Kreisen DVR-530S Progressive Scan DVD Recorder
By: Kreisen Average Rating: 4.0 Total Reviews: 4
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 On: 2006-01-06
I began to have a serious problem (no audio) with my KREISEN DVR-530C a few
months after purchase. I e-mailed warranty service at Encross and shipped it
to them at MY EXPENSE ($20) on November 12, 2005.
On November 17, 2005 Encross wrote: "We received your DVR yesterday, and we
will probably be testing it out this afternoon or tomorrow. Well get it back
to you as soon as possible."
On November 28, 2005 I wrote: "Did you test my DVR?"
On November 29, 2005 Encross wrote: "Yes, we tested your DVR and found it
definitely had a problem. We will be sending you a replacement in the next
couple days."
On December 11, 2005 I wrote: "I have no new information from you since
November 29. When could I expect to receive my DVR back?"
On December 12, 2005 Encross wrote: "Our repair center has it, and is working
on it (along with many others). We hope to get it back this week, and will send
it to you as soon as we can."
On December 18, 2005 I wrote: "You received my DVR for repair/replacement
more than a month ago and it seems that I have no chance to get it back
before Christmas. I will write customer reviews about the Encross/Kreisen
bottom quality and the worst warranty service."
On December 20, 2005 Encross wrote: "Weve had some problems getting parts
from Korea. We are hoping to get your player back this week...
January 5, 2006 - I still did not get my DVR back...
THINK WELL before buying any Encross/Kreisen products........
 On: 2005-12-30
Having only a little vertical space left before the stack of components hit the top of the entertainment center, I was immediately attracted to this model by the slim design. When I found it for $130 with a $50 mail-in rebate, I knew that for $80 it would be hard to go wrong. I was right! What a great little unit for the money!!!
The 530S has just about every feature you could hope for, including editing recordings, playing MP3s, displaying JPEG photos, etc. I was initially surprised at the incredible video quality it provides when playing well-made commercial DVD movies. It is much better than our old major name brand DVD player which cost a lot more (and all that unit does is play DVDs and CDs).
When recording from satellite in the 2-hour-per-disc mode, there is virtually no difference in quality between the original and the recording. There is a noticeable loss in the 4-hour mode, but it is still way better than tape. I havent tried the 1-hour and 6-hour modes. I suspect that at one hour per disc it would be essentially perfect.
The only problem I have encountered is that even though Kreisen refers to the off mode as "standy" it forgets what input it was on before it was powered down. It needs to be on rear s-video in my setup, which takes three presses of the AV IN button to re-acquire. I thought perhaps this would be addressed in the firmware upgrade, but it refuses to install the firmware from CD. Maybe it already has the latest version?
Construction seems solid, much nicer than some other low-budget models I have seen. I feel fairly confident that it will last a while. Theres amazingly little info floating around the Web on this unit. I cant even find out who makes it. Most of the cheaper models seem to be made by Lite-On, but except for the limitation of recording to DVD+R/RW media, I dont see many similarities with those units.
I cant imagine anyone would be disappointed with this unit and feel quite comfortable recommending it.
 On: 2005-08-17
I bought this device in early August 2005 and I expected a few typical difficulties with it; I have never encountered a dvd recorder that did not have technical quirks. I observed the dvd recorder freezing in the middle of my recording sessions at times so I had to often unplug it, replug it and decide whether to let the recorder recover the current session or just erase it and start over. I like the recovery option and the append option to continue where I left off at my desired point after did a little trimming first using the split title feature.
Now you see why I mentioned in my review title that this device makes up for its folly.
To make a long story short, this device is worth the investment because it has good features that can sort of keep you from wanting to throw the unit out the window.
;->
On: 2004-12-08
I love this beautiful DVD recorder. Its a great bargain for all the rich features it has. This is the only DVD Recorder in the market I know of with both FireWire & USB, which makes connecting & playing digital pictures and movies from camcorder so easy! The DVD recorder is so slim that I thought it was a DVD player at first. It works beautifully and looks even better below my KREISEN LCD TV (32" HDTV-Ready). I would definitely recommend this products and hope others find this hidden gem Amazon.
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