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Panasonic Unveils Europe's First Blu-ray Disc Recorder

PostPosted: Thu Aug 28, 2008 4:11 pm
by Ian
At IFA, Panasonic will unveil the first Blu-ray Disc recorder (DMR-BW500) for the
European market that can record and playback High Definition imagery on Blu-ray
Discs. The DMR-BW500 features an integrated twin HD Digital Tuner for
Terrestrial Broadcasting making it possible to record two digital programs
simultaneously. Packed with innovative features, the new Blu-ray Disc Recorder
will be available in France.

Michael Friedrich, Manager Product Marketing, Home AV, Panasonic Marketing
Europe said, “As a leader in cutting-edge Blu-ray Disc technology, Panasonic is
proud to be the first company to introduce this model into the European market.
With the development of High Definition broadcasting and further growing demand
of large-screen flat panel TVs, there is an increasing desire to record and play back
High Definition images.”

In addition to recording two digital broadcasts at the same time, the DMRBW500’s
twin HD digital tuners make it possible for users without a digital TV to watch a
digital broadcast and record it at the same time. The 5.1-channel Surround Sound
(Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, or HEAAC) signal and subtitles that are included
in digital broadcasts can also be recorded, allowing users to enjoy surround sound
and subtitles during playback.

The DMR-BW500 comes equipped with a built-in 500GB Hard Disk Drive allowing
for up to 100 hours recording time in DR mode as well as an SD Memory Card slot,
making it easy to view AVCHD-format images captured with an HD camcorder
such as the Panasonic HDC-SD100. The DMR-BW500 feature an HD Archiving
function that makes it possible to save Full-HD images from an SD Memory Card
onto a Blu-ray Disc or the built-in hard disk drive. Also, in addition to a High Speed
Copying function, a High Speed Copy Preparation function makes it possible to
convert TV programs recorded in DR mode to HG, HX, HE, or HL mode (highdefinition).
This greatly shortens the time required to save the data onto a disc
making it easy to preserve special moments in Full-HD quality.

Thanks to Panasonic’s image processing technologies, the DMR-BW500 can
record and reproduce images in high quality. Image-enhancing features include the
“Pixel Precision Progressive Processing for HD” or P4HD Processor which renders
high-quality progressive images and “PHL Reference Chroma Processor Plus,”
which achieves sharper images by improving color reproduction to produce
cinematic images that rival the original film quality. The DMR-BW500 also adds a
BD-Live (including BONUSVIEW) function available on the newest Blu-ray Disc,
which allows consumers to access exclusive on-line bonus features via an
Ethernet connection.

The DMR-BW500 supports all new HD Audio codec so that it can decode HD
audio signals (Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD) encoded on the Blu-ray Disc. By
connecting the DMR-BW500 to an AV control receiver with 7.1-channel
compatibility, the user can enjoy high quality, 7.1-channel surround sound.

Panasonic DMR-BW500.png
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