Panasonic DMRE85HS Progressive-Scan DVD Player/Recorder with 120 GB Hard Drive Recording

I purchased this product in Dec 2004. Hard to operate. The TV guide feature did not work. Slow to startup. It locked up in March of this year. The display showed "PLEASE WAIT", and the machine did not respond to any buttons on the box or remote. Resetting the box did not work. Leaving it unplugged for days and plugging it back in again did not work.

I finally called Panasonic because I had about 50 hrs of programs recorded on the hard drive that I wanted to retain. This included Superbowls, bowl games, concerts, boxing, Survivor TV show finales, '06 Olympics, etc. which I had no way of replacing. They wanted $130 to repair the machine. I told them on the phone that under no circumstances were they to erase the material on the hard drive because the only reason I wanted it fixed was to be able to retrieve the stuff I had previously recorded.

I got the unit back on 8/6/08 after about 3 weeks at their repair center. The hard drive had been erased and all my programs were gone. I was infuriated by this and called the repair center the next day and demanded an answer as to how this happened. They blew it off as did the Panasonic customer service people. I then disputed the charge on my cc and have refused to pay them.

I WOULD NEVER BUY THIS ITEM NOR ANY OTHER PANASONIC PRODUCT. THEIR SUPPORT PEOPLE ARE USELESS AND SO IS THIS PRODUCT. I beat this DVR to pieces with a hammer yesterday and would do the same to the idiot who erased the hard drive if I knew who he was.

I bought my unit over 3 years ago when my vcr died. Did some research and liked what I read about this unit.

The DMR E85H is not as difficult to learn to use as some reviews state, and it's not as troublesome either. Mine has operated nearly flawlessly the entire 3 years I owned it. Earlier this year, I bought a second dvr,and went with the Phillips DVDR 3575H, since more Panasonic DMR E85s were not available at that time. The Phillips is a fine unit, but I definitely like the Panasonic MUCH better.

Last week, the Panasonic went completely dead.... a simple internet search took me to this page: http://vassfamily.net/projects/DMRE85H/dmre85h.html I followed the information on that page, and found the same 3 capacitors leaking on my unit. Easily replaced them myself, and got it back in operation, for less than $10!

This DVR was the biggest waste of money EVER. I wouldn't even give it one star, but I had to in order to save this review.

During the first year we owned it, it was in the repair shop for more than half the year. They repaired it once, we brought it home and it still froze up and wouldn't work. So we had to take it back and they ended up replacing the hard drive (which is what we told them was the problem the FIRST time we took it in). Of course both times it was in the repair shop they kept it for about 3-4 months. They should have given us a new unit since it was obviously defective (it stopped working after about a month the first time). We used it the 2nd year we owned it here and there, but we were afraid to count on it for anything since it still wouldn't tape things consistently (even though we had scheduled it to tape a few shows weekly). We got talked into buying a 2-year extended warranty for another $150 since we had so many problems the first year. That was another huge waste of money, because when did this machine die (yes, die -- it doesn't even turn on any more and we haven't even used it this year because of the TV strike)? It died on a Saturday, the day before the warranty expired but of course Panasonic wasn't open on the weekend so we couldn't report it until AFTER the warranty expired. I would NEVER buy another Panasonic DVR, particularly one with a hard drive, because they DON'T work.

I have had this unit for 2 years or more and it was great compared to using a VCR, in many ways, but I find that it isn't very reliable for recording everything I program in. Whether it is programmed by using the TV Guide listings or by putting in the time and dates myself, it will sometimes just skip a program I want recorded. I think that the causes can be that sometimes the TV Guide listing goes out or the tv channels do not match exactly what my channels are. Also, there are times when it thinks I don't get a channel that I do get and I have to go in and turn that channel on. If it would stay on, that wouldn't be so bad, but this thing is always having to be reset to get the channels back for TV Guide.

Why can't some company design a recorder that has a hard drive and dvd but can also use a cable card?

I bought my E85HS over a year ago and from the start have had problems with the TV Guide feature. Now as of March 2007 it does not work at all and with 2 hours into tech support it doesn't appear it will be working anytime soon. This TV guide access is an important feature of the programming of this machine if you desire automatic recording.
The first failure in 2005 the tech had me plug the unit directly into the cable line ahead of the Comcast cable box. Well that worked for a year and now nothing. The next call to the techs had me reset the unit using the up/down channel arrows and then I was told to wait 48 hours before even turning it on. Two days later nothing.
This unit plays well, it recorded well, and the manual though too intense was readable and a necessity to learn how to operate it.
I find after two years people are complaining across the board about most of the Panasonic DVR's not working with the TV guide set up. Panasonic has a better reputation than this. This should have been solved over a year ago. Yet I see here on Amazon that people are having the same trouble with the newer units as well.
The tech support was always accessible and appeared to really want to help but the engineering of this platform is HALF BAKED at best.
I would tell everyone not to buy right now until this problem is solved for all units.
Also a tip off came with my last call to Panasonic, the tech told me the next generation will have "digital tuners" so that you can access channels above 200. While that would be nice digital cable has been around for awhile now and Panasonic should have been on top of this not lagging behind. I thought for the money this unit would have access to all of the cable programming except HiDef but I was wrong and dissappointed.
I am also told that Panasonic makes the rental units for Comcast and I have had friends who have them report the same trouble and also that if their unit calls for a download of TV Guide during a recording event then the machine just shuts off in the middle of the recording.
Now today wouldn't you know it, I turned it on after writing this and its working again. Its set to program a recording tomorrow we'll see.
Its hard to tell if the fault lies with Panasonic, or TV Guide/Gemstar or Comcast. You have 3 vendors involved in this mess.