Rio Go Video R6530 DVD Recorder

I bought this because of the low price, the rebate ...

Strengths: inexpensive

Weaknesses: cheap, locks up, sluggish and unintuitive interface, picky about media, short warranty

Summary: I bought this because of the low price, the rebate at ecost, and the fact that i recognized the brand from a few years ago. Big Mistake. If I could return it, I would. As it is, I think I've just paid 2x + average cost for a plain player.

Just like my old Archos mp3 player accepts commands slowly, this player's user interface needs a cup of coffee. To make matters worse, the remote only seems to work when pointed slightly away from the unit, and neither the recorder nor the remote has any indicator to show that you're actually getting the buttons pressed to it's liking.

When I got the recorder, I picked up a spindle of basic DVD+r media to go along with it. The disks burn nicely in my PCs burner, but this recorder does not recognize them as blank media. I somehow convinced it to record on one, and it did. When I was done it refused to recognize the disk it had just burnt. So far, this has happened once with better media, but I'm half certain it's because I ran too long on my recording and it 'fell off' the end of the DVD-r.

After you record something, you have the option to go back and add chapter marks and an index image. Navigating back and forth to get just the right frames lined up presents multiple challenges. The first of those challenges is that you use the play button to mark the frame. This means that you cannot use it to navigate to the frame - you only have the pause, slow advance and fast advance buttons. Even better, if you already have the frame queued up and hit the edit button to bring up the options, the player starts advancing the recording again. As a coup-de-gra, half the time the recorder will not even show you the video while it's doing this. It flips to a generic govideo screen and you must jog back and forth a bit to get the video back so you can identify the frame and tag it.

Oh, and did I mention the way it likes to lock up during editing? The only way I've been able to free the unit up was to eject and reinsert the recordable disk.

As a final kick i the pants, after recording a two hour special and going through the hassle of adding a title frame and chapter frames, the playback gets worse the further I go through the disk. Towards the end there are consistant and noticeable jitters. Someone moves, suddenly they jump back, then jump forward to where they were, and the scene just plays on. Theoretically it could be a media problem, but unlike my first spindle of Fry's house-brand discount specials, these are quality disks. I'll try one more type before I completely write off the box, but I'm not hopeful.

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I purchased this unit for $119.95 after $20 rebate ...

Strengths: Low Price Ease of Use Multiple Inputs and Outputs Great Video

Weaknesses: Reverts to RF input in standby or power-off

Summary: I purchased this unit for $119.95 after $20 rebate. This price blew everyone else away so I didn't expect much but was surprised that it works so well and has as many features as it does. A multitude of inputs and outputs and very simple recording procedure.

Video quality is great in the second to the best setting (2 hours per disc)

Overall I am very pleased with this purchase and have had no problems to date.

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I just sent back my second GoVideo R6530. Consista ...

Strengths: Price, feature set, jpeg-capability, good image and sound

Weaknesses: Small twitchy remote, unit slow, unreliable burning

Summary: 2004-01-12 14:47:54 I just sent back my second GoVideo R6530. Consistant problems of unpredictable frequent repeated skipping, sometimes several chapters at a time. First one did it on two different brands of DVD+RW blanks, including the one that came with the unit. Thought it was just a dud unit and sent it back to the vendor for a replacement. Second one the same. Tried it with 4 different DVD blank brands, including RiData blanks (the same as came with the unit) and it was even worse. I don't know if it was a bad batch of units sent to the vendor or what.

My demands on the unit are not that great - copy some VHS tapes to DVD and some movies from TV (got a PERFECT copy of The Day The Earth Stood Still off of satellite - GREAT movie! - that is, until the last 15 minutes where the whole story comes together - when the DVD began hanging up, then skipping all over the place making it unwatchable - oddly enough, when I played it in reverse, it went just fine - but that's a tough way to watch a movie!).

Overall, the feature set of the unit was fine. I particularly liked the JPEG capability (it showed all 1000 of my last trip images just fine, even though they were divided into subdirecties - although it didn't obviously recognize the subdirectories, it just continued from one directory to the next without a break. Didn't particularly like the remote. It was small with small, closely spaced buttons, twitchy, had to be aimed directly at the receiver, and the unit often didn't always give feed back ("...I pushed the button...is anything going to happen...? - Oh - there it goes..."). There is one button that doesn't appear to do anything at all. I sent a detailed email to their tech support about my problems and got an automated reply of Frequently Asked Questions. Telephone help was quick and responsive but not much help either ("...never heard of that before..."). They did offer to immediately send me a replacement unit, but, after two bad ones, I decided to try another brand.

Finally, I can't say the looks of the unit particularly excited me - a full mirror front with a tray and a couple of buttons, one of which turns of the unit completely, as if it were unplugged (rather than just a standby mode) which was a pain if I had turned if off and forgot about it. Just when I get into couch potato mode I realize I have to get up agan to punch the On button. Not serious beefs though. Clearly there's a problem with my particular units - no one would deliberately sell something like this that simply doesn't work. However, with that said, I feel I can't chance it again. Too much of a pain. From now on, if I can't find a (positive) review of it in a popular A/V magazine, then I won't get it.

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I thought I would give Go-Video a shot. I was very ...

Strengths: Price

Weaknesses: Very erratic performance. Would waste discs upon Finalizing. Remote control not responsive. Timer programming clumsy and frustrating. No One Touch Recording.

Summary: I thought I would give Go-Video a shot. I was very optimistic with my purchase. After three frustrating months between a touchy, unresponsive remote control, and a slow response between recording and monitoring modes, and erratic behaviors, I returned this unit back to CostCo. The most frustrating example was to record a two-half hour movie only not to Finalize properly and generate a "Read Disc Error". Must have dumped 5% of recordings, estimating a $25 loss in DVD+R discs and my time. The unit does not have an One Touch Record feature. Making recordings was difficult when a known time frame could have been possibly set when burning a disc. A user would have to babysit a burning one hour program on a six hour record mode without wasting potential disc space.

I got a Philips DVDR 75 and been extremely happy with its user friendly features and reliable performance.

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Everything included to start recording including r ...

Strengths: Easy to set up. Excellent owners manual with good illustrations. Excellent picture quality using component video cables. Front panel face clean.

Weaknesses: Remote control small with a lot of buttons. Will take some time to learn all functions.

Summary: 2004-01-06 07:35:37 Everything included to start recording including rewriteable disk. Quality of recording excellent using two hour and 3 hour speed modes. Very clean front face with many digital front readouts. Has all needed plug capabilities for any combination of hookup's for highest quality of picture out. Great price for all features included. Has all features and quality of much higher priced recorders. Records in most popular format but plays all disk formats now available.

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So, far it seems to be more compatable with all my ...

Strengths: low price, stereo tuner, stylish, recorded dvds played on my other two units, can work on older tv sets without audio/video inputs. records and play great. plays all of my recoded dvd from my others.

Weaknesses: remote control dosen't work very far away. my remote might be flaky or the new batteries are old.

Summary: So, far it seems to be more compatable with all my other recorders and player, which I've experienced problems between them. I believe that most of the negative reviews was operator errors. I sure hope so. I thoght my first one was a pos in the beginning, but figured out I was trying to operate it like a vcr. Dvd recorders are more complex and you can lock them up by pressing too many buttons repeataly.

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