DVD recorders

Skip the Elite! You will be paying mostly for the appearance
upgrade. All of the Pioneer DVD recorders use the same
transport and chip sets. That includes the Consumer and
Professional PRV-9000 models.
I own a video editing and media duplication company,
(for 12+ years) and currently own both Pioneer and Panasonic
DVD recorders. There seems to be little difference in the
recording quality except when I am transfering digital
material into the Pioneer via Firewire. (The Panasonic units
only have analog inputs.)
Most of the computer DVD recorders on the market are
based on the Pioneer DVD drives. They will cost you a lot
less - but functionally I think they are a waste of time.
Do you have the patience to upload all your video, navigate
a menu system, and then have your video recorded at about
2x normal speed? And what if the system crashes?
While most DVDs are authored/edited on computer based
systems - they are usually workstation systems that have
little in common with the average home PC.
As for copying DVDs - that is another matter. Most
commercial DVDs have macrovision encoding - which can be
defeated with the right equipment. But is it worth two hours
of your time and $10 to $15 for a blank DVD-R to make a
copy of a movie you can buy for $20.00?
One last thing - the audio quality on DVD recordings is
just great!

I agree

I've heard that the current DVD recorders are NOT allowed to record copyrighted DVDs. I suppose they're okay for recording from your video camera or TV. I've also heard that the resolution is still not quite as good as it could be. This might be one of those situations where you'd be happier if you waited for a few years before purchasing. These early units will probably be obsolete in a few years.

I watched a streaming video at the CES website on the new Phillips DVD R-RW and it looks very good. It has progressive scan DVD playing capability and it records DVD-R AND DVD-RW. I think it is about 1k US.