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Sony RDR-HX710S DVD Recorder with 160GB Hard Drive Best Buy
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Price - £249.99 Correct as of 27/09/07
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5 Reviews for Sony RDR-HX710S DVD Recorder with 160GB Hard Drive
Wonderful specifications, but atrocious reliability - 28 Aug 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful.
Even if you read no further than this first paragraph, just bear in mind that I have had SEVEN Sony DVD recorders over just 18 months and ALL of them have developed faults. The RDR-HX710S was one of the models I owned, and its review is included in the saga below.
MACHINE NUMBER ONE
Sony Recordable DVD Player RDRGX300
This was great...for 6 months, after which time it developed a fault. It would record to disk, but when you called up the title list, it would not display the titles, appearing as if the disk were empty, although, when you examined the disk surface, you could clearly see that a recording had been burned to the surface. I called Sony's customer 'Help' line (and I use the term loosely). A bored-sounding operator told me that they had never heard of that fault and referred me to Sony's service centre. The engineers kept the machine for ages, and still couldn't fix it. Finally it was returned to Amazon and a refund issued.
MACHINE NUMBER TWO
Sony RDR-HX510 DVD Recorder with 80GB Hard Drive
It was a lovely piece of kit and I was very happy with it...for 4 months, after which it seized up: freezing and going into recovery mode.
Another call to Sony resulted in the unhelpful diagnosis of a generic 'hardware fault,' and the suggestion that I take it to a service centre. As the Manchester one had closed by then, and the nearest one was now in Liverpool, I declined this directive and opted instead to return the machine to Amazon.
MACHINE NUMBER THREE
Sony RDR-HX725 DVD Recorder with 160GB Hard Drive
Allegedly similar to its predecessor, but with a bigger hard drive.
I didn't really like this model. Although it had a hard drive that was twice the size of the previous one (a massive 160 MB) the extra capacity seemed to have been provided at the expense of many of the features which made the previous model so good.
Gone was the full-screen edit facility, with the playback being in a much smaller screen within the main screen. The rest of the screen area was needlessly given over to dead space. There were other drawbacks:
Gone was the x2 FF and RW option of the predecessor, which I very much liked, and used a lot. Now the first setting was 1.5. Not too bad a speed, but unfortunately rendered next to useless, because playback is not smooth. The predecessor when running in 2x FF would playback the recording at twice the speed, and ran smoothly, whilst also allowing you to hear the double-speed sound track. This was a lovely feature for the purpose of quickly, accurately and easily finding certain points in a recording. The new machine only played back at a slower x1.5 speed, and 'jumped' annoyingly every few frames or so as it did so, making the playback so jerky as to be unwatchable, if you don't want to get a headache.
NO RECORD PAUSE!!!!!!!!! Now this is the most bizarre of all the feature cuts made with this supposed upgrade. There was no REC PAUSE button anymore. Again, for the purpose of editing out adverts, this is a command very commonly used (you can't use the REC STOP function, because this will then break up the programme into what the machine sees as entirely separate recordings, so that a movie for example would be cut up into as many as seven separate recordings, which of course don't playback consecutively. Therefore, when making a direct recording, you would naturally use the REC PAUSE button at the start of the ad break. This is usually my preferred method of cutting out ads, rather than using the edit facility afterwards, as using the REC PAUSE button gives a seamless edit point in playback, with no momentary freeze, as with recordings edited later in edit mode.
Timed recordings
The set up for this was the most complicated and least intuitive I have ever encountered on any television recording device. The menu was very hard to navigate, and when you had finally managed to set your recordings, not all the details were displayed for them, so it was very hard to go back and review your timer settings. Even after several weeks of using this machine, I could not get the hang of this feature to the point where I could set a timer without thinking about it (as I have been able to do with every other VCR and DVD recorder I've owned).
Nevertheless, I persevered, not wanting the hassle of having to send back another machine. However, I needn't have given that thought because any decisions on the matter were taken out of my hands when after less than a fortnight machine number three developed a fault. While trying to record to the hard drive I got an error code of C:13 and a message saying 'The Disc is Dirty.' Now sometimes you might expect to see that when recording or dubbing to a disk, as the Sony machines seem to be hyper sensitive, and even brand new disks straight off a spindle are rejected, but to see this message pertaining to the device's hard drive was obviously worrying. I deleted a few recordings from the hard drive, wondering if the fact that the hard drive was nearly full had anything to do with it, but it made no difference. Perversely, although the machine wouldn't allow me to record anything new to the hard disk, it did let me dub programmes from the hard drive onto single disk. However, even this facility was short-lived, and soon it was exhibiting the same problem as my first machine: namely dubbing to disk, but the titles not showing in the Title List, so the recordings couldn't be accessed.
MACHINE NUMBER FOUR
(Our second) Sony RDR-HX 725 160 GB hard drive DVD recorder
This one lasted just four weeks.
Exactly the same fault as before occurred. I didn't know whether to take an axe to the device or sit down and cry.
When I'd composed myself I contacted Amazon and opted for a different machine: Sony RDR-HX710S DVD Recorder with 160GB Hard Drive.
MACHINE NUMBER FIVE
Sony RDR-HX710S with 160 GB Hard Drive (No Freeview)
This one I liked. It was basically the Sony RDR-HX510 DVD Recorder with 80GB Hard Drive, only with double the capacity. I loved it...for the three weeks it worked. When dubbing to disk suddenly everything crashed and I got the by now nauseatingly familiar error message: C 13:00 'The disk is dirty.'
I returned the machine to Amazon, who agreed to a straight swap for an identical machine: by then our sixth Sony DVD recorder.
MACHINE NUMBER SIX
Sony RDR-HX710S with 160 GB Hard Drive (No Freeview)
This one lasted the longest of all of them. At nine whole months this was, for Sony, very impressive. And at least this time I had a little variety with the breakdown, as this time round I got some weird grinding noises when the machine was trying to dub to disk, which served as a warning that things were about to go belly up...AGAIN.
Machine returned to Amazon and a straight swap agreed.
June 2007
MACHINE NUMBER SEVEN
Sony RDR-HX710S with 160 GB Hard Drive (No Freeview)
I was worried when right from the outset, dubbing from HDD to disk was accompanied by the same grinding noise at the previous machine, but it did seem to dub OK...for six weeks. Then, surprise surprise, whilst dubbing the machine switched itself off, went into recovery and then powered up and displayed the C 13:00 'The disk is dirty' message, with which I was more familiar than I wanted to be.
I sent the machine back to Amazon and am currently awaiting a refund.
Now if you're wondering why I stuck with Sony, it wasn't by choice, believe me. It's because I HAVE to. When you make a recording on a Sony machine, it has to finalised on a Sony recorder before you can play it in any other device. As I tend to record lots of TV series, I'll often have multiple episodes on one disk, and not finalise the disk until it is full up. Hence when the machines break down, as they ALWAYS do, I'm left with dozens of unfinalised disks, which are in effect useless unless I can finalise them on a Sony DVD recorder. Clever on Sony's part, huh? Absolutely INFURIATING on mine. I'm seriously thinking of buying a bottom-of-the range Sony DVD recorder: the very cheapest they do, to keep as a standby, so that when machine number eight turns up its toes, I can use the back-up device to finalise any disks which still need it, while I use my refund from Amazon to buy a PANASONIC!
This may be a long review, but it reflects the prolonged saga I've had with these useless machines. It's very very frustrating, when you can see that these machines are for the most part excellent in terms of design, but atrocious when it comes to reliability/longevity. On that basis I am sorry to say that I would definitely NEVER recommend a Sony DVD recorder, and resent the design element which necessitates me being locked in to buying this brand over and over again.
2 Years trouble free recording - 02 Aug 2007
0 out of 0 found this review helpful.
This is a fantastic piece of kit. I've had it now for two years with no trouble apart from it locking up every now and then, which is rectified by switching it off at the socket.
This is with out doubt the best piece of hardware I have ever bought and use it all the time.
Manual now included! - 13 May 2007
7 out of 7 found this review helpful.
The comments in the other reviews (that there is no English-language manual included) are now I think out-of-date. I guess Amazon has reacted to this, as mine came with a pack of continental manuals AND a separate English one (and both UK and continental two-pin power cords).
The manual is hard work but mainly because there's so much function there - and so many choices to make. I only watch via Sky (FreeSat) - poor UHF TV signal here, and no Freeview. I recommend you set it up first to watch UHF, as if you go straight to Sky-connection you may not be able to see the set-up menus.
And getting it to work so it records automatically when the Sky box switches on (using the Sky AutoView function) was tricky: as the manual says, you MUST use an all-pins-wired SCART lead (but how do you know if you've got one?). Contact johnandgill@cole2.com if you can't make AutoView (Synchro Recording) work and I'll tell you how I fixed it (by ignoring the instructions - may work for you too!).
Never Looked Back - 16 Aug 2006
12 out of 12 found this review helpful.
I've had this HDD unit for 4 months and have had absolutely no problems with it. Setting the timer is easy and picture quality is great. No problems dubbing to DVD either. Its great not to have to worry about looking for a VHS tape anymore when you want to record something in a hurry. The editing function is simple too. The lack of freeview isn't a big deal as I have Sky anyway. Just brilliant.
UK Manual - Help - 24 Jul 2006
16 out of 16 found this review helpful.
The 'No Freevew' version of the 710 is intended for the European market, hence the European Manual.
If you do not want to spend the £8.99 and are happy to print your own manual then you can download it from here:
http://support.sony-europe.com/manuals/manuals.asp
Just input the model etc and download the pdf file. The manual is the same for both the HX710 and UK HXD710.
Great machine, with or without the freeview.
Hope this helps others in this situation.