We bought this unit to supplement our TIVO which, because of its single tuner and inflexible program guide, has difficulty recording both cable-scrambled and unscrambled channels. The 640H is directly replacing a VCR that we used to record scrambled channels and, for the moment, will give us a second DVD player.

This is our first experience with a DVD recorder and I suspect that, since we don't do home video or want the jukebox, we do not need many of the included features.

One of the reasons we chose this particular unit is that it DOES NOT depend on either the TV Guide video input or a TIVO-like service but rather, has its own programming options very much like a VCR. Note, though, that for scrambled channels, both the cable box AND the unit timer need to be set.

For us the DVR-640-H-S does the following:

-Records cable-box scrambled channels directly into the unit's channel 3 and then onto the hard drive (HDD) or a DVD. Again, the... Read more

I dont think the previous rating can be taken seriously, because shipping problems should not affect the product rating.

Having owned 3 previous DVD recorders (Philips, Panasonic 100 and Pioneer 320), i was anxious to check out this product. To make a long story pretty short. This recorder is just about perfect, but missing 2 things.... if you need them.

1) believe it or not.... this recorder does NOT have a DV in. Every cheap 90 dollar DVD recorder has it now, for some strange reason, Pioneer does not include it in this year's model.

2) An HDMI out, if you need it. For a 400 Dollar model, you would assume, this is included for the 2006 model year.

Now the good thing. This year, for the first time. Pioneer recorders finally do record on ANY media, even DVD+RW and DVD-RAM and Dual-Layers.

Whats very unique on this recorder and not available anywhere else is the jukebox function, which lets you store several CD's on the... Read more

I purchased this DVR a couple of months ago to replace my Sony DVR that could not be relied upon to time record. My purposes are pretty simple, just recording TV programs directly off the analog portion of my cable so I can't say that my usage has been anything involved. I haven't even recorded to the DVD yet, only to the HDD. But, my experience is that it's very easy to set the time recording, the time and counter display is easy to read, playback is simple, deleting is simple, and I like the fact that it fast forwards much easier than my Sony. It also has a nice large hard drive so I don't have to worry about running out of room. I love it so much that I'm even putting it on my Christmas list in hopes Santa will bring me a second one since I often like to record more than one program at a time. Good-bye VCR!

There is a disclaimer on the Frontier website that this unit does not have a digital tuner so in 2009 when everything goes digital, it may not be able to record... Read more