Wharfedale DVDR24HD160F faulty

I know, it sounds ridiculous! I just wanted to see if these Vestels could do anything worthwhile. My experience of Vestel products in the past has always meant they get returned within a few days. I can't stand bad technology.

I've researched this more since posting, gavtech, and it looks like:

PIONEER DVR-LX60D - The KING of DVD recorders: but seems to be discontinued and very pricey now (and difficult to find in multi region).

SONY RDR-HDX970 - Excellent features as it's a Pioneer rebrand (but again, as it's no longer made, I can't find a new multiregion anywhere online)

SONY RDR-DC205 - useless: lacks many essential features and full of annoying flaws which is very surprising for Sony. Although the UI and design are nice.

PANASONIC DMREX83 - Best all round features, but I believe has worse jaggies than the Sony/Pioneer. Very good features and clear Panny UI though.

Any suggestions?

Oh, and Tosh are out as they're just Funai rebrands. LG will not come into my house either, maybe for a LCD monitor or microwave or as part of another companies product, but not anything else!
 
Hi I read your info on the Warfedale/ Vestel DVD/HDD recorders and would like to ask the following:


Does it have an annoying really bright blue led when on standby?

Do HDD recordings always resume when you play them (even after the unit is switched off)?

Do DVDs resume in the unit when the unit is switched off, and do DVDs resume when removed from the unit (as with Philips recorders)?

What's the recording time in SP on the HDD?

just don't buy one period. I've just returned two brand new units back to ebuyer because these recorders are rubbish. They cost £65.00 each on clearance which is an indication of their true value.

The manual is incomplete and inadequate.

The proceedure for recording and finalising DVD+r etc is ridiculously difficult requiring all sorts of setting and mode adjustments .

You have to reset everything each time you switch it on which is a pain in the ......

If you want a simple 'one touch' recorder with basic straightforward controls this is definitely not the recorder for you.

Do yourself a huge favour and buy something else which other users recommend:smashin:
 
I've been upto my old tricks again buying another faulty dvd recorder off ebay. This is my last one for a while as I don't need anymore now. This one for the grand total of about £20.05 minus quiddco.

dvdr24f.jpg


The seller stated that since coming back from holiday the wharfedale has been permantly stuckin setup and there is nothing displayed on screen. I guessed that they turned the power off before leaving for holiday and the wharfedale lost its settings. I also guessed that this would result in the wharfedale going back to scart mode and that the wharfedale had been originally configured to hdmi. So when he came back there was no picture via hdmi and he assumed the recorder was faulty. Anyway I managed to get it for £13.10 plus postage. I thought even if the recorder itself was faulty I'd get a 160gig hard drive out of it.

Feature wise it has a dvd+r/-r/+rw/-rw type optical drive. Thats what the specification says but on one of the pages it says only dvd+r/+rw so not sure which is true another page contradicts again.

It has front av inputs with only composite and no s-video (there is a reason for that) plus DV/firewire input. At the back two scarts. coaxial digital output, RF in and out plus 2 audio out phonos and a composite output. There is no analogue tuner.

Component appears to be strangely setup on the wharfedale if I'm reading the instructions correctly if you select interlace the scart gives out RGB but if you select progressive the scart gives out a progressive component output and the manual shows a picture of an adaptor cable that goes from scart to 3 phonos for component and you have to run a seperate audio cable from the two audio phonos to the tv (I bet it would also work from scart as well though). Not seen this arrangement before. Not seen the adaptor cable available to do this either. Neither have I seen any wharfedale owners asking where to get the cable . Very strange. The scart input socket is configured for RGB I believe but I've not tried this yet. No support for s-video on any sockets at all. The other socket is of course hdmi which can display 576p, 720p and 1080i. It doesn't do 1080p.

These wharfedales which are actually made by Vestel of turkey are very modular. You can get the same model with or without a hard drive plus a choice of hard drive sizes plus you can get it with either a analogue or a freeview tuner. The freeview tuner connects via s-video. This is one up on some of the Toshiba models currently sold which are only connected via composite but not as good as models with a RGB connection which I think my Panasonic has but I could be wrong. No dvd recorders as far as I know take the raw digital information from the DVB-T tuner for recording, only freeview pvrs do that. I've not seen a dvd recorder where you have the option to just record freeview direct to hard drive without choosing a quality setting.

General operation of the Wharfedale is ok. The remote layout isn't amazing but acceptable. The menu's themselves seem logical. Editing is basic and not very user friendly.

I have experience of 3 other dvd recorders, 2 panasonics which I own, a sony my mother owns and now this wharfedale. Its powered by a LSI logic processor but I don't know how this compares to other dvd recorders. No mention of divx or anything like that. It can play mp3s from disc you can't move them to hard drive.

You can dub files to a dvd while recording a freeview program and while watching a stored video. You can not do any editing at all while dubbing.

Splitting files is slower than the panasonic and deleting sections of files only skips those sections rather than removing the bits. If you dub to dvd the bits won't be recorded. So to fully reclaim hard drive space you have to delete the file rather than edit it.

From what I've read elsewhere if you replace the hard drive it will automatically prepare it, itself. You don't have to get any special discs or service remotes.

I bought this for a bedroom CRT set and for that purpose is more than satisfactory. I can't imagine using it in the living room because it just wouldn't be satisfactory for me in that regard especially on a 42" display which I have. Its certainly eccentric in design. Why limit recording to composite and s-video quality and then fit a hdmi socket with upscaling where the limitations of composite and s-video would be more striking. The reality is the hdmi socket is a pointless addition. Whats more annoying is the earlier vestel model that wharfedale rebranded which didn't feature hdmi output had RGB recording!

Good points.

Excellent quality samsung optical drive (reads iffy dvd video discs no problem)
160GB hard drive plus you can upgrade it yourself (not confirmed).
Has RGB scart passthrough when in standby.
My unit is multiregion. I tried my region 1 of 'finding nemo' and it played.
Good picture quality from dvds in scart RGB or hdmi.
Upscaling HDMI output to 1080i (not tried yet and only really useful for DVD playback)
Can watch dvds even NTSC dvds while recording from freeview.
Can watch video from HDD while freeview is recording to HDD and also dubbing from HDD to DVD.
digital video input for recording from camcorders.

Bad points.

No s-video inputs
Only records from external sources at composite quality.
Freeview recording is composite quality.
Internal fan triggered by heat sensor is quite noisy. Could be annoying if used in a bedroom.
Basic Editing.
Known reliability issues.
Wierd progressive component output option requiring special cable (confirmed).
Easy to end up with a black screen if you select various options wrongly.
No divx playback.
MP3 file manager is pretty basic.
No ability to move files onto HDD except actual recordings.
High power consumption (a revised version of this model reduces this but is also a major reliability problem in that it can struggle to come out of standby but you have the option to disable low power standby mode. Its normal consumption is about 38 watts and 24 watts in standby)

Summary.

A poorly designed product with regard important features, performance and usability. It gets the job done in a rough unsatisfactory way.

Please note the Logik LDVR1608 and LDVR808 are the same vestel origin as the wharfedale except for the styling differences plus the LDVR808 only features a 80gig hard drive. Not sure if the Logik models feature hdmi output.

Please also note I'm not recommending this set. Its working for me but if you have the money and don't like fiddling and playing about with gadgets like me you'd be better off with a higher quality, easier to use recorder like a panasonic or sony.

Argos do not provide good support for this unit. The manual is poorly written. Vestel do not provide good support. They are practically unreachable if you have questions as they are an oem supplier and aren't really interested in the end customer.
HI

I've got a Wharfedale dvdr24hd250 and the picture suddenly stopped showing- i still have audio. I saw on some other posts thats its about the HDMi setting but I don't have a HD TV to plug it into nor knwo how to fix it. I've took it to a local repair shop but they said the nain board had gone- but it will still record onto disc so with a picture so I don't think this seems to add up. I've got 80 hours of stuff stored on the HDD that I don't want to lose and I can't get in to see the menu to dub it onto disc- is it possible you could help?
 
Don't you know anyone who has an HDMI TV that you could use to switch back to normal mode (if that is the problem)

You could always buy a HDMI lead cheap off eBay and use a display model in a shop to do it. If an assistant asks, say you are checking compatibility/picture!

Should be in the manual how to change it
 
I've got the HDMi lead that came with it so I can ask a friend who has one but I'm not sure thats the problem or how to change the settings if its got no picture?
 
I've got the HDMi lead that came with it so I can ask a friend who has one but I'm not sure thats the problem or how to change the settings if its got no picture?

Hi
To get back to normal viewing
1:On the remote control set vidoe source to Scart showing on display
2:Then press Setup
3:Then press Down arrow once
4:Then press Right Arrow once
5:Then press Down arrow twice then Select
6:Then press Down arrow once then Select
This will return you to the setup screen for video which should be set on Interlaced

Good Hunting
Dave B
 
Just recovered a Wharfedale DVDR24HD160F from my dad. He's replaced it with a new Panasonic model, as the Wharfedale was playing up.

He had a DVD-R in the machine, and the front panel stuck in "Preparing".

I managed to extract the DVD, and got it to play a DVD, but when I tried the DVD-R again it pulled the same trick. (The disc was ok though, as it played fine in my Sony). I have no instructions, so not sure if it supports DVD-R?

Anyway, I'm having the 160GB drive out of it, to use in another project, but I was going to skip the rest.
The boards and DVD drive seem ok though, so wondering if anyone wants it? Happy to send it to a UK address for the cost of postage. PM me.
 
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Hi
I would love to have it and willingly pay for post and other expences you have to lay out
I have the same model also not working but may be able to get one working out of the two
Best regards
David Brown
Manchester
email = Removed by moderator.

2002th, Please contact Gavtech for the email address
 
Just recovered a Wharfedale DVDR24HD160F from my dad. He's replaced it with a new Panasonic model, as the Wharfedale was playing up.

He had a DVD-R in the machine, and the front panel stuck in "Preparing".

I managed to extract the DVD, and got it to play a DVD, but when I tried the DVD-R again it pulled the same trick. (The disc was ok though, as it played fine in my Sony). I have no instructions, so not sure if it supports DVD-R?

Anyway, I'm having the 160GB drive out of it, to use in another project, but I was going to skip the rest.
The boards and DVD drive seem ok though, so wondering if anyone wants it? Happy to send it to a UK address for the cost of postage. PM me.

Thanks for the recorder managed to get one working out of the two everything on it seems to be working Ok touch wood again thanks and Best Regards
Dave B
 
I have just acquired one of these - I'm beginning to regret it having read these pages! Does anybody know where I can get a user manual for it please?
 

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