Home > Consumer Reviews > Panasonic DMR-EZ17K DVD Recorder with ATSC Tuner Black

I've been using my new DMR-EZ17K for around a week now. As expected for the price, it's got some features that are great, and some that are not. Here are the unexpectedly positive highlights:

(1) The ATSC tuner picks up perfect widescreen digital over-the-air channels, under conditions where an analog NTSC tuner can receive mostly only static and snow. This feature alone - even without the DVD recorder - nearly justifies the cost of this unit.

(2) The quality of the recorded image in LP mode (4 hours) is truly exceptional - it's nearly indistinguishable from the original 480p off-air HD digital signal. Kudos to Panasonic for this one.

(3) Using 480p outputs, and playing a downsampled off-air digital HD widescreen recording (EDTV), the recorded image quality nearly equals that of a 780p digitally-upsampled standard (non-HD) DVD. From 8 feet away on a non-huge screen, the image looks nearly as good as a true HD broadcast.

(4) Plays and/or displays JPEGs and MP3s burned to CD (but not DVD).

(5) With a certain amount of fiddling, and the use of the proper recordable medium (DVD-RAM), you can achieve chase-playback and "pause live TV" capabilities. While not nearly as convenient or seamless as a TiVo, it *can* be done with this recorder.

(6) With the use of the proper recordable medium (DVD-RAM), you can record one TV program while watching another (or the same) recorded program. Combine that with the 60-second commercial-skip button, and you might just never have to watch another commercial again. Nice!

Negative highlights:

(1) Panasonic seems to have maliciously omitted certain 'free' features merely for marketing parity or to cost-justify the other products in its lineup. Examples include an HDMI output connector and digital upsampling - features found even on $35 Chinese DVD players.

(2) Even though this unit includes an ATSC tuner, which picks up high-definition terrestrial signals by default, Panasonic has chosen to disallow the received high-definition signals from being passed through to a connected HD monitor. Live signal video quality is needlessly reduced/downsampled to 480p, which is standard definition (but digital) EDTV.

(3) It literally takes 10 seconds to change digital channels.

(4) The ability to record the free, on-air Dolby-Digtal 5.1 signal broadcast with certain HD programming seems intentionally crippled, perhaps for anti-piracy reasons. This recorder down-samples the 6 digital channels to only 2 (ordinary stereo) when recording. So you can never record off-air Dolby Digital 5.1 audio. You can, however, play it back when viewing commercial DVDs, using the built-in optical output (no cable included, of course).

(5) No digital inputs OR COMPONENT VIDEO inputs; the highest quality external video you can record is S-Video! There are also no digital video outputs whatsoever, although the component video output quality is decent, and there is a DV input for your camcorder.

(6) The manual is sketchy; while comprehensive and well-illustrated, it still contains some remnants of Asian grammar, and resolutely refuses to explain any usage models or DVD recording theory, focusing instead on acronyms and a context-free explanation of the minutae of each individual button and menu option. You will need to be thoroughly familiar with DVD recording and digital video concepts and theory BEFORE attempting to use this unit effectively, or the manual WILL NOT make complete sense.

(7) No digital zoom during playback means you can't always eliminate the horizontal or vertical black bars present on most widescreen analog (NTSC) broadcasts or recordings.

Overall, due to the ATSC tuner and superb EP recording quality, this recorder is a fantastic buy. I would buy it again.

After much research and in store model checkouts spanning Samsung, Sony and others I finally decided to go with this unit.

As many of the unit's advantages have been accurately covered in other reviews, I'd like to go into more depth regarding some of the unit's supposed shortcomings:


1.) Channel changing speed - having timed it, it takes some 2-4 seconds to change channels. This is about average for the three other ATSC tuners with which I've had experience. You simply can't channel surf the way it is possible with some NTSC and analog cable channels.

2.) Higher quality inputs - given the unit only records at 500 lines, having component video inputs wouldn't yield any better results. Super video connection is more than enough to get the maximum quality attainable.

3.) Start up disc motor noises - yes, the unit makes a few chirping noises starting up - just like a typical laptop computer does. Afterwards it is essentially dead silent. No big deal.

4.) Operator manual comprehension - it does take awhile to read through a fairly convoluted manual which has a number of cross references to other pages. However, it's a fairly complex unit and I found all the information for which I was looking.

5.) Fitting the picture to the screen - unlike my older, but also excellent standalone Samsung ATSC tuner, this unit doesn't have multiple zoom options to fit the picture to the 4:3 screen. This is probably the unit's major shortcoming, but much of the blame can be placed on the private broadcasters who intentionally send shunk images. The PBS stations are full screen on all channels.

6.) No HDMI - considering this isn't a Blue Ray resolution model, having HDMI does nothing to improve outputted image quality. I can't see why many buyers are so willing to shell out so much more for the EZ27 for a feature which is of no practical use whatsover with 500 line resolution. Neither the unit's DVD nor ATSC output is 1080 which unfortunately is due to legal copyright issues beyond Panasonic's control.

7.) NTSC tuner quality - the ATSC is better than any of the three other ATSC tuners (Samsung, Tivax) I have, and the NTSC also has better sensitivity. Understandably, the NTSC picture doesn't come close to the ATSC, but it's much better than the native NTSC in the Sony and Panasonic analog tvs for which I'm using this unit as a digital tuner, as well as competitive with my brand new 46" Samsung LCD HDTV's ATSC.

8.) Heating up - considering this unit only consumes about 14 watts it gets surprisingly warm and has a cooling fan. The operator's manual explains there is a visible error code given when the unit overheats. Not clear why getting warm, and needing a cooling fan is the case for a unit that only draws so little power.


All in all very pleased with the unit and glad I didn't waste my money on the HDMI EZ27 model. If it proves to be as reliable as other Panasonic products I've had, no real complaints. My Panasonic analog TV is a good 20+ years old with only an RF input which required an FM modulator for connectivity with this unit.

The box would randomly quit responding to the remote control commands and I would have to pull the AC plug and re-plug to recover. Even the unit's on/off switch would not respond when the box was in this condition.

Digital TV was fine. Recorder function was also fine. Just the hanging was too much.

Amazon made the return very easy with even a UPS pickup at the house ! Full refund including return shipping.

I will probably buy a HDTV through Amazon because of their excellent customer service and white glove delivery service.

I have been a loyal Panasonic user for decades. I bought this product in the expectation I could replace my DVD player, HD tuner and VCR. I am sadly disappointed. The unit is frustratingly bad in user functionality. Setting functions, changing channels, even powering on or off are painfully glacial. You have to wait a long time for it to power up and read the disc before you operate the unit. If you switch channels too fast it gets confused as to what channel it is on; the unit display will show one channel yet the TV displays another. The HD tuner is only 480p. The unit has unexpectedly hung to where you have to unplug the unit to reset it. If I could return this unit I would, but the Amazon affiliate supplier will not take it back. This is an extremely poor engineered product from Panasonic. It should be avoided.

UPDATE

This unit continued to have problems. I shipped it back to Panasonic for service. They replaced the digital board and fully tested it. Two weeks after getting it back it started to exhibit other problems including dropping the received signal and stopping in the middle of recording. Again, this is a poorly designed unit and should be avoided.

UPDATE II

Problems continued. I sent the unit back to Panasonic a second time. Within hours of receiving the unit it back it started to exhibit other problems. The product design is flawed.

I am one of the people who uses an antenna to get expanded digital programming for free, but I had no way to record/time-shift any of these programs. I did not want to pay for an HD recorder since my tv's are SD, and the SD digital-signal picture is free from interference and distortion and has consistent color, just minus the extra details of HD.

The only dvd recorder with an atsc turner and the ability to watch while recording (chasing playback), when using dvd-ram media, was made by Panasonic as-of mid-07. I have had mixed success with Panasonic products in the past: one mid-low end vcr and one tip-top svhs-editing vcr both broke just after the warranty period, while some St Swithen's Day blowout sale generics are still working perfectly -- other Panasonic devices are still performing well for me.

The 72 page instruction manual (only 4 pages in Spanish) seems clear, but after performing the step-by-step instructions for any given task, one has to read footnotes, which may continue for several pages, to see if all is as it appears. One still has no concept about how a recording will turn out as a program's screen proportions are dependent on the type of blank media inserted AND the original program's original proportions. The dvd player and/or tv that the recorded dvd is played back on may need to have the ability to manipulate the screen proportions, for example. Some things in the manual are wrong or misleading, eg the timer icon does not appear on the display until just prior (1 minute before) to recording, so there is no confirmation that a timer recording is pending; choosing different recording speeds for different programs to be recorded on a particular type of blank media may result in one of the programs to be unaccessible, though "successfully" recorded; when using VR speed to fill out a dvd, only the final program may be so designated; programs recorded to +r media don't take the titles you entered, but -r media programs do; and on and on. So far, only one timer entry did not record at all, even though the on-screen indication of proper setup was given.

However, when everything works right, the quality of the recording is better than analog tv, better than other dvd recorders I have seen, even in 4-hour mode, and as good as many dvd movies I have rented. Now if we could just get things to work right more than 50% of the time.