Gadgetman: Blu-ray Recorder in NZ, At Long Last!

Blu-ray Recorder in NZ, At Long Last!

I just read the news, on tone.co.nz no less, that Panasonic will soon be releasing a Blu-ray recorder with a 500GB hard-drive built it!  It’s about time that the NZ market had a real alternative to DVD Recorders, especially in this age of Freeview and Sky both offering HD programs.  And no, I don’t consider the MySky HDi or the MyFreeview HD boxes alternatives as they offer no way to get the content off the internal drives and onto something standard or for archiving.  The Panasonic fixes that by offering one box that give dual digital tuners, and allows programs to be recorded in HD to the internal drive and also copied to Blu-ray, which whilst not quite as good as an external HD or a network interface, is still fantastic.  Plus the 500GB is a nice step up in drive size and allows more recording than either the Sky or Freeview units.

PC World in Ausi have a nice review here which is worth a read, although it’s important to remember that the Ausi’s use a different format for the HDTV than we do, so importing one will just give you a very expensive Blu-ray player.

Price wise the unit is VERY expensive, at over $2000 in Ausi dollars, well into the territory of Home Theater PC’s (HTPC) which offer more flexibility and features, but can more complicated to use.

I envy whoever gets this to review at Tone, Gary, hint hint!!!