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Upscale DVDs in style with this slinky spinner
At £65, Samsung’s entrant is clearly in a different price bracket to the other models here. But, taking value into account and the fact that Sammy is selling this as a stripped-down player with the emphasis on its 1080p abilities, it could still do well.
This £70 deck certainly has the measure of the budget market, but faces a tougher task against rivals in the sub-£100 HD-upscaling arena.Visually, it puts them all to shame with a beautiful black finish and gently sloping fascia
Samsung's HD860 impressed when we reviewed it last year, with its budget-priced upscaling and multimedia playback. There were one or two minor issues, but the player packed in a great picture and sound for the price.
There appears to be a competition among the major DVD player makers to see who can cram the most into a deck and charge the least for it. The Samsung DVD-HD870 won't upscale your DVD collection to 1080p, true, but there's enough here for the £70 price tag
Acouple of years ago, Samsung launched the DVD-HD935. This inexpensive player was groundbreaking, because it was one of the first at any price to sport a digital video output - DVI (Digital Visual Interface), in this case.
Samsung learned an important business formula from the staggering success of its LCD TV range. Keen technology + stylish design = vast increase in market share. Hence the artistically sculpted and fashionably black DVD recorder displayed here
This black box recorder from Samsung has all the latest digital goodies packed inside, so it's strange to see such an old-fashioned design. Still, the DVD-SH855M may well appeal to those who like a bit of retro chic in their styling
The main claim to fame of this DVD-RW/DVD-R recorder is an HDMI output with video upscaling to 720p and 1080i, which makes it a great machine to go for if you already own an HD Ready TV
Despite the advantages of DVD/HDD combis, disc-only recorders still have an important role to play. Users upgrading from VHS may be more comfortable with the idea of using removable media as opposed to an integrated hard disk drive
On paper, the Samsung DVD-R145 looks like it may well be a sturdy enough DVD recorder. For starters, it features excellent disc compatibility, being able to record on all types of DVD media, including dual-layered DVD plus-R and DVD-R discs
We're seeing plenty of upmarket DVD recorders with hard disks, integrated Freeview tuners and so on. But what if you don't need these features? You might, for example, live in an area where Freeview reception is iffy
This product really surprised us. It's among the cheapest around, but it wouldn't look out of place among the most expensive. It may be a bit big - in the way that all VCRs are - but it's well finished and is solidly built
Unique to this group test comes Samsung's DVD-R100E, the only multiformat recorder contender. It utilises the DVD-R/-RW format, alongside the edit-friendly DVD-RAM, and as such adds up to a pretty different prospect all around
Affordable DVD recorders are no longer the reserve of obscure, supermarketonly brands. Samsung's latest, the DVD-R100E, is a case in point - it offers the Korean giant's home cinema expertise for as little as £160.
For some time now, several companies have presented combined DVD-RW and DVD-RAM recorders and drives as 'multi-format' devices. Although that might be a fair and accurate description, these machines don't support DVD RW.