I found TV-DVD combos with screen sizes ranging from 13 to 27 inches, but apparently the only manufacturers at this time are Aiwa, Konka, Panasonic, and Sylvania (Funai). A Konka 20-inch combo sells for around $400, while a 27-inch Panasonic combo costs about $654. It seems to me that most movie lovers would still want to have a VCR, and you probably already own one you could hook up to the combo. If not, you can buy a good VCR for about $90. Another consideration in buying a TV-DVD combo is that if you want to play music on it, you want to be sure you are satisfied with the features and/or sound quality.
I could find only two manufacturers for TV-VCR-DVD combos--Panasonic and Konka--and the only available screen sizes appear to be 20 inches and 27 inches. Prices for the Panasonic models are in the $800 - $1200 range. A major issue with these combos is whether you want to pay the extra money to get a flat screen, which somewhat improves the overall quality of the viewing experience. TV-VCR-DVD combos offer a lot of capability and operational convenience, but the same general considerations mentioned earlier for other combos still apply.
DVD-VCR combos seem to have a lot of potential, but as of this writing, they haven’t caught on very well. I could locate only two manufacturers--Go Video and Sensory Science. I looked at one Go Video DVD-VCR combo model with a 4-head VCR, and it cost about $400. It seems to me the main issues involved in considering buying a DVD-VCR combo are price and whether the DVD component of the combo provides all the features you want.
I’ve tried to give you a few general ideas about combos, but the information here is only a start at best. If after reading this, you still think you might want to buy a combo, you’ll want to do some more investigating on your own. Much of the information available on combos is hard to fully grasp because it’s written from the point of view of a consumer electronics expert, and the perspective seems to be that people want to do a lot of different things with TVs, DVD players, and VCRs. As for me, I mostly just want to be able to watch good movies at home on reliable equipment that is reasonably priced, and this article is aimed at people who think along similar lines.
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