Harman Kardon CDR 20 CD Recorders/Players Reviews

amclaussen

Overall Rating
 2 of 5

Value Rating
 1 of 5

Used product for
More than 1 year

Visitors rate this review
5.00 of 5, 3.00 votes

Price Paid:  $0.00

Summary:
AVOID IT. Avoid any dual deck Harman Kardon CD recorders at all cost! Those are badly designed and assembled, will work for a few months at best, and then start to trash top quality Music CD-R's of several brands. After a couple of years mine also started to skip when playing perfectly good best quality CD's also!

Problems frecuently start when trying to "Finalize" recordings, the units display a "Disc Error" message, or the newly recorded disc does not play or read at all on other units... damn, even on the left side of the same Harman Kardon recorder! Mine is NOT the only one that failed, several other I have seen have similar behaviors and sympthoms. General consensus is that a huge lot was defective, but the extent of the defective units suggests design or construction problems. Now, when it worked (about 20 to 30% of the times initially) it produced good copies of CD's, but some times those were playable only in the same unit. Lately, even the left side deck (the player only) started to skip badly. A Lemon, a piece of crap, nothing more.
I will NEVER buy another Harman Kardon unit at ANY price. (unless it is a vintage, before 1980 unit, when Harman Kardon was a respectable company and not the bandits run group it has become). amclaussen.

Tommy121

Overall Rating
 4 of 5

Value Rating
 5 of 5

Used product for
Less than 1 month

Visitors rate this review
4.25 of 5, 4.00 votes

Price Paid:  $170.00 from ebay

Summary:
Purchase price in £ Hmmm. When I opened the box, I frowned at the (relatively) miniature dimensions and slight weight of this unit. (my MF amp weighs 40 KGs combined and my speakers 50 KG each...) It didn't look especially promising either. The CD drawer mechanism is crap a really tinny plastic affair... Hooked it up (with misgivings) to the amp wondering what it would make of the CDP aspect of this item. Or rather, I wondered what my Thiel CS 3.6's would make of it, since my amp tends to be quite forgiving, unlike the speakers which show every flaw possible of any piece of equipment (amp, speaker cables, badly recorded cd's etc). Well I was quite impressed. For its price this player wasn't bad at all. For sure its soundstage was far from perfect, lacking definition (despite help from a forgiving amp). But it was listenable to... and for the price I paid I really couldn't complain at all - it had decent musical characterics with good treble, mid and bass. After all this isn't really a CDP & obviously isn't going to outperform a dedicated CD player at 5x its original list price is it? As a recorder this unit is perfectly acceptable - the CD quality does depend a bit on the quality of the disks used though. With good disks (and recorded at 1x speed - leave it working while you're at work) it did a very good job. Which is what I bought it for. That's fine then.

Strengths:
Works well as CDR

Weaknesses:
Isn't the best CD player you can get, or even close, but then it does a sufficient job in this sphere for most people I imagine. Build quality!!!!

Price Paid:  $450.00 from Circuit City

Summary:
I first reviewed this recorder in September 2001. I have been using it since then and am very happy with it. Initially, I was having a problem with some of the copied discs skipping when played on other recorders, but that problem seems to have worked itself out (knock on wood!). I have made many discs over the last two years and the sound quality has been excellent. I have made copies of LPs that have also been excellent.

Strengths:
Sound quality is excellent

Weaknesses:
none

Price Paid:  $300.00 from J&R Music World

Summary:
Sorry, but my advice is, avoid this product. The first unit I received malfunctioned, and when I exchanged it for another unit, that one also malfunctioned. The problem was with the lefthand player, the one that plays but does not record. With certain tracks, the unit would skip twenty seconds ahead at the start of the track. This happened with a variety of CDs, old and new. To make sure it wasn't the CDs, I played them in the righthand player, and there was no problem. When I received the second unit, I had even more of a skipping problem, with more of my CDs. Again, I could play the CDs in the righthand player without a problem. The company rep's response was that it might have been a bad batch of units. I realize these are mass-produced, but I wasn't very impressed with this response. This was my first experience with Harmon Kardon, and it has been a totally negative one. I returned the unit and got my money back, and I definitely don't plan on trying any of their products again. The player did sound great--regular CDs and the ones I recorded, both digitally and analog (turntable). And it was easy to use. I was new to CD recording, but the manual was clear and the whole process was a snap. As a matter of fact, I came to view the unit as being somewhat schizophrenic--the righthand, player/recorder unit never gave me a problem, the lefthand unit was like the Bermuda Triangle. I guess if I was using another digital source for recording, it wouldn't be so bad, but I bought the unit precisely to have an all-in-one player. I appreciated the recording level graphics, and especially liked that they always appeared, regardless of whether you were recording--made it easy to match recording levels. I was a bit disappointed in the fit and finish and general ergonomics of the unit--I had a Sony unit previously, and it was just more of a pleasure to use. Specifically, the buttons were all kind of small and a bit chintzy. The analog recording level knob especially--I absolutely loved having such a feature, but the button itself was cheap plastic and wiggled a lot. But for me, all of this is irrelevant, because the thing just wouldn't work properly. Of course, if the digital source of your dual-deck CD recorder doesn't work, your digital recording options are greatly limited. Too bad, too--the unit sounded so good. A real disappointment.

Strengths:
Great sound, easy to use.

Weaknesses:
Simply would not play properly. I tried two units--both malfunctioned. Nothing but a tepid apology from the manufacturer.

Price Paid:  $200.00 from UBID

Summary:
I bought a new factory refurbished unit - CDR20. Thought, what the heck, for $200 bucks, when normally $499, it appeared to be a deal. How wrong I was... Unit worked perfectly for about 3 months. Then I noticed that it recorded skips into the copies. The source material was a brand new cd. So I sent back for repair. That is when the odessey started. It took 8 weeks to get back from HK authorized repair shop. To summarize, they gave me the runaround. The authorized repair shop finally, after 6 weeks tried to fix it but it still would not work! Very incompetent and lazy customer service people and repair center. Finally, they send me a DIFFERENT unit, since it took so long to fix. That unit worked like a charm for about 3 months. Then I noticed it recorded hiss into the copies and the unit itself started making a wierd clanking noise. HK begrudgingly agreed to pay for shipping this time to the repair shop. Similar to before, it took 9 weeks to fix. Thus far it works... Very sorry I purchased. Soured me on the company.. Luckily my Infinity speakers work flawlessly, I would hate to think of sending 70 pound speakers back and forth to repair centers!! Experience - thus far 2 players have mal-function. Customer service was incompetent..

Strengths:
Relatively easy to use. 2 trays makes for easy copying. Plus digital and analog outputs.

Weaknesses:
Constantly breaks!! What a piece of junk. Sorry I ever purchased..