Home > Consumer Reviews > Pioneer DVR-630H-S Ultra slim DVD-R / DVD-RW Recorder, 250 Gb HDD - Silver

I purchased this machine 2 months ago as an update from the Pioneer 420 (wanted a bigger hard disc drive). First of all the picture quality is a big improvement over the 420. That's not to say that the 420 was bad, far from it, just that the 630 is an improvement. The menu system is still basically the same, just tidied up. The 250 Gig hard drive, however, is a huge jump. At the standard setting (ie SP approx 2 hours per dvd), there is 110 hours of space for your recordings. I have come nowhere near using up this amount of time, but I am sure I will eventually. I will certainy try. One main addition, I suppose, is the Guide Plus system. This is a 7 day EPG that you can use for setting your recordings and so on. Its looks very good, but to be honest, its just a glorified Videoplus. It did work perfectly with my sky box. However, I have now changed to cable and I am having trouble getting it to work with that. A minor quibble. There is one downside, though, and that is that my box has crashed 4 times in the 2 months I have had it, and all 4 times was when I was in the Guide Plus menu. The machine wouldn't quit out of the menu, but doing a shutdown on it resolved the issue. I can honestly say that that is the only problem that I have had with the recorder. On a positive not another thing worth mentioning is that this machine will play almost any disc you throw at it. I have had no problems with any discs at all. And, as a plus, it will record in NTSC format if you desire it. Very handy.

All in all, I have no hesitation in recommending this recorder. I am more than happy with it. If this one is too expensive for you, then have a look at the 530. the only difference between the 2 machines is the size of the hard disc. 250 gig in this one, 160 gig in the 530. Highly recommended.