Brian, go to the previous page for the refurb link. $399 USD.

Time to buy some HDNET programming, could be the only legal way to see it in Canada :lol:

You can buy these for as little as US$300 now...

http://www.nextag.com/serv/main/buyer/outpdir.jsp?doSearch=y&search=jvc%20d%20vhs

Quite a drop from almost US$2k a couple of years ago...

If anyone were in the market for an S-VHS deck, they should buy this instead.

hmm have to think about this one... if Rogers enables the 1394 ports and add the required software on the SA8000HD when it comes out so that I can archive some of the shows I want to save...then I'm there. Again the availability and price of D-Theatre tapes is a biggie too.

I like the idea of recording onto S-VHS if it lets you for digital programming (can anybody confirm this?) but I think they might be hard to find and D-VHS tapes might be pretty expensive.

yes big drop from the $2K price for sure.... if the SA8000HD has DVI enabled then I guess I could plug the JVC DVHS into the the component input I have the 3100HD in, otherwise have to switch around all the time and that ain't happening.

Brian, go to the previous page for the refurb link. $399 USD.
It was $299 US from Ecost. The price through BorderFree was $505 Canadian, all inclusive. I ordered it last Saturday morning, it arrived here Thursday morning!

Time to buy some HDNET programming, could be the only legal way to see it in Canada :lol:
Excellent! I had forgotten that they sell material on D-VHS!

Brian, The Samsung tuner I have does not have Firewire I/O, unfortunately. I actually bought the deck for use at home. S-VHS is nice, but you only get 2 hours on a cassette. HD recording/playback is just a really huge bonus :)

I just check out ecost and the price is now $399.

http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?DPNo=285107&adcampaign=email,ECOSTPG)

http://store.yahoo.com/hdnet-store/index.html

Got my refurb JVC D-VHS deck yesterday! It's in mint condition and I'm certainly pleased about that. Can't complain about the $505 price tag either!

Now what the heck do I do with it? :)

Welcome to the club!

I wish the Firewire equiped SA cable STB units would become available, but other than that I've been extremely pleased with my deck. The quality of SD recording is beyond belief, and the DTheater stuff is stunning. The opening of X-Men usually leaves people's jaws on the rug.

The Victor-JVC DTheater region 2 decks have been out in Japan since July. So, that might drive studios to begin releasing a bit more content.

According to the AVS forums Lucas was specifically asked by Fox to see if they could release Star Wars (I & II probably) on DTheater. He apparently said no. B*st*rd!

Ah well. HD-DVD is still just a gleam in the eye, so the JVC deck is the main source for pre-recorded true HD content for some time to come.

Gary

Picked up a refurb JVC deck as well. Damn that was annoying to get the remote working and the menu to come up. After some fiddling around all is good. Don't use the front svideo/rca video connections when trying to set the unit up. By default only the back ones work.

Now it's waiting time for the DVHS tapes. :x You'd think at least one video store in or around Toronto would have some. I just want to buy one while I wait for the other shipments to finally get here. It sucks just having it sit there taunting me...

Despite the included warning, some high-quality S-VHS tapes are reported to be better then JVC's D-VHS tapes by owners at AVS Forum.

The ecost price is back down to $295USD. Tempting :lol:

Futureshop in Burlington has D-VHS tapes. Hard to find, but they are there.

Can you tape OTA signals with this?

Can you tape OTA signals with this?
Yes if you have an OTA STB with firewire out.

It has an MPEG2 encoder in it so you can record regular video digitally via composite or s-video input. HD recording requires Firewire I/O though.

Futureshop in Burlington has D-VHS tapes. Hard to find, but they are there.

Burlington?! Oh man! I realize DVHS is a niche market and all but after a failed DVHS search of downtown and midtown Toronto over the past two days, I expect the Centre of the Universe to represent better than Burlington. Geez.

My tapes are sitting in Oshawa at Fedex. *sigh* Failed delivery attempt. Of course. Why can't companies use the Post Office instead? At least I'd be able to walk down to my local PO to pick up my package the next day. Why can't Fedex or UPS do the same instead of either staying home (my work location can vary day-to-day) or driving out to Oshawa or Finch & Keele? :-? Or have accurate delivery day and times so I could plan to be somewhere to receive the package? We can put a man on the moon...

This is why i used Amazon and not Futureshop to buy DVDs. FS uses UPS while Amazon uses the post office. Since i have a Superbox the postman just puts it in there.

Got my tapes. :D Sweet! Except for one dead one, Bikini Destinations. :x Had to be that one... *sigh* I recommend getting one of these units especially for only $500CDN total. The thing has it's weird little oddities but you can't argue with the output. :P

Of course I fully realize that they'll probably be a HD-DVD announcement tomorrow with availability by Christmas and a flood of movies. :-? Remember to send your thanks to me...

What does dead mean?

The FAQ over at HDNET has tips about not working tapes.

Which episode did you get. I might get the Las Vegas one, if and when i get the JVC system :lol:

What does dead mean?

The FAQ over at HDNET has tips about not working tapes.

Which episode did you get. I might get the Las Vegas one, if and when i get the JVC system :lol:

Dead means the tape doesn't play properly. The JVC deck either reports that it can't play the tape or it's constantly auto calibrating. There's some snow at first before either of those two messages come up.

The video is Bikini Destinations: Bahamas.

I'll check out the FAQ. Thanks. Hmmm... A firmware update?! The other HDNet tape I got Smart Travels: London works just fine. X-Men and U-571 play fine too.

X-Men and U-571 play fine too.

U-571, although only a so-so film, is a great example of the DTheater format and the potential of HD.

The underwater scenes show amazing subtle colour variations and few to no digital artifacts. Compare that to DVD.

Dark scenes and underwater scenes are a joy with DTheater.

Gary

X-Men and U-571 play fine too.

U-571, although only a so-so film, is a great example of the DTheater format and the potential of HD.

The underwater scenes show amazing subtle colour variations and few to no digital artifacts. Compare that to DVD.

Dark scenes and underwater scenes are a joy with DTheater.

Gary

Most of the movies out on DVHS are so-so films. I watched X-Men entirely and it looked pretty good. Very sharp, no film grain. I only watched a few minutes of U-571 to make sure the video worked.

I went out to Burlington yesterday to visit that Futureshop that has the DVHS titles. Man, what a tiny little FS! I still can't believe that *THAT* place had them and not any other FS locations in Toronto that I could find. Brutal. Ah well. Bought a whole whack of DVHS videos and will figure out which ones I want to keep over the next month. Good thing you can return stuff to any FS.

Despite the high quality, tape still sucks. I wish the powers that be would get off their fat asses and just make Blu-Ray the HD-DVD standard.

The Burlington FS is several times larger than than the one on Yonge Street. That FS doesn't even sell DVDs or music CDs.

The ironic part about the FS in Burlington is that they don't sell the JVC D-Theatre any more.

The Burlington FS is several times larger than than the one on Yonge Street. That FS doesn't even sell DVDs or music CDs.

Oh I immediately discount the Yonge St store and never bother to go there. I've got two big ones right near me and can regularly make trips to Markham and Mississauga locations. I'm surprised FS hasn't opened a proper downtown store yet.

And you'd think between FS and Best Buy that one of the chains would have some DVHS titles...

The ironic part about the FS in Burlington is that they don't sell the JVC D-Theatre any more.

I decimated half the DVHS display there.

I'm finding the JVC unit rather squirrely. The remote doesn't seem to have a really wide range. It seems you have to be pretty dead straight on to it when you press buttons. The white screen is annoying and jumpy. Ah well. At least the HD playback works flawlessly. If I bought new when it came out ($$$) I'd be furious at the quality of the unit.