Philips PHILIPS DVDR3455H/37B Hard Disk/DVD Recorder

Reviewed by: DB_downtown

Duration of ownership:

Strengths: Numerous features and friendly tech support

Weaknesses: No "DUBBING"

Overall Evaluation: ONE MAJOR FLAW: I have had this unit [Philips DVDR3455H/37] for 6 weeks. Feature packed and menu navigation is ok [haven?t used others so I do not have anything to compare to] and Philips tech support has been very friendly and helpful. All this said, if you want a unit that will ?dub? [copy] from its internal DVD drive to its internal hard drive this unit is not for you. There are other similar units [Toshiba RD-XS52 or Pioneer DVR-520H DVD Recorders for example] that do offer this function and I only wish I had looked deeper before I purchased. I don?t know about Toshiba?s or Pioneer?s units or their tech support, etc. so I?m not recommending their products, just pointing out that their units will allow dubbing.According to Philips own presales personnel it does provide this dubbing feature, but speaking to their tech support it definitely does not and there is nothing in the owners/user manual referring to a dubbing feature. Tech support says this is to prevent copyright infringement. This seems somewhat ridiculous as it has copy guard to prevent copying [dubbing] copyrighted material from other sources to its inputs. I am able to copy to its HDD or directly to a blank DVD disc from my satellite dish [DirecTV], a VCR or another DVD unit. I would assume all of these sources? programming would predominantly qualify as copyrighted. Also, tech support says it does not know if there are any firmware updates planned [and doubts there will be any] to correct this. I purchased this unit believing it would dub from the DVD drive to the HDD but didn?t review the small print. Actually nothing was written about this feature and I suppose the reason I didn?t notice this is because this seems such an obvious feature [to me anyway] that I just assumed it would. It seems the only recourse is to purchase a separate DVD player to connect to this unit?s input. Alas, space required for yet another piece of equipment, more cables and remotes, more instruction manuals, etc., etc., etc. for something that this unit should do and the afore mentioned other units will do.I am very disappointed!