SONY VRD-VC10 DVDirect External DVD Recorder

I didn't purchase this product at Amazon, but commonly rely on others' recommendations at this site, so here's my take. THIS PRODUCT IS A GREAT INVESTMENT. The primary reason that I didn't give it a 5 star rating, is because the packaging doesn't clearly state which brands of blank DVD's are compatible. I bought a 100 pack of memorex DVD+R & the disks wouldn't finalize. I contacted sony support & learned that there's a list of approved brands.

DVD+R DL (Double Layer)

Verbatim/Mitsubishi 2.4x speed

DVD+R

Sony 4x & 8x

Ricoh 8x

Verbatim/Mitsubishi 4x & 8x

Taiyo Yuden Co. 4x & 8x

Hitachi Maxell 8x

DVD+RW

Sony 4x

Ricoh 4x

(The support person also said TDK works but it wasn't on the list)"The list" goes on for other types of Media (ie. DVD-R etc.) Visit sony.storagesupport.com for more info.

I have used only Sony disks without difficulty.

Note: the Double Layer disks are priced about 10 times the single layer disks, so you'd better have a good reason to use that feature.

Also, if you have an older DVD player, be aware that some will not read/play burned DVDs. I've lived this problem. It's frustrating, but I found a new, very inexpensive DVD player that works well.

One drawback... using the stand-alone option with a Digital Video Camera requires the signal to be converted to analog, then back to digital & there's certain to be loss of picture resolution whether it's noticable may be a matter of opinion. Fortunately, you can hook up your Digital Video Camera to your computer via firewire and utilize the Video Capture software by Nero, that I found to be very straightforward. I recommend using the DVD+VR software feature that allows you to insert your latest video footage into a previously burned DVD+RW disk that works in most all newer DVD players.

I didn't commit to converting my old VHS to digital until I found an older VHS tape whose image quality had detiorated so much as to be useless. What a loss! I had been intimidated by peers who'd told me to plan on spending upwards of 10 hours to edit a single hour of finished tape. The standalone operation & the quality Nero software bundled with the software make this Sony product a less-intimidating, worthwhile investment.

I have to admit, at first I was a little intimidated about entering the world of DVD writing and authoring. With all those formats out there I felt confused. And if you are like me, you have a lot of old VCR tapes around of your favorite shows that are taking up valuable shelf space in your living room. They weigh a lot too if you need to move them. But the Sony DVDirect VRD-VC10 made it easy and fun to reduce my video tape clutter. As a stand-alone recorder, all selections and options are available from the well-designed front panel and display. Connect your video player or camera to the back of the unit, push "Record" and start your VCR player. That's it. When the recording is done, you push a few buttons to finalize your disc and eject it. I especially like the "Auto-Play" feature which lets your DVD start automatically when inserted in a DVD player. The Sony unit also automatically formats your blank DVDs, a nice touch.

Contrary to other reviewer's experience on this page, I was able to use Memorex DVD+R discs, however, these discs will not display menu screen chapters created by the "Auto-Chapter" function. Your DVD player will still be able to locate these chapters manually, you just won't see them in the DVD start menu. As a stand-alone recorder the unit is limited to the "+R" (or "+RW") format. If you need "-R" for your DVD players, you might want to consider the newer VRD-VC20 which has compatibility with both formats. Curiously, the DVD+R discs I recorded would not play on my older Sony VAIO desktop, but worked perfectly in my Toshiba laptop and Samsung DVD player. Many recent DVD players read the "+R" format so you need to find out what format your equipment requires.

The DVD copied from a video tape in the Standard Play mode (for 2 hours of recording time) showed only a slight loss of color from the original tape. Copy quality is very good, overall, in my view. The Sony also records in a one-hour High Quality mode and 6 hour Long Play mode. The High Quality mode makes a slightly better looking recording but also creates some pixelation and skipping because of the large amount of data being recorded onto the disc. The Sony tech support person recommended using the SP mode exclusively because of these occasional HQ mode errors.

As a stand-along unit, the VC-10 only records with analog inputs. If you want to go directly from your mini-DV camcorder to the Sony, get the newer VC-20 model. Connected to your computer, the unit works with Nero 6 burning software offering many possible ways to use the DVD burner, including CD copying and video disc formats.

On the negative side, I received the "Recording Prohibited" message mentioned by other reviewers when attempting to copy tape from my Sony miniDV camcorder. I called Sony tech support and was told that the VC10 has problems with some digital camcorders (including Sony's models!), even when using the composite analog inputs on the Sony DVD burner. The support rep suggested that I exchange the VC10 for the newer VC20 which supports the DV format. Apparently this glitch is not being mentioned in any of the ad copy you see for the VC10, but it could prevent you from using the unit with your camcorder.

Overall, I like this unit a lot for its simplicity and ease of use. Sony has a good idea with the DVDirect and the price is not that much more than other external drives. The Quick Start Guide that comes with the unit is straightforward and very understandable. I was able to start copying my old video tapes within a few minutes of taking the Sony unit out of its box. If you want a DVD burner that can connect to your computer and also be used to make copies of VCR and camcorder tapes, you should seriously consider this model. However, if you have a digital camcorder, go for the VC20 instead.

(Dr. Simeon Hein is the author of Opening Minds: A Journey of Extraordinary Encounters, Crop Circles, and Resonance and the forthcoming Planetary Intelligence: 101 Easy Steps to Energy, Well-Being, and Natural Insight.)

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Unfortunately, I was expecting a bit morethis coming from Sony, but feel let down by mainly one major issue. Keep in mind that this may not matter much to you; but to me it is bothersome. Other issues are a nuisance but clearly less grave than the main one.

I waited for Amazon to carry this burner but needed this product before it showed up on their pages. So, I mail ordered it from Dell.

First the good stuffgreat packaging. Looks cool out of the box and next to your computer or video equipment. The buttons are easy to use and moderately intuitive. Still, I needed to refer to the Quick Start cheat sheet. Yes, this is not an Apple :).

OK, here goes....I really wanted to get the computer out of the way and this product caught my eye. Its nice to be able to hook up a DVD burner directly to your camcorder. I was foolish enough to think that my MiniDVs, which are digitally recorded on tape, would be copied over using a high quality conversion to a DVD. Not! The camcorder must output analog for the DVD to burn. The current scheme is good when you have analog camcorders. The fact that I cannot preserve decent quality (say, NTSC DVDs for my MiniDV tapes) has been a big disappointment for me. The only tool I have for measuring the quality is my naked eyeand as a computer graphics programmer I can tell the difference is huge. For example, my 8mm tapes play really well on the TV directly but show significant color saturation loss when I record a DVD on the VRD-VC10. Also, I see some artifacts such as color bands (discussed later in this review).

Now for some lesser but still painful problems. I stuck in a Memorex DVD+R and copied over a tape from my MiniDV camcorderno issues. Things just work as they should. I hooked over the USB cable to the Sony burner and backed up some files from the computer over CD-R. That went smooth but for one coaster (it complained of verification failure at the end of the copy). About 8 other CDs went though smoothly with the same procedure.

Copying over 4.3 GB of data onto a Memorex DVD+R failed in a different fashion. It said that the operation completed successfully, but neither the burner nor my local DVD drive on my laptop can read back what was written. I used the backup/restore feature of Nero for the above operation.

I don't like the UI of the Nero software. To copy photographs (4 GB on my laptop's hard drive), I sat painfully going through 30 folders and selecting every photograph to be copied over. There was no "Select All" for a given folder. What a shame! Once this repository was created, the copy onto DVD started and eventually failed due to reasons I cannot remember. It would've been nice if I could've pointed to a directory hierarchy and saidCopy the damn files (there was nothing in there but jpegs). But the software does not believe that you have anything better to do than baby-sit this thing. Once again, Nero is very non-intuitive, extremely poorly written software, and impossible to work with if you are used to pleasing user experiences like Apple & Co. offer. To add to the pain, my Nero CD stopped working. I called Sony to ask for a replacement (to install the software on my new laptop) and they wanted 20 bucks. It didn't make sense to put another 20 into the sink, and I am stuck with working with this product from my old laptop.

Until, there's something better on the market this may still be your best option. I think I am going to keep this product for exactly that single reason. 3 stars because this is not a lemon, but a step forward in helping consumers not get bogged down by the confusing space of DVD standards that Sony sems to have simplified by hiding the details from you. I really don't want to know if I am adding R's or subtracting R's from DVD's or CD, or make that R/W/RW/DL, etc.

Copyrighted media cannot be copied, and rightly so. But once I have a my own (home video)DVD created (by hooking a camcorder to the Sony burner directly), I expect to be successful in making a copy of that DVD using my computer as the playback. I placed the newly burned home video DVD in my computer and used the Nero software to play it back; that worked (keep in mind that the Nero MPEG4 player is quirkyit can hang and you'll have to kill it from time to time using the taskbar; it can show the first frame and not play, the play buttons on the DVD console on your screen may not always work, but sometimes double clicking on the movie screen seems to start the process.) But I have not had any luck in making a copy of my newly burned DVD by playing it on the computer and using the DVD copy feature of Nero software. Given that there are no copyright issues this should be a breeze for a home video, but I guess not. It is possible I am missing something and I'll update this review as I discover the workarounds, if any. I plan to call Sony (that itself should cost a Sony a few brownie points because I have read the manual, not just the cheat sheets, and most of the features in Nero software do not even bear a mention)to find out what the hell is supported. I could not use a two step imaging process either where you copy the DVD from the computer's DVD ROM to hard disk and then burn the image. BTW, I am using an 8 month old Dell laptop running XP; that is, a fairly up-to-date computer with tons of memory (2GB) and hard disk space (~100GB available). I do not wish to speculate what other problems people with standard configurations may face (like being out of memory or not having enough disk for temporary files).

I checked on the Sony product pagethere is no mention of the specific media vendors they support. The previous reviewer has been kind to share his findings; but picking up the phone to find out what kind of bread my toaster can toast seems like a headache, at a minumum.

I have updated this review ((1/3/2006)) since I originally wrote it up. Now the VRD-VC20 is out and I see some horror stories therenot being able to use Firewire to Firewire between a Sony Camcorder and the VRD-VC10, etc. I have called up Sony support and not been able to get clear answers to many of my questions. For example, when I transfer my 8mm tapes to a DVD using this box I get color bands. Sony support said that was the expected behavior as camcorders like the Sony DCR-TRV480, that I just bought for the explicit purpose of archiving my 8mm tapes, are really digital players that give you backward support for 8mm analog video. My original 8mm player broke down and I do not have any easy way to get another one. I guess I have to live with the color bands. Sony suggested that there exists commercial software that can help me get rid of these bands. The whole thing gives me a headache. The list of issues starts to stack up as you try and go deeper to solve any particular one. I am almost at a point of losing sight of the original problem I sought to solve. With a greater degree of exposure to tinkering with the VRD-VC10 I now feel comfortable in rating it to just 2 stars (I do not believe amazon will let me downgrade my own star rating). So you know this is 2 star if you get this far!

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Sony has apparently tried making a great hybrid product, but missed the mark. This product is NOT ready for primetime.

First the good stuff it looks nice; is solidly built; and if you simply want to record TV programs, old VHS or 8mm tapes, or download a program from TiVO, it will do the job. In the "stand-alone" mode it is easy to use.

Now the problems:

1. In the "stand-alone" mode there is no way to monitor what you're recording not as far as this drive is concerned. You would have to run another output from the source device (VCR, Tivo, etc.) to the TV. This may be easy for you, or it may not. It cost me a $50 gadget to do it.

2. Unlike the true entertainment center DVD Recorders, there is no remote control for this drive. A real annoyance if you try to start and stop while converting home movie tapes to DVD as I was.

3. There is no way for you to name the titles that you record in the "stand-alone" mode. The drive just names them TITLE1, TITLE2, and so on. And the DVD navigation menu is pretty poor too.

4. In the "computer" mode, problems get worse. My Windows XP computer does not recognize this device as a DVD drive. It is seen as a CD drive that is "inaccessible"! The Nero software that is supplied with the Sony drive DOES recognize the device and will record to it. But this means that you're stuck with using the Nero. Sorry, but Nero is not nearly as good as Adobe Premiere Elements that I'm using. And Adobe Premiere Elements (only the top selling DVD production software) does not recognize this drive. So you cannot simply play a DVD from this device on your computer, nor record one unless you use the Nero software.

5. Sony user guide has next to nothing about the Nero software. They expect you to read the Nero documents. And the Nero documents are not very well written. You get this? There is no way to playback or record to this device in the compuer mode without using Nero, but Sony wants you to go deal with Nero to figure out this software!!

6. Since the device has just been released, Sony website and their technical support people are not much use.

Conclusion Not Ready For Primetime. I'll be returning mine and will buy two separate drives one for the entertainment center and one for the computer. Yes, it will cost about $100 $150 more, but at least they will work today. This drive will be a good product when Sony fixes the above-mentioned problems.

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I was pleased with the ease of connecting the unit and its small footprint. I was not as pleased when I tried recording with Phillips media I happened to have. It is a little upsetting that there are only four manufacturer's media that work in this unit. C'mon Sony!