have in our family room (Toshiba dr560) for about $110 but it's factory refurbished and was wondering if anyone had ever bought a factory refurbished dvd recorder.

Hmmm, Odd. I just looked on there website and they show the tvguardian as having COMPOSITE cables , not coaxial , are they yellow, red.white? three wires? or one old style round plug type?

in EITHER case, just buy the dvd burner you want and if you need to you can buy a coaxial to composite converter, and ALL dvd burners have composite cables at a minimum. Any decent radio shack will be able to help you out there if need be, but my local wal mart actually stocks the converter.

The model I have has the RCA cables -- red, white, yellow (are they also called composite cables?) and a coaxial out. I bought this a couple of years ago off of ebay. The RCA cables hook into the dvd player and the coaxial cable hooks into the a/b video switch. I got the idea for the a/b video switch from rigging up the family room system. Honestly, I just guessed in hooking the TVG up and it works. What I really wish is for Comcast to incorporate the TVG into their parental controls. That would solve everything.

I didn't know that they made a coaxial to composite converter . . . is that the same thing as an RF modulator? If I can figure out how to hook the TVG up to the dvd player in a different way I might look into this.

Okay , after a little more research, this is what you need to do.

there is in fact no need for splitter or a converter. the guardian itself has two sets of composite input/outputs. You can daisy chain a tv box and a dvd player into the guardian and then out to the tv. Unless you have an ancient ass tv that doesnt have composit in jacks.

coaxial into your satellite? box. RCA from satellite out to dvd in, dvd composite out to TV guardian composite in. TV Guardian composite out to composite tv in. Then tune TV to rear 1 or front 1 or whatever channel the RCA ins are lableed as. tune dvd to rear RCA or whatever RCAs that satellite is plugged into to watch watch tv and change channels with satellite? remote. or conversely play dvd. TV guardian will now operate correctly on all inputs

 

[Zoom-boing]

Hmmm, Odd. I just looked on there website and they show the tvguardian as having COMPOSITE cables , not coaxial , are they yellow, red.white? three wires? or one old style round plug type?

in EITHER case, just buy the dvd burner you want and if you need to you can buy a coaxial to composite converter, and ALL dvd burners have composite cables at a minimum. Any decent radio shack will be able to help you out there if need be, but my local wal mart actually stocks the converter.

The model I have has the RCA cables -- red, white, yellow (are they also called composite cables?) and a coaxial out. I bought this a couple of years ago off of ebay. The RCA cables hook into the dvd player and the coaxial cable hooks into the a/b video switch. I got the idea for the a/b video switch from rigging up the family room system. Honestly, I just guessed in hooking the TVG up and it works. What I really wish is for Comcast to incorporate the TVG into their parental controls. That would solve everything.

I didn't know that they made a coaxial to composite converter . . . is that the same thing as an RF modulator? If I can figure out how to hook the TVG up to the dvd player in a different way I might look into this.

Okay , after a little more research, this is what you need to do.

there is in fact no need for splitter or a converter. the guardian itself has two sets of composite input/outputs. You can daisy chain a tv box and a dvd player into the guardian and then out to the tv. Unless you have an ancient ass tv that doesnt have composit in jacks.

coaxial into your satellite? box. RCA from satellite out to dvd in, dvd composite out to TV guardian composite in. TV Guardian composite out to composite tv in. Then tune TV to rear 1 or front 1 or whatever channel the RCA ins are lableed as. tune dvd to rear RCA or whatever RCAs that satellite is plugged into to watch watch tv and change channels with satellite? remote. or conversely play dvd. TV guardian will now operate correctly on all inputs

Hey thanks for this. I'm going to try this on what we have now and if it works, then my options for a dvd recorder just opened up. Wait, where do I plug in the Wii? Ok and I also thought that you had to use the coaxial if it was on the dvd player. So I can just use the red/white/yellow as the connection for everything, as long as the coaxial is coming from the wall into the digital (Comcast) box. Is that right? If I wanted the TVG just on the dvd player . . . coaxial into comcast box, RCA out of box into TVG, RCA out of TVG into dvd player, RCA out of dvd player into tv. Would that work? That might work. The TVG has to be in front of the device you want it to work on. Since I use Comcast's parental controls on the tv, I'm not too concerned about the language on the shows allowed; I just want it to work on the dvd player. Kind of just rambling here, thinking/typing out loud.

Are RCA (red, white, yellow) the same thing as composite?

eta, ok another thought. If I set it up the way you suggested or the way I suggested, can I still record onto the dvd recorder or does there need to be a coaxial connection between the Comcast box and the dvd recorder? If yes, just an "in" connection on the dvd recorder from the Comcast box?

 

[ConHog]

No, you do NOT have to use coaxial EXCEPT where it comes from the wall to your satelite box, and technically that is not coaxial, but we will call it that for simplicity sakes.

Yes RCA is composite, same thing.

As for the Wii. Again , if your TV is less than ten years old, it should have multiple inputs. In fact I'm guessing if you have a Wii, you have it set up via HDMI? just bypass the entire setup and plug it in via HDMI directly into the TV, unless you want it ran through the Guardian as well, which I'm not even sure it will work with the WIi?

 

[Zoom-boing]

No, you do NOT have to use coaxial EXCEPT where it comes from the wall to your satelite box, and technically that is not coaxial, but we will call it that for simplicity sakes.

Yes RCA is composite, same thing.

As for the Wii. Again , if your TV is less than ten years old, it should have multiple inputs. In fact I'm guessing if you have a Wii, you have it set up via HDMI? just bypass the entire setup and plug it in via HDMI directly into the TV, unless you want it ran through the Guardian as well, which I'm not even sure it will work with the WIi?

I did not know about only needing the coaxial for the initial input. THANK YOU!! So I wouldn't need a coaxial from the comcast box to the dvd recorder in order for it to record ... the composite plugs are the connection? I feel so duh not realizing that.

The tv is a five year old Sharp, old school not lcd or plasma. I know it has composites in the front but am not sure about the back. I don't think it has hdmi -- isn't that just for the lcd/plasma sets? I could be wrong, have to go look.

I'm am going to play around with the connections when I get a chance (read: when kids are in school) and see what I can do.

 

[ConHog]

No, you do NOT have to use coaxial EXCEPT where it comes from the wall to your satelite box, and technically that is not coaxial, but we will call it that for simplicity sakes.

Yes RCA is composite, same thing.

As for the Wii. Again , if your TV is less than ten years old, it should have multiple inputs. In fact I'm guessing if you have a Wii, you have it set up via HDMI? just bypass the entire setup and plug it in via HDMI directly into the TV, unless you want it ran through the Guardian as well, which I'm not even sure it will work with the WIi?

I did not know about only needing the coaxial for the initial input. THANK YOU!! So I wouldn't need a coaxial from the comcast box to the dvd recorder in order for it to record ... the composite plugs are the connection? I feel so duh not realizing that.

The tv is a five year old Sharp, old school not lcd or plasma. I know it has composites in the front but am not sure about the back. I don't think it has hdmi -- isn't that just for the lcd/plasma sets? I could be wrong, have to go look.

I'm am going to play around with the connections when I get a chance (read: when kids are in school) and see what I can do.

That is correct, if you have a composite connection, you will not need a coaxial connection as well. There will be no HDMI connection on your 5 year old tube type TV. As for component connection, if it has a set in front, it absolutely has a set in the rear as well. The Wiii can be plugged directly into one of them and operated independently of the reset of your AV system. I would plug the Wii in the in front , and the other system in the back as I described above, it will absolutely work.

 

[Zoom-boing]

Con, thank you so much for all your help! Not only does this give me way more options for dvd recorders but it will also reduce the amount of 'wiring' I have going on.

 

[ConHog]

Con, thank you so much for all your help! Not only does this give me way more options for dvd recorders but it will also reduce the amount of 'wiring' I have going on.

You're quite welcome. if you need more help or advice, just ask

 

[Zoom-boing]

Ok, what am I doing wrong?

Let's take the TVG out of the equation for a minute . . . . .

I can run coax cable out of the wall, into the comcast box then run rca cables out of the comcast box and into the tv. Everything is oakie dokie.

I run coax out of the wall and into the comast box then run rca cables out of the comcast box and into the dvd/vcr then run rca cables out of the dvd/vcr and into the tv and . . . .nothing.

I've tried switching the input (pushing that button on the comast remote) to input one (which is where the cables are plugged into on the tv), I've tried changing the channels on the tv, I've tried all the inputs on the tv and both inputs on the dvd/vcr and . . . nothing. Just a blue screen. I can hook up the dvd/vcr independently of the comcast box (as well as the TVG) with rca cables but why can't I daisy chain them all together? If I run coax to connect them all, it works. Shouldn't it also work with just the rca cables? Gooorb! Blarg.

 

[ConHog]

Ok, what am I doing wrong?

Let's take the TVG out of the equation for a minute . . . . .

I can run coax cable out of the wall, into the comcast box then run rca cables out of the comcast box and into the tv. Everything is oakie dokie.

I run coax out of the wall and into the comast box then run rca cables out of the comcast box and into the dvd/vcr then run rca cables out of the dvd/vcr and into the tv and . . . .nothing.

I've tried switching the input (pushing that button on the comast remote) to input one (which is where the cables are plugged into on the tv), I've tried changing the channels on the tv, I've tried all the inputs on the tv and both inputs on the dvd/vcr and . . . nothing. Just a blue screen. I can hook up the dvd/vcr independently of the comcast box (as well as the TVG) with rca cables but why can't I daisy chain them all together? If I run coax to connect them all, it works. Shouldn't it also work with just the rca cables? Gooorb! Blarg.

My guess is you have them hooked up correctly, but are tuned to the wrong channels to see them.

Start with this. how many rca inputs does your tv have?

 

[Zoom-boing]

The tv has three rca inputs (1 in front, 2 in back), a coaxial cable input, an s-video input, and a component input.

The dvd/vcr has 2 rca inputs (1 in front, 1 in back), 1 rca output, 1 coaxial input, 1 coaxial output. And probably an s-video.

The comcast box has 1 coaxial in, 1 coaxial out, red and white rca audio to tv, red and white rca audio to dvd/vcr, 1 yellow rca video, and 1 orange coaxial (it says coaxial but it looks like the rca ones).

I just went down to see if maybe the dvd/vcr channel got changed but both that and the tv are on channel 4.

I have to run but tomorrow I'm going to try a small dvd player that's in our bedroom (it only has rca and is new) to see if that works.

 

[ConHog]

and how many inputs does the tvga have?

 

[Zoom-boing]

and how many inputs does the tvga have?

lol, I forgot that one. I was trying to get the comcast/dvd/tv to work then was going to add the TVG back in.

The TVG has one coaxial in, 1rca input, 1 rca output.