Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Thursday, 29 May 2008 10:58
Opinion and Analysis
Page 2 of 3
So what else can this recording Blu-ray baby do? Well, if you’re going to record in glorious high definition, surely you can record in 5.1-chanel Dolby Digital surround sound if the program is so broadcast?
Of course the answer to that question is yes, with Panasonic promising audio recording is done “without deterioration in sound quality or surround effects”, although this is surely because the broadcast is digital, as is the video.
Closed captions that are broadcast with television programming is recorded too, which can be a very handy feature whether you are hearing impaired, or not.
In addition, Blu-ray movies can be played back at 24 frames per second on the DMR-BW500, the way movies are played in the cinema. Most previous Blu-ray players were unable to do this.
The specs of the unit are impressive. To start with, unlike many previous Blu-ray players, Panasonic’s Blu-ray recorder is only 59mm tall.
It has HDMI 1.3 (for 4,096 grades of “deep colour” reproduction), DVB-T adaptive noise reduction, 1080p Up-Conversion with HDMI and silence technology. Up to 7.1 channel surround sound is supported in Blu-ray movies and if you have a 7.1 surround sound system to match, with support for Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD, DTS-HD Master Audio and onboard decoding of Dolby Digital and DTS.
The latest Blu-ray “profile” is supported too, which Panasonic calls “Bonus View”. This gives you picture-in-picture and audio mixing, letting you watch directors and actors appear “in front” of the movie for video commentary, instead of just audio commentary as is available on many of today’s DVD movies.
There’s also an inbuilt SD memory card slot. Sadly, you can’t record video direct to an SD card, with 32GB SDHC cards now available, but you can playback JPEG photos stored on these cards as a slideshow, as well as video recordings in AVCHD mode from a compatible SD-equipped camera.
Of course Panasonic has such a separately available video camera that records to SD cards instead of tapes, and the Blu-ray recorder lets you transfer that video either to the hard drive or burn it to a Blu-ray disc.
A built-in USB port also lets you display photos or play mp3 files on any USB memory stick.
Panasonic also have a technology called ‘VIERA Link’. It’s been upgraded to work more smoothly than before, and Panasonic say it gives you “single-remote control of Panasonic AV devices via HDMI and streamlining operation with features such as Pause Live TV, Direct TV Record and Auto Preset Download.”
In English, this means that your devices all talk to each other and can be controlled from any of the remote controls. An example is watching free-to-air TV on a Panasonic TV, through that TV’s built-in TV tuner. If you see something you want to record, pressing the record button on the TV’s remote will instantly switch the Blu-ray player on from sleep mode, set it to the same channel and start recording to the hard drive within one second.
So how much does it cost? Please read on to page 3.
