The HRS7600U has every feature under the sun. I like the movie advance as well as the commercial advance. I love how silent this unit is. Some Hi-Fi's I've had in the past were loud and slow. But then again, I've never owned a Super-VHS! I might of bought the 9600 but I can't see the gold unit with all my black components. Plus the extra money for a 4 meg memory was'nt worth it to me.

I don't like the on-screen display while the tape is rewinding or fast forwarding.

I love the quality i get from the S-VHS recordings. The ET feature is kind of silly. I understand it but if you can't afford a S-VHS tape then why did you buy the machine in the first place? But I will buy another one when this one wears out. I only use it when recording from Dolby Digital satellite programs. I'll never buy another Sony Hi-Fi or S-VHS. As far as video viewing goes, Sony is the only thing I would watch TV on. But that's another review!!!!!!

Similar Products Used:

I've had three Sony Hi-Fi's in the past seven years!

Performance is as good as it gets, very good digital comb- filter and Y/C seperator, can pass through a Macrovision encoded signal from DVD or another VCR without distortion (for viewing, not recording)

Nothing, except for $300 something probably suffered and it is not performance, I suspect it is build-quality...time will tell

I've held off on buying a S-VHS VCR because I live in an apartment where I can't get DBS, and I figured without DBS there is little reason for S-VHS but...I am now house hunting so I thought I should get one now before I am bogged down with mortgage payments, etc. The first deck I looked at was Sony's $800 S-VHS deck. My uncle has one but advised me not to buy it because his has been in the shop already. I also considered the new Marantz S-VHS but it appears to be a badge-engineered JVC (I could be wrong about this). I wasn't impressed with anything from Mitsubishi, Panasonic, or Sharp so JVC it is. Since I was prepared to spend much more I was going to buy the 9600, until I seen what eCost was charging for the 7600. That $180 difference is nearly 2/3rds the price of the 7600, and the only upgrade I would make use of is the 4MB frame buffer. Recordings made on both machines look exactly the same. In fact, these JVCs have a bit more resolution than my uncle's Sony and my friend's $600 Toshiba (which is no longer in production). As mentioned above, the comb-filter and Y/C seperator are great, clearly better than the comb-filter on my TV (Panasonic SuperFlat). With a cable feed, it is just a bit softer than my TV, but with absolutely no hanging dots. I don't mind giving up a little resolution for a cleaner picture. It also vastly improves my daughter's N64, making it look almost like a PC game. Another benefit is my TV looks better with different contrast settings for S-Video, standard video, and RF. Now I feed my TV with a single S-Video cable eliminating the problem entirely.

The first thing I recorded to test the 7600's performance was the only DVD I own that doesn't have Macrovision, "James Taylor Live at the Beacon Theater". Using TDK XP Pro S-VHS tape, the results were amazing. No, it is not as sharp as DVD and the colors aren't quite as vibrant, but still excellent. This VCR has better than DBS quality resolution, and is about as good as LD (really!). The ET mode was also impressive even using the cheap (buck a piece) RCA VHS tapes I use for time-shifting but I think that I'll heed JVC's warning and just use ET in a pinch. I haven't tried out many of this VCR's other features yet but I find its ease of use to be pretty good. I don't think the remote is too bad either, though I have the Marantz RC2K Mk. II so it isn't a concern to me.

This is not only the best bang-for-the-buck S-VHS VCR currently available, it, and the 9600, are the best performing consumer VCRs out there now. Highly recommended!

Similar Products Used:

Toshiba and Hitachi HiFi VHS, Sony S-VHS

Can record in S-VHS mode on a regular VHS tape

Too many. See in the summary below.

I am probably the only one who is dissatisfied with this product here.
1. The VCR has an intermittent problem with changing the year of the recording date. It often changes year 00 to 01. I missed several good TV programs because of that.
2. LCD display doesn't keep your preferences. I like to see a present time on the VCR LCD display. But each time you change the mode of the VCR (for example, switch from play to rewind), it changes the LCD setting to "counter".
3. The remote control requires pushing two buttons to control the TV set.
4. The picture is only as good as the videotape is. I tried TDK S-VHS Pro and Fuji S-VHS tapes and saw much better quality with TDK.
5. The picture from my "old" videotapes recorded using Panasonic VHS VCR comes out really bad eventhough it looks good on the original VCR.

I have decided to return this JVC VCR back to the store and get a new Panasonic if it changes the recording date on me again.

Similar Products Used:

Panasonic VCR

Good Picture and Audio quality. LCD display is slick.

Extremely inconvenient. Terrible home integration for the couch potato. Painfully sharp control buttons damages fingertips - a lawsuit waiting to happen. Too expensive for what you get.

JVC is in the stone age when it comes to convenience. Even with one of their best models, the HR-S7600U, I was appalled by the design flaws.

1. You need 2 hands to operate the remote control for the simplest tasks (such as changing channels on TV). This is because you need to press more than one button at a time! Can you believe this nonsense?

2. JVC cannot fully integrate with high quality Bose audio systems. (their "universal" remote cannot handle it)

3. My fingers turned red with pain from the small sharp plastic buttons on the remote control, which you have to hold down to control the TV or Cable box.

4. Video out RCA connection does not relay the MTS decoding to TV. KIND OF IMPORTANT, WOULDN'T YOU SAY? The only alternative is to use coaxal connection to TV. I haven't tried the S-Video output yet.

5. Took me 4.5 hours to reach their support phone number.

Alhough my opinion reflects only model HR-S7600U, these design flaws are present in every JVC VCR, as confirmed by their support representative. Picture and audio quality is good overall, but not good enough for $440. I do not recommend this product or this company.

Similar Products Used:

Sony HiFi VCR, Zeinith VCR

2MB digital memory for picture enhancement and to allow lo-fi audio to play during FF and Rew.
S-Video connection on front panel.

Build quality (afflicts most VCRs today)
Lack of buttons and controls (e.g. audio rec level controls)

I bought this VCR after my cherished JVC HRS-7000U finally died from video-head-old-age. The 7000U was the first S-VHS VCR that JVC made for the US consumer market and one of the first (if not THE first) S-VHS VCRs available to home consumers period--back around 1987 or so.

Compared to that benchmark VCR, the 7600 is considerably lighter (could double as a life perserver). The 7000 had
a zillion more buttons and dials to allow for more customized control over sound and picture. This is probably my only disappointment with the 7600U but that is more a sign of where all VCRs have evolved to today.

Nevertheless it is impressive to see what JVC is able to offer for under $400 in the 7600 (the HRS-7000U was around $900 if I remember correctly). Thanks to those that mentioned that E-Cost was offering it so cheaply (and with free ground shipping).

I own a small collection of commercially available pre-recorded SVHS tapes (e.g. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) and the 7600 plays them all very well with impressive video and audio.

The 7600 does a good job in recording pictures with high resolution (have only tried it only in SP).

Similar Products Used:

JVC HRS-7000U SVHS VCR
Panasonic SVHS VCR

I'm still trying to determine.

Same comment as above, only I'm not sure I really understand how to use all the features this deck has.

I've had my 7600 since October. I haven't used it all that much. I have noticed that it tends to show alot of details and has a great picture, but it seems to wash out, or smear the facial, or skin tones. Details in the background and individual hair strands my look very clear but the skin looks blurred. There does not seem to be any compatibility with other VCR's, either Panasonic or even older model JVC's. If I record on the old JVC it looks like crap on the 7600. If I record on the 7600 it looks like crap on the old JVC or Panasonic and vice versa. It makes you wonder if you got a defective machine. If anyone has had similar experiences, please advise, maybe I don't have the settings right or something. It's hard to believe that such an advanced, supposedly quality VCR doesn't make a tape that will work in another VCR. The remote is OK, but it lacks some obvious buttons that it should have, since it's supposed to be universal. It's hard to imagine that JVC thought it would be a good idea to have to hold down two buttons to adjust your tv with the vcr remote. I'm still determined to hang with this thing hoping that it's me instead of it. I've been happy with the other JVC products I have had and still have. I'm hoping for the best with this one. Besides, it's too late to return it.

Similar Products Used:

Panasonic

Great video quality and easy to use.

Noisy and Commerical Advance SUCKS!

Purchased this product brand new. Within 1 month the VCR started to jam tapes when ejecting. It would also spit out tapes (even brand new ones) after insertion. VCR would also rewind itself for no apparent reason. Exchanged the VCR 3 times at Good Guys. The last VCR exchanged worked for 3 months until warranty expired. Had VCR repaired 4 times through Good Guys after that. Finally I received a brand new VCR which has no problems at all.

The Commercial Advance feature should be removed from the product. When turned on for recording, the VCR takes up to 2 hours to mark commercials after recording is done. When playing back a tape with Commercial Advance recorded, the VCR slowly fast forwards the tape (with a blue screen on TV) through the commercials. Fast forwarding takes just as long as if you watched the commericals. There is no point to this feature.

S-VHS ET, video enhancement circuitry, smooth playback at a variety of speeds

time shift recording issues, noisy at times

This VCR is very good in terms of video quality. The picture on a S-VHS or S-VHS ET recorded tape is nearly as good as the source (e.g., Directv).

However, this VCR is not a good choice for time shift recording. When using the commercial advance feature, several things are awkward:

1) When a program is recorded, it will not mark commercials automatically if there are future programs to be recorded. So if you set up a daily or weekly recording of one or more shows, the VCR will only mark commercials when you turn it on. At that time, you have to wait 5 - 15 minutes for the commercial marking to complete.

2) When advancing over a commercial block, a blue screen is shown in place of the FF commercials. This makes it harder to detect when it has accidentally advanced over part of the show.

3) If you set up your Directv receiver to record a show using the JVC, the JVC is not shut down properly at the end of the show. When the show is over, the Directv receiver sends "stop" and "off" signals to the VCR. The VCR starts marking commercials when "stop" is issued, and ignores the "off" command. All other programs on the VCR and Directv receiver will then be ignored after that point because the VCR is left on.

Similar Products Used:

JVC HR-S4500U, Panasonic 4664

Fantastic picture quality and sound quality.

Awful remote.Very noisy on rewind and fast forward,Claims
to enhance picture quality of old tapes (I dont think so!)

I first wanted to Buy the JVC7500 after reading several
good reviews, but was told It had been replaced with the
7600, so I decided to purchase that instead, thinking it must be an upgraded version .When i got it home and set it up I was amazed at the quality of the picture and sound.
I have connected it to my digital satelite reciver and was pleased with the recording results.The only problems i have found so far is that when you rewind or fast forward its so noisy, is this a common problem? Also with rewinding and
fastforwarding when i want to stop the tape at a certain
point the tape moves on past the point i want it to stop.
The remote leaves a lot to be desired but then so do most.
Great picture and sound what more can you ask for, but playing back old tapes there is little change in quality,
May be my tapes are little to old.

I have dubbed DVDs from my Apex AD-600A (with macrovision disabled) in SVHS ET mode and the picture quality and color depth is great. I picked this model because it was a full-width model and matched my other rack componenents in size. The 4600 was shorter. This is the Ferrari of VCR design. Oh and Peter, I agree about the Bose comment. :)

(I got a rather good deal on this - $300 US)