Recording programs are DVD player recorders are becoming extremely difficult to find, to the disappointment of many home theater owners. They are available in other parts of the world; they are just disappearing in the U.S. There’s a reason for this. It’s the movie studios and cable/satellite providers who are the culprits in this case. They put such restricting prohibitions on their products that it is no longer profitable to make or sell new DVD player recorders.

Copy Protection

It’s the home-theater aficionados who buy these recorders. They want to view programs at their leisure and in the comfort of their own theaters. The movie studios and cable/satellite program providers use copy-protection to restrict severely not only what can be recorded but also how it can be recorded.

In some cases such as with HBO, the copy-protection is done randomly. “Record Once” is used to permit recording to a temporary storage device such as a hard drive but not to a permanent one such as a DVD.

Also, HBO or other premium channels are “Record Never,” a copy-protection tool to prohibit recording on DVD. It’s not the manufacturer of the DVD recorder who has brought this about; it’s the copy-protection of the content providers such as movie studios, and it’s supported by court rulings. You have the right to record, but they have the right to protect their copyrighted content from being recorded. More often than not, you cannot make a hard-copy recording unless you use a DVD ripper or a DVD decoder.

With a DVD ripper or a DVD decoder, the copy protection can be stripped and the DVD can be copied. This is usually done on a computer where the DVD can also be burned onto a burnable DVD disc.

Cable/Satellite

Cable/satellite DVDs and TiVo permit recording of most programs for home theaters, but the recordings are made on a hard drive, not a disc, so they are not saved permanently. These are, of course, profit-makers for the cable/satellite providers. If you want to record “Record Once” programs, you’re forced to buy and pay for these added services of the cable or satellite company.

Should you happen to have a DVD recorder/hard drive combination (increasingly scarce), you can record on the hard drive of the combo but you can’t copy it to a DVD. The hard drive, of course, fills up fast, and you’re back where you started.

Blu-ray Disc Recorders

At the moment, standalone Blu-ray disc recorders are not available for home theaters in the U.S. The increasing use of TiVo accounts for this. Also, the movie studios are concerned about consumers recording high-definition video content in permanent form.

Home theater owners can obtain Blu-ray disk recorders in Japan. They are showing up in other countries. Most manufacturers of Blu-ray recorders don’t want the expense and hassle of dealing with the recording restrictions in the U.S.

Concluding Thoughts

Some TV, cable, and satellite programs that are popular with home theater owners are not affected by these copy-protection schemes. You can still record these programs although you can’t know ahead of time whether or not you can record them. It’s a matter of trying and failing before you can find out. The VCR era when we were able to record any and everything for our home theaters seems to be relegated to the history books.

So now, if you live in the U.S., you know why you can’t locate a DVD recorder for your home theater unless you shop in Japan or elsewhere.

- Dave

Larger than life 1080p projectors, Americas Home Cinema. http://davesprojectorworld.com

Tags: dvd decoder, dvd player recorder, dvd recorder, dvd ripper

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