I have an Emerson EWR20V5 DVD Recorder/VCR Combo. A few months ago I had a problem where most of my DVD-RWs that had worked before were not working. Every time that I pushed record it said that it could not record to disc. I tried cleaning the DVD Recorder and using a Disc Doctor but nothing worked. I decided to just stop using DVD-RWs since my DVD-Rs had no problems at all. For months my DVD-Rs worked with no problems but just last night I placed a new DVD-R that I had never used before into the DVD Recorder, but when I pushed record it said that it could not record to disc. I was thinking that it could just be the disc, but when I pushed record again it worked. I have used 12 other DVD-Rs out of this specific set and they have worked fine. If anyone knows what the problem is please let me know. Thanks in advance.
How old is the unit? If it is under warranty, have a tech check it out. Consider an exchange for another unit. OTH if it is out of warranty you won't have that option. How much have you been using it? Lasers eventually wear out. That could be possible. Reparing the units often is not cost effective. Consider another unit (with a warranty) if repair costs are high. Is you firmware uptodate? Can it be updated? What brand of disks are you using? Are they on the list recommended by the mfgr? What speed are you burning at?
I've had the unit for 6 months, the warrenty is up, I'm using Maxell DVD-Rs, I'm recording on EP (6 Hours), and I use the unit for about 2-3 hours on weekdays and 4-5 hours on weekends.
The unit should not be "old" enough to wear out the laser at this point. You could try recording at the 2 hr speed. See what happens. I have a disk/tape combo - recording at the 6 hr speed yielded poor results. The pictures were all jerky and pixeled. Changing the speed cleared it up very well for me. Disk recordings looked exactly like the original show. I use the -RW disk as a time shifting device to watch later and use over again. I searched for firmware on www.rpc1.org for your unit and got no results. Does Emerson recommend Maxell disks in your Owner's manual? Some machines can be picky. Try another brand to see what happens.
Just ran across this thread re Emerson. Check it out. http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/105106 Many pages, may or may not apply for you (I have not read the entire thing).
