HD EzRecorder Plus Review: Average Device For Taking Snapshots and Recording Shows
HD EzRecorder Plus Review: Average Device For Taking Snapshots and Recording Shows
The AVerMedia HD EzRecorder Plus is a full HDMI recording device that hooks up to your cable box and allows you to record your shows and take snapshots of your favorite scenes. It hooks up by way of component cables, but does not support HDMI which is disappointing. It supports three different video recording settings which are 15 MB per second, 10 MB per second and 8 MB per second. Also, you can choose three different settings for your screenshots as well. Clearly you will need a lot of memory to record many shows, so your best bet would be to purchase a hard drive that you can attach to the bottom of the device. However, if you are interested in taking snapshots or only short video clips, you can hook up a USB flash drive as well.
The use of the device is fairly easy, but it’s something that I would only recommend for a specific few things. I wouldn’t recommend this device for your basic television show recorder. You can experience a much simpler time by use of a regular DVR box from your local cable company. The device allows you to set up and record your shows at a specific time and it does have an IR blaster that hooks up to your cable box, but it’s not the easiest to set up. It’s not a complicated process, but I had difficulties with my cable box reading the IR – not to say that it would be the same for you. However, one major issue is that most cable channels are 4 digit channels these days and this device only allows you to set up a total of 3 digits. However, if you have your TV already set on the channel you want to record on, the recording time is completely adjustable to when you need to record something.
When you record something or take images, the device is very easy to use and you’ll be able to watch your recordings on the device by using its remote. The quality looks decent and it handles motion fairly well, however, when you take snapshots that don’t handle quick motions very well. Still, being able to take snapshots of your favorite shows is probably one of my favorite things. Also, if you record something and you see something while you are watching, you can pause the video and then take a snapshot of that screen. This is where the device actually wins my approval.
One of the best things about recording your shows to a hard drive or USB flash drive is that you can easily take it straight to your computer and watch it on there. Also, you can share your snapshots on your website, Facebook, Twitter or anything else that you may use. For all of you fans out there, this is the best way to get the screenshots you want from the shows you watch, but it still isn’t that great of quality. It’s not as clear as the HD screen you are watching it on. Also, when you take a snapshot, it interrupts the sound of the show, so you can freely watch the show and take a snapshot anytime you’d like – it’ll just interrupt the experience. So you should do it afterwards.
In the end, the device has its uses, but it still feels a bit dated with its setup menus and I don’t like the fact that I can’t use HDMI. It just comes off as not that appealing of a device, but it does the job of recording shows and taking snapshots. One more quick complaint, when you have the device on, yet you are not recording anything, it’ll sometimes interrupt what you’re watching by giving a component disconnect error, though it’s clearly connected. I haven’t had any issues like that when recording a show. Still, if you want easy transferability of your recorded shows and the ability to take snapshots and transfer both to your computer, this is a device that can do that for you. Just make sure you have use for that and that you are ok with it giving average quality image screens and just decent video quality. It’s not a perfect capture of what you are watching on your HDTV.
There is a workaround to enable up to 5 – 8 numbers long channel setting.
*Open up the Menu, and go to “IR Learning setup”.
*Enter the keys for ‘1’ to ‘0’ as you normally would with your set top box remote.
*If you have keys for ’10’, ’11’, ’12’ you may enter them — or press [OK] to skip.
* -Important- Do not skip entering a key for the [.] ~If your set top box has a key for the the [.] (decimal marker) then enter it. If not, please press an unused key of your set top box to set it.
*Finish the IR learning process.
*You may now proceed to schedule a recording, there should be 5 – 8 entries available for the channel setting.
In the above instructions, I mentioned 5 to 8 entry spaces. It will be 5 for previous versions of firmware, and 8 spaces for a soon to release firmware update.
Here are the specs.
PC-free
1080i HD Video Recording
IR Blaster for Schedule Recording Included
One-press Capture and Snapshot
Instant Playback
Time Seek Function during Playback
H.264 Hardware Compression
Built-in 2.5 Inch HDD SlotInput Signal:
Component
Audio L/R
Output Signal:
Component
Audio L/R
Storage:
Internal: 2.5” SATA Hard Drive
External: USB 2.0 Hard Drive
* Internal/External hard drive is preferred for stable recording. NTFS is recommended file system
* Hard drive is not included. Please install or connect a hard drive before using the HD EzRecorder Plus
Recording Formats:
AVI (Codec: H.264 & MP3)
Supported Resolutions:
480i / 480p / 576i/ 576p/ 720p / 1080i (50/60 Hz)HD EzRecorder Plus (Weight: 335g; 164 x 124 x 57 mm)
User Manual
Remote Control (Batteries Included)
IR Blaster Cable
Component Cable x 2
RCA Audio Cable x 2
Power Adapter (12V/1.5A)
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