JVC HR-VP59U Hi-Fi VCR

The best VCR I have ever owned!

I bought this VCR to replace a 10-15 year-old Hi-Fi VCR that was no longer recording right, and that had problems on some rental tapes keeping the Hi-Fi audio playing without cutting in and out of regular Fi.The first thing I noticed is that it's VERY light compared to the older stuff (6.6 lbs), but this is probably the norm nowadays.The bad trend that this VCR continues, though, are a reduction in the amount of controls on the VCR. They are not very intuitive, besides the large play button, as in, it's hard to read the labels. There are power and eject buttons on the left side of the display, and REC, Pause, Rew, and FF on the right. The right hand buttons also double as channel change buttons. To change the channel, there either has to be no tape in it, or you have to hit the pause button, the channel begins to flash, then you use the Rew and FF buttons to change it. Pause again to exit.There are front-panel left and right audio and video inputs on the front. The downside is that these are the ONLY inputs, none on the rear.Most of the functions are accessed on the remote control. To record, you have to hold down record and press play. They are diagonally from each other, not side by side, which takes getting used to. If you hit record, then decide you want it to stop in a hour or half hour or whatever, you can only access this feature by going to the VCR and hitting the record button (by itself) until the display shows the length you will record.The remote does have nice express programming buttons, but if you are in a hurry, you may forget to put it in timer mode. It does warn you on screen when it's just about timer time, but timer mode always turns off the VCR.The 4-way shuttle control is one big button that sometimes doesn't seem to know which way you are pushing it.I have rented fairly new movies that STILL cut in and out of Hi-Fi. This was a disappointment for something that supposedly has super duper 19 micron heads. The picture looked about the same to me on a regular TV.If you use closed captioning, if they DO NOT show up on the screen, you have to find the Picture Stabilizer (with the remote of course) and turn it OFF. Turning it off didn't seem to make much difference, the picture was moving a bit either way. This IS covered in the instructions, but something that you'll have to remember.There is no tracking control, it is fully automatic.The auto clock set can take 15 minutes or so if your PBS station has static on it! This is even if you tell it what channel PBS is on. It also defaults to some cable mode, so you have to be sure to put it in TV Antenna mode (if you need to) before auto-setting the channels or the clock, so it can find PBS on UHF.With most of the functions on the remote, it is a bit cluttered. Some buttons have very different dual functions. The remote can control your TV or cable box, but you have to hold down one button while pressing another.It is impossible to tell if it's on or off by looking at the display, even if you are right there, you may have to turn it on and off to figure it out. The display will only show either the time, or the channel. It usually shows the channel if it's on, but if you hit Display on the remote to see the time, then who knows if it's on or off.The good: Energy Star (2 or 18 watts), VCR+, Hi-Fi Stereo Tuner, on screen tape position, lots of information superimposed on screen when you hit Display, quick play start after hitting play/stop then play again, very clear seeking, seekable index marking (only sets a mark when you hit record), plays S-VHS tapes but with regular resolution (there is only standard video output), records standard VHS video with Hi-Fi stereo audio.Similar to: JVC HR-VP49U (mono Lo-Fi)