I am new, and I apologize if this is being posted in the wrong forum. I have had a stand-alone Philips DVD Recorder (DVDR75 model) since July of last year, and yesterday, it wasn't too kind to me. I was recording something on a DVD+R, and when I hit the pause button, a gibberish message appeared on the front of it. Before I could write the error message down, the unit shut off. I was recording on the best quality setting (one hour), and I had probably 45-50 min. of media on the disc. When I turned the unit back on, it refused to play the disc and said that the disc could not be played. Since I had NOT finalized the disc (obviously I couldn't do that since I was still recording), my computer will not recognize it, and neither will my PS2. After many trials & tribulations dealing with the insanity that is Philips Customer Service (who told me the data is unrecoverable), I went and bought a Sony unit at Circuit City tonight, because I do NOT want to risk this ever happening again. At the same time, I'm wondering if it could have been the Fuji DVD+R disc itself that was defective, but this is a disc I have been recording on here and there for the past two weeks! I have not had a problem before with Fuji DVD+Rs. I did set up the new Sony recorder this evening, and it will not play the damaged DVD+R either. I'm curious if anyone has ANY suggestions as to what I could possibly do to bring back this media, or if this is truly a lost cause.
You could go to the refridgerator pull out a cold beer, pop the top off and take a swallow, then set it down ontop of that disk. That is what we call a coaster my friend. Sorry it happens to the best of us. Chalk it up to a learning experiance. I would wonder why you would pause your burner while writing though? That would be a big no no. Enjoy your new coaster I have several just like it myself Burners Nec 2500A Pioneer DVR 105
It could very well be the media. Most of the time I recommend that a person should change the media before changing the hardware. It is also possible that the recorder screwed up because the problem occured when you pressed the pause button. I recommend that you try some Ritek media. If your new Sony will record -R media, use that instead of the + R, it is a bit more compatible in DVD players.
In response to bbmayo, this stand-alone DVD recorder is like a VCR, in that you can record, pause, etc...it is NOT a "no no"...it is common practice. Fasfrank, I had heard over a year ago that +R was better quality & more compatible than -R. I know there has been quite a debate. I have not had time to read the latest articles, but has -R taken over as the new standard? I was under the impression that +R was the "Betamax" and -R was the "VHS"...so just like VHS won out over Beta, -R is winning out over +R, even though +R is better quality??? So, the bottom line is, there is NO software program out there that can detect anything that is on this DVD+R? The recorded media was REALLY important to me, and I hate to see it all lost.
Hi again Susan, I was thinking that it was probably important to you. Most of us are using a PC with a burner to back-up DVDs. so if something goes wrong we simply start over. With a DVD recorder, folks are collecting episodes and such, so it is a one time thing for them. No doubt you have a few episodes already on your disc. Yes there is (or was) a debate over compatibility between +R and -R. I'm just going by my experience trying to play either in a variety of DVD players. I had more problems with the +R than the -R media. The quality difference was not apparent so that was never an issue to me. If either one played played without freezing or pixelating then I could not tell the difference between the two. I have had problems or issues with just about everything except Ritek G-04 -R media. Everyone I have talked to and here at the forum usually won't use anything else after trying them. I burn about 20 to 40 DVDs a month and have gone through quite a few. There are some programs that are supposed to let you recover data. Try a Google search. I saw a couple here: http://www.softlandmark.com/CDRWUtility.htm Good luck! Frank
Susan I'm sorry, I do see you said it was a stand alone player my fault for not catching that. I didn't realize they made them 1 1/2 years ago. Thats cool I looked you model number on the Phillips web sight and that recorder only supports +R/RW disks so you couldnt use -R/RW disks, but I would have to agree that the type of media you use is important, but generally FujiFilm media is good, but not always. They have different company's manufacturing there disk's for them. You can run a disk threw Disk Identifier to see who actually manufatures them. There are a few programs out there you can get to try and recover your data on the DVD, but most of them were designed with retrieving data from a disk that was damaged and they more than likely arent going to work for you, but I could be wrong. Has anyone out there tried this before? I know in the stand alone players you really can't read the disk in anything else but the player that recorded the media until you finalize the disk. By the way what model Sony did you get? I got a Sony RDR-GX300 myself and I love it you can just record your shaow and come back later and edit out the comercial's and stuff. I think thats the best feature, and that it burns any type of media. I'm sorry to say though you probably lost whatever is on that disk, but if you find a way to retrive it I would sure like to know how you did it. Because I got a DVD -R disk like that. In the middle of recordin the power went out and I lost a show I had actually paid for on PPV to watch. :-( I tried a couple of the proggys out there to see if I could get something off the disk, but with no luck the only one I really remember the name to is DVD X Rescue. I remember that one because it cost me $50 and didnt work :-( It might be hard to get that program now any way because it is from 321 studios, and I believe they went out of buissness. I wish you all the luck and hope you can get what you need off of that DVD. VR,
No worries, bbmayo. I appreciate your response! It turns out that I purchased the same Sony model yesterday as the one you have. I am very pleased with it, yet at the same time, I am frustrated that it only does the extra-special editing features on -RWs (since I own a LOT of blank +Rs and +RWs). I am thrilled that at least with the +RWs, I can do the A-B editing. I just got really spoiled with the Philips unit in that I could create chapters on +Rs in addition to +RWs, and I could "hide" specific chapters...for instance, I could "hide" commercials. However, when the disc would play on another system, the commercials WOULD be there, even after finalizing...which was frustrating. I wish the Sony allowed this "hiding" process as well with DVD+Rs, but if it doesn't appear on other systems, what's the point?! The Philips also allowed me to do thumbnails with the +Rs, which Sony doesn't. The GREAT thing though is that all the DVD+Rs that were recorded on the Philips unit and were NOT finalized ARE playable on the Sony unit. I was quite relieved to discover that... I will certainly post again if I find a solution to bringing back the lost DVD+R media. Thanks again for your post.
Susan, that sounds pretty cool what the Phillips did. I actually like recording on the RW's because I can Edit them and do what ever (take out comercial's and then finalize the DVD. Then I take it to my computer and copy that disk onto a R disk. then I just take my RW disk and un-finalize it, and start all over again. I only use about 3 RW disk at one time. I would think what the phillips was doing was basically just skiping where the comercials were if they where still on the disk. Wouldn't that be wasting some valuable space on the DVD? I have recorded in LP, ELP, SP all the speeds just to see if there is much difference in quality, and it really dosent change that much. I mean you can tell the difference but the picture is still better than a VCR tape when you record at the slowest speed. I also bought a Sharp DV-SR3 about a month back. The only reason I bought it was because it was on sale for $79. That one does everything you mentioned in your above post. It does the menus and all. I was pretty darn surprised at how good it works, and also a little mad cause I paid so much more for the Sony :-( There is only one thing that the sony can do that the Sharp can't and that is the Sharp dosent record on +R or +RW disk's only on -R and -RW, but that is really no big deal to me because I pretty much just use -R's anyway. The Sharp does a lot that the Sony can't do though. Well Anyway I got to run. V/R, bbmayo
How long does that copying process usually take? I do NOT have a DVD burner on my computer and am really regretting that. It would certainly save me some money not to have to buy +RW or -RWs all the time if I could simply transfer what I had "edited" to a +R or -R. There isn't a loss in quality when you transfer the media, correct?
It only takes about 15min @ x4. You could burn it faster, but I try to play it safe? It is just copying from 1 disk to the other (on the fly) Comes out just as good as the original disk. No difference in picture quality. You could save on the price you are paying for RW disks and get a DVD Writer you would gain your money back in no time. Writers are so cheap now a day you can get a decent one at newegg for $50 or $60. cheers!!
Try this link for info on how to recover "lost" data from unfinlised discs http://www.camcorderinfo.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=104705&page=1
Thanks again for all the suggestions. I placed an order at newegg earlier today for a DVD burner. From the link Noel provided, I downloaded the software called CDRoller. Unfortunately, to use it, I need a DVD burner. I figured that it was time anyway, so I'll see what happens when my burner arrives later this week. bbmayo...you might want to try the program and see if it works for that DVD-R of yours...crossing fingers it does!
I tried that program CD roller, and it reads the files but to actually rescue them and put them on your HD you have to buy it. I am not sure if I wan't to waste any more money and time on this. It looks like it could work? I'm just not sure and even if it can put them on my hard drive what do I do with them from there because they look like they are in some really wierd format. I don't know, but if you get to work I may invest $29.50 so let me know if it works for you. Also you don't need a burner for this program just a DVD ROM thats what I read it from. Thanks for the heads up WinXP SP2 AMD Athlon XP 2400+ (2.01GHz) 1GB DDR 3200 ATI All In Wonder 9600 Burners Nec 2500A / Pioneer DVR 105
I had e-mailed tech support at cdroller.com last night, and the guy responded saying that to check a DVD+R that had not yet been finalized, the disc HAD to be read in a DVD burner drive. I'm glad your drive was able to read your disc somewhat; I had tried this first in the regular DVD-ROM drive, and it couldn't read anything. However, since the tech support guy said that it should be read in a burner drive, I'm going to cross my fingers and hope that it works. $29.50 seems reasonable to me if I can get back this media, and I will be sure to let you know what happens.
Well, I now own a Lite-On DVD burner from newegg.com, and with CD Roller (paying for the full version), I WAS able to recover the media. However, I am far from done with this debacle...still communicating with CD Roller's tech support. Before I begin my tale...with the Lite-On burner, I also received CyberLink PowerDVD and NeroVision Express 2 software. So, with CD Roller, you can instantly tell (with a DVD burner) that you have a VOB file on the disc. Then you can recover this file. Took me once 12 hrs. to recover the file, but the tech support guy showed me another method that took about an hour. Not sure if there is any difference in quality...not obvious to the naked eye. I then opened the VOB file in PowerDVD. The file would play WITH audio (this is important info for later) just fine; however, after a few minutes of playing, it would "hiccup." I am 99.9% positive that the "hiccups" (causing the PowerDVD software to shut down) were due to the breaks in the recordings of the various titles on the DVD+R. So, I then imported the VOB file into NeroVision Express 2. I was amazed how the software immediately divided up the large file into the smaller titles that I had recorded. When I would then edit the titles, the audio would only play for a second, and then it would be SILENT. I figured that possibly my system couldn't keep up with things, but that was NOT the case. When I burned a new DVD, I had BEAUTIFUL video, but NO audio. I have since burned another DVD with other video clips I had on my computer, and there IS audio & video on the DVD just fine. Sooooo, the tech support guy at CD Roller has been having me run all these various tests. He said that in the past, his customers have had success using TMPGenc to extract a separate audio file as well as MyDVD software in order to burn a new DVD just fine. I'm kind of at a standstill right now with the audio thing. I have ordered other DVD editing software that won't arrive until Monday, so I'm going to try that first before forking down more moolah to purchase the MyDVD software.
Just a quick update...success, success, success! I used TMPGEnc to separate the files into audio & video files. My computer couldn't read the AC3 files, but using the free software from ac3dec.com, I was able to convert the files to WAV files and piece them back together with the video files in NeroVision. So, I am giving CDRoller my HIGHEST recommendation in recovering lost media from DVD+Rs as well as TMPGEnc and AC3DEC. Without these programs, I would have lost this DVD that was so important to me.
