Cyberhome DVR 1600 DVD Recorder

I purchased the Cyberhome DVR 1600 DVD Recorder at my local Best Buy in March. I was confident that I was buying a good product because # 1 – it's coming from Best Buy and # 2 – I have a compact Cyberhome DVD player that has worked fine for a couple of years. I needed a new DVD player to replace a Sony that had suddenly stopped working only 1 month after the 2-year warranty expired. (Isn't that how it always happens?) While shopping for a new DVD player, my husband and I explored the option of a DVD "recorder", but found that they were much more expensive than just the "player". I have noticed that they have come down quite a bit in price since they were first introduced, but were still more expensive than what we wanted to pay. Then we found the Cyberhome DVR 1600 for just under $100. It's size and features were similar to the other DVRs at Best Buy, but the price was much less. We paid $93.00 (after instant rebate) and the next lowest price was $169.

After making our purchase, we rushed home to spend several hours unhooking the old DVD player and hooking up the new DVR. You know the drill…
1) Husband moves the entertainment center (without removing any of the 500 lbs of equipment) just enough so that the wife can fit behind it and still manage to breathe.
2) Wife coughs and sneezes from stirring up all of the dust and cobwebs that have been collecting back there for a year or two.
3) Husband hands wife a 20 lb flashlight which falls to the floor, kicking up another cloud of dust.
4) Kids think that mom is playing some sort of game and try to join mom behind the entertainment center.
5) Wife spends 10 minutes trying to figure out which equipment is hooked up to the receiver and to the TV and to the VCR and to the DVD player and to the cable box...and which cords are coming out of the wall and out of the TV...and which ones are plugged into the wall or into the mass electrical power strip.
6) Unplug and remove cords from existing DVD player and whatever equipment it's currently hooked up to and plug in the new DVR cords, hoping that it hooks up through the same equipment so that you don't have to figure out a new way to route the cords. We were not so lucky this time.
7) Husband yells useless instructions at wife and wife demands to see the actual booklet that came with the new equipment so that she can do it the right way.
8) Wife asks husband to watch the TV for any changes while repeating "How about now?....How about now?....Anything yet?" and proceeds to plug things in to and out of all different outlets, praying that something will work.
9) Husband leaves wife working behind the entertainment center so that he can prepare a small snack.
10) Kids are crying because they've been waiting for an hour to watch TV.
11) Finally, things are hooked up (hopefully the right way) and you have picture and sound working properly.

Our first problem came when we went to use the remote that came with our DVD recorder. It didn't work. Assuming it was an issue with poorly installed batteries, we replaced them. It still didn't work. Needless to say, we were VERY UPSET at having to uninstall the equipment and return it to Best Buy. The customer service person hooked up the DVD recorder to one of their TVs (to make sure I wasn't lying, I suppose) and also found that the remote did not work. They gave me a new unit and sent me on my way.

Knowing how things hooked up earlier in the day, the 2nd installation was much easier than the 1st. And the remote worked! We were well on our way to watching and recording DVDs.

I found the instruction manual to be well written and also included pictures to follow along with. The hardest part for me was figuring out the difference between DVD R/ RW and DVD-R/-RW. I still have no clue what one is to the other or how to tell the difference. All I know is that this unit will only take the R/ RW DVDs for recording.

I recorded my first show that same day. It was fairly easy for me to figure out from the manual instructions. Note: I gave the recorded show to my mother and it would not play on her DVD player. I don't know if this is a common issue. Perhaps shows that I record can only be played on the same unit that they were originally recorded on? That doesn't seem right.

I also successfully recorded a show from another DVD player. This was also fairly easy. You just hook up another DVD player to the front of the DVD recorder using the red/white/yellow cords (those probably have a technical name, but I have no clue what that would be).

Only 6 weeks after installing our DVD recorder, it broke. We had only recorded a handful of shows. It was used more as a DVD player for movies than ever really recording anything. It stopped playing. It stopped recording. Where it would once show "PLAY" and "RECORD" on the menu line, it now shows weird hieroglyphic messages. It's useless and will do nothing but open and close. I was so determined to get it to work one day that I actually got a Blockbuster movie stuck inside of it and it refused to open. I had to pry the door open to remove the movie.