I found another forum thread regarding the not recording from TVG+. After reading the posts, I think I may have figured out why it does not record. The machine has to be off to receive TVG+ updates. I believe the unit may be receiving an update at the time of the TVG+ recording, thus preventing it from doing so. Some of the posts from the other forum had noted the DMR would record the back to back TVG+ recordings when the unit is left on versus in standby mode. I will be testing this theory next week to see if true. After verify I am still having this random problem, I plan on leaving my unit on during the day the recordings are set for and off at all other tims unless I am watching something. Robert
I wish I had read this thread before buing my DMR-E85H maybe I wouldn't have baught it. I baught it at ciruit city in Feb. 2005. A couple of weeks later I got the green screen.Unplugged to fix it. I updated the firmware and that went well. Everything going ok until one day after a power outage it didn't work anymore. It would play a dvd and I could turn it on/off but not much else. Called tech support and after pushing the chan. up/down buttons it really got locked up and said test 1 or something like that and that was all. They said I would have to take it in for repair. Thats were it is now. They replaced the HD first. (I didn't think that would fix it from reading here.) I called today and now they're replacing the main Board and "it should be fixed". I hope so. It's been 3 weeks. Still under warranty thank goodness. I am very happy with the recording quality. If it only worked. P.S. I baught a UPS and I'm never plugging it into the cable ever again.
Robert, thanks for the info. I tried leaving the unit powered on during my recordings and it got them all. I wonder if anyone knows what is causing the U99 error when the machine is in standby? It happened again today. I emailed panasonic and they said I need to take it in to be serviced. This error message doesn't seem to affect anything. It works fine except that is doesn't update the program guide when it happens. I'm not sure what I should do. Does anyone know what is causing this? I have updated the firmware by the way.
I have recorded Power Block on The Nashville Network (TNN) and this is a series of 4 half hour shows. I use the TV guide program only because it then names each 1/2 hour segment. These four shows run into each other and do not start or end right at the 1/2 and hour time on the clock. Although this does not need to change channels it does record each 1/2 hour segment and covers the whole 2 hours and I have not had a problem to date. When you watch the shows it goes from one to the next one and it looks like it is continious with out any interuptions or blak spaces. Because the show run over the 1/2 hour time you need to make sure you watch in the correct order or you will either start with the end of the previous show or miss the end of the earlier one you are now watching. When I have recorded shows that are on different channels I find that I may miss either some of the beggining or end. I think the recorder starts recording 1 minute before the scheduled time and then runs over. This may be the way I have it set up.
Does anyone know how to disable the TV Guide Onscreen function? My hunch is perhaps the data coming in through the cable to update the TV Guide Listings maybe sending my unit into U99 mode. I've tried putting the unit into standby and then rebooting, even unplugging the unit for a day; but it remembers all my settings when it comes back on. I'd like to completely disable the TV Guide function and try programming the unit manually; anyone know how to do it?
I agree it looks like the TV Guild updates are the problem. We all started getting this at the same time (in the last couple of weeks) and it only happens when in stand-by mode. The system only does TV Guide updates in stand-by also. So to answer your question... to disable the updates, don't turn off your system. Could this be due to the new fall channel line up? There has been a lot of changes to the schedule lately. Is there a TV Guide tech support?
I think it is definitely related to the tv guide onscreen somehow. I found a telephone number for tv guide onscreen but I haven't gotten around to calling them yet. It is 1-800-386-7380
I also have been getting the error (U-99) after having set the unit to record a show. When I get home it just has the error and I start the unit using the remote. It does go through a self check and when I check the recordings everything seems to be OK. I think it has happened about 3 times in the last two weeks. I also think that I was recording using the TV Guide recording format but I'm not sure. The DVR is set up for cable with no cable box for TV Guide recording and then I have the cable box set up to L3 to record from it. That way I do not have to use the IR blaster. Because of the way the TV Guide gets its information I have to remember to leave it on channel selector so it can get the information. I try to do this at night and as far as I can remember I have never received the error with no recording set to take place.
Okay, the 120GB HDD advertised is supposed to hold 213 hours of recording data at EP. When I started using the unit, the "status" display said I had about 164 hours of recording time. Where is the missing 49 minutes? More importantly, I started getting the annoying U99 messages when my HDD was getting down to the "120 minutes remaining at EP" range. My timer recordings will not initiate as long as the unit displays U99. After backing up my recordings and erasing them on the HDD so that it's back up to about 145 minutes remaining, the U99 hasn't reared its ugly head. SO... does this mean I'm in the clear as long as I only work with 40 hours of EP recording? Seems like a huge waste of hard disc space.
You appear to be set up for the EP (Extra Long Play). According to my understanding their are 2 EP settings. 1. EP at 8 hours that will give you 214 hours. 2. EP at 6 hours and this will give you Approx 160 hours. I have not used any of these settings. Since new I have mine setup at LP (Long Play) and this give 104 hours with video recording quality. Instead of getting 6 hours on a disc I'm able to get only 4 hours but feel the better quality is worth the trade off. My suggestion would be to go into the SETUP menu choose DISC and then sub menu Recording Time in EP Mode setting and then be sure you have selected EP 8H) and then should give you the 216 hours of recording time. Just as a note I also have the DVD-R High-Speed Recording set to ON for faster transfering from the hard drive to a DVD-R disc. I have received the U-99 error with a half full hard drive and a almost empty drive in the last couple of weeks as stated in a previous post.
This thread has been great! Thanks to the experts (Roger A. et. al.), I bought 2 DMR-E85HP's at different times on eBay. Because of the contributors here and some other forums, I knew what I was getting into. Hope the experts keep checking back to this thread to help me out now. Received the 1st unit in mid-August. Applied the firmware update. Still experienced a TVGuide U99 related problem resulting in reboot/service check/etc. I disabled the TVGuide download. No big deal - I had not counted on using it because of what I had previously read here during my research. Otherwise, that unit has been working great. Received the 2nd unit a couple of days ago. Was advertised as not being able to burn DVD's. Well, it could be that the prior owner did not have a technical background and was not aware that the unit might be finicky with respect to DVD brands. Or, perhaps the prior owner did not know that you must use a certain DVD type (i.e. DVD-R). Anyway, I was ready to accept that the burner might be inoperative, but at least I could use it as a HDD recorder. Well, the 2nd unit will not complete init when power is applied. I get one cycle of hash marks with "Please Wait" displayed, then just "Please Wait". I hear a couple accesses of the hard drive and then it just sits there. It does respond to some of button presses (power-off/on). I can perform a DVD tray lock/unlock (at least that is what the display confirms). I cannot get it into service mode, cannot get it to eject the DVD tray, and cannot perform the other functions documented by Roger A. on his SNAFU page. I opened both units and checked the models and jumpers on the hard drives. They are identical Samsung SV1203N drives. I installed the drive from the faulty unit in my WIN98 PC. The BIOS recognized it. I performed an FDISK and formatted it. I downloaded the Hutil from Samsung and executed it. I performed a SCANDISK. Everything was fine. I reinstalled it in the faulty unit and there was no change in performance. I left the unit in the "Please Wait" state for a couple of hours. All it did was heat up significantly. Obviously the fan is bad or the power application cycle must complete successfully in order for the fan to be operated. Not good. Hopefully nothing was damaged by letting the hard drive run for a couple of hours with no fan. Has anyone else had this problem or know of a solution? I thought as a last resort I might manually pull open the DVD tray, insert the CD with Roger's firmware update, force the drawer closed, and see if the unit recognizes the CD with the update before it gets to the point in the power application init where it stops prematurely. If nothing else, I know I have a working 120 GB hard drive that I may install in a PC or as a spare for the other unit, and I have a spare working remote - but those considerations are scant consolation. Any advice? Thanks, Mark
fargen, There is a procedure for disabling the download of the TVGuide. I'm not presently at home, but I believe if you press Functions on the remote and then select the top item from the Functions menu (in the list on the left), you'll be presented several options on the right. One of those options (in the middle) is to manually activate a scan of the channel range to detect broadcasting stations. If you activate that process I recall that you'll receive a warning that manually activating a channel scan disables TVGuide operations from that point forward. The procedure is listed in the manual - I think on a page in the 40's. Mark
Sounds very familiar kossello. I've also gotten the U99 three times in the last few weeks. When I get the U99 I've also always had the machine set to record some programs at the time. I think every time this has happened I've had it set to record some programs "back to back" but I'm not sure if that has anything to do with it. My hard drive is less than half full. I reset the machine with the up/down channel button method a few days ago and so far it hasn't happened again but it normally takes awhile so I doubt that it is fixed. If it keeps it up I'll take it to the repair shop.
fargen, Sorry that the instructions I supplied yesterday were not quite accurate for disabling the TV Guide download. I should have checked the manual first. See on page 43 of the manual. But if you don't have the manual: Press Setup button on the remote; Press up or down arrow to select Channel on the left menu; Press >; Select up or down arrow to select Auto Channel Setting on the right menu; Press Enter; Press < or > to select Yes; Press Enter; Press Enter; The channels are scanned and then you may perform an auto clock setting. At this point the TV Guide download is disabled. You may then set up timer programs manually by using the remote's Prog/Check button. If the unit is ever returned back to factory defaults, you'll have to run through the procedure again to disable the TV Guide download. Mark
It has been 2 days since I last had a U99 error. I think TV-Guide may have fixed their problem. Did anyone else get the U99 while in standby mode in the last 24 hours?
Nope not yet. If I get another U99 I'll post it here. Maybe if we all do that we can notice some patterns.
On Wednesday 9-21 I received 2 U-99 errors. When I got home after doing a timed recording which I did get at 9:30 am the machine showed the error code. (it was set uo to record from L3) I started the unit with the remote and after a self check it was OK. I then set it up to record a show at 7:00 pm (on L3) and while waiting I noticed that the U-99 error code was showing and the unit was not recording. I started the recorder and again after the self check everything is OK. I have the recorder set up to retrieve the TV guide info on the tuner setting. While I received the errors I was on L3 so I could record off the cable box. (TV guide and recorder are set up as not having a cable box.) I'm now wondering if I'm receiving the code when the unit tries to update the TV guide but because I'm on L3 it can not locate the signal and then gives the error.
I found my system had another U99 when I got home yesterday... so the problem is not fixed. I really do think the problem is in the TV-Guide data and has nothing to do with being on L3. Several of us started running into this problem all at the same time. We didn't change, the data did. On that same line, is there anyone here who is using the TV-Guide feature who hasn't had a U99 error in the last few weeks? If it were the data, you would assume we all would be effected (or at least all within a region).
I reset my machine last friday (Wow, I didn't know it had been a week already.) with the up/down channel method and so far it hasn't had the U99 since then. I have had it in standby most of that time and I actually have a full week of program guide data now. I'm beginning to wonder if maybe it hasn't had the U99 because it cleared out all the old (possibly corrupted?) tv guide data. I also had not done the reset since I updated the firmware. Anyway so far so good.
What is the "up/down channel method"? Clearing the old data makes sence. It may also explain why it is happening with less frequency now as the old data purges it self.
