Sony KDL20S2020 - 20″ Widescreen Bravia HD Ready LCD TV with Freeview - Silver

February 29, 2008 | By Doug In Uncategorized |

Sony KDL20S2020 - 20″ Widescreen Bravia HD Ready LCD TV with Freeview - Silver
SONY 20IN 50CM LCD TV HD-READY INT DIG TUNER 16:9 HDMI IN

Customer Review: Get one in time for Christmas!!
I got mine just the other day and have to say I’m blown away, I cannot fault it personally it’s just a great display. Sony seem to be the leaders in the market at the moment and if you’re on the look out for a new TV you’ll not go far wrong with one of these!

Customer Review: Great TV…… but no added extras?
I bought this TV for me room, since I only have a very small amount of wall space. Having read the reviews, this one was the best one out of the whole 20″ range on Amazon.

The picture is brilliant. Even for a small screen size, details are still clearly seen. Sound quality is really good too. I also like the function on the remote control of switching between analogue TV and digital TV.

What I was a little disappointed with was that there was no sleep timer. I do often fall asleep with the TV on, but there is no function for the TV to turn itself off after a while either. Subtitles are hard to get to. No easy on/off button. You have to scroll though 4 pages of set up options. Im not hard of hearing, but I am considerate of others. Late night TV watching in my house wake everyone else up. It just really bugs me that I have to spend 45 seconds messing about with the remote, where on most TV’s and digi boxes, there is one simple button.

Apart from that this is a FANTASTIC tv. It was all agreed in my house that mine is the best. (I often come home and find people sitting on the floor on my room watching something)

If you want a great TV, and are not bothered about the things I mentioned, then this is it.

(it has two scart sockets too! Enough for a DVD player and a Nintendo Wii)

Mustek R580 DVD +R/RW Recorder
Customer Review: Good Unit but poor Support
The record quality is very good with 5 quality options. To get a 2 hour film onto a 4.7gb DVD the quality setting needs to be on SP (The middle setting) and the reproduction is as good, if not better than the original. The 80Gb Hard drive is ample for fast recording and transfer to DVD, but if you are looking for a unit to store your favorite films on, look for one with a larger hard drive. The control facilities are better than some DVD players, they include Fast forward up to 80x and fast backwards also. The audio is supoosed to be 5.1 but my particular machine has an audio problem. I get sound for around 1 hour after power up and then it disappears until disconnected from the power for 1 hour. I have contacted Mustek and they have told me to return it to the factory at my own expense for assesment and to include the purchase receipt. This was a Christmas gift so I have no receipt. I will probably scrap this and Buy a Panasonic or something that has a better after sales service. A pity because all round the machine it self is well worth owning as long as there are no manufacturing faults with it.
Customer Review: Cheap and cheerful HDD/DVD recorder
It’s an HDD recorder, it’s a DVD recorder, and right now, it’s 120 quid. That’s a pretty tempting proposition. But the example that I bought has had a few problems. On my old TV, I had a lot of trouble with crackly sound (only from this player, not from any other source) though since changing TV’s, the problem has gone away. More annoyingly, the discs that this player was burning all had CRC errors on them, making them impossible to edit on the PC. I’ve downloaded and installed a firmware update from Mustek’s website, and (touch wood) that issue seems to have been resolved. Be aware that firmware upgrades are not without risk, and Mustek’s website expressly says that any units which die during a firmware upgrade will not be covered by their warranty. The interface is pretty clunky. Many of the buttons won’t do what you’d expect them to when you’d expect them to. For example if you stop the DVD disc and try to switch to HDD it won’t let you. You have to have pressed stop twice before it will let you switch. This can all get pretty frustrating, and I wouldn’t expect anyone who’s not ‘technically savvy’ to be able to get to grips with it. If you’re expecting to record stuff to HDD then edit onto DVD (cutting out the adverts for example) then be prepared for a disappointment. This unit is nowhere near that clever. Dubbing from HDD to DVD is really just a straight copy. If you want to do anything clever with the results, then you’ll need to manipulate it on your PC afterwards using the likes of VobBlanker and DVDShrink. If your budget will stretch, then buy a better model. If it won’t, and you don’t mind odd quirks and firmware upgrades, then this unit is a lot better thn nothing at all.

Cooking Light: Microwave: 80 Nutritious and Tempting Recipes
List Price: ?4.99
Amazon Price: ?6.98
Used Price: ?0.44

Sony RDR-HXD870 - DVD Recorder With 160GB Hard Drive - With Freeview - Black
DVD Recorder / Hard Disk Drive with Integrated Dual Digital and Analogue Tuner 160GB capacity and series link recording function Player Type: DVD Recorder (HDD)/Digital TV Tuner Playback Options: DVD-R/DVD+R/DVD-RW/DVD+RW Recording (dual RW compatibility) HDMI: 1 (Output)
Amazon Price: ?209.00
Used Price: ?194.99
Customer Review: great recorder ….BUT
I love this recorder and have it hooked up to my Samsung tv which has freeview built in so I am able to watch one programme whilst recording another. The only issue I have is that the picture quality when watching freeview via the samsung tv is of better quality than via the recorder, the picture is not ’snowy/fuzzy it’s just not as bright and sharp. Can anyone advise, do I need some sort of connection? My family think I am the ‘techno head’ they don’t know that my info comes from Amazon reviews! so don’t let me down.
Customer Review: How do you watch one programme and record another
I have the recorder connected to a new Sony Bravia KDL-203020 which has its own built-in Freeview box. Can any one, please, give me a step-by-step guide to enable me to record one programme while watching another? The 170 page manual does not cover this most basic of functions. One week later :- I now have the answer. Both TV and DVD recorder have built-in “TV Times” programmes which are constantly updated. Use only the one built-in to the recorder and it will then be possible to watch one programme while recording another. The recorder manual is appalling. It should have a brief “Quick start guide” which is clear and logical.