I have an E95 and that happens to me on ocassion. I haven't seen any consistency to figure it out. It's a Panny thing!
pizza, By trying "all resources" do you mean you've read this entire thread from start to finish?? There is quite a lot of good information and advice for solving, or at least understanding the behavior of, these DVRs. My own perspective, as I've stated several times, is to disable the TV Guide download and program the timer manually. I've manually set up timer recordings (once, weekly) for well over a year and a half and never had a problem.
as you can see...."pizza" I own a restaurant and work until 1AM...and then found this site. All resources are other sites and the useless panny techs themselves. I appreciate the feedback...yet hate the idea of not using the ease of TVG...hell, this is one of the main reasons I chose the Panny. If you have any links to this discussion from the past, it would be appreciated. Thanks
For the past several weeks I was getting a U99 almost every morning when I got up and then when I got home at night. Had to go back to leaving the unit on so I could get a show recorded. As fast as it came it has now gone away and I have not had another U99 in a week. I think it was Video Bob that said when the new season start up the changes take a while to get setteled and then it is OK. I sure do hope it was just an irration for a couple of weeks and not a new problem.
pizza, In my opinion, this thread is the best resource on the Net about the DMR-E85H and the E95. So, if it's not in the prior 50 pages, the information probably doesn't exist on the Net, or if it does, it hasn't been indexed. VideoBob has a post just above and many other good posts. A couple of pages back there was a post about hitting Stop twice when you finish watching a program. Anyway, I knew from reading this thread way back in mid-2005 that I might wish to disable the TV Guide download, so I was not that disappointed, but I can understand why people would be upset if they bought the DVR primarily because of the advertised utility of the TV Guide.
IR Blaster Problem. DMR-E85h Assuming there is no hardware problem with either the unit or the blaster: Is there a way to fix the "IR ERR" problem? This pops up with no warning at almost any time of day. Is there anyway to prevent this from happening?
Not an expert, so take these comments with a grain of salt: 1) make sure there is no signaling code conflict with other IR emitters (i.e. remotes). 2) make sure line-of-sight/angle requirements met between the IR blaster and cable box it is controlling. 3) since you indicated the problem occurs at any time-of-day, this probably isn't a factor, but make sure the IR blaster and your cable box are not exposed to strong sunlight (directly or reflected). Obviously there are many sources of IR noise (any object emitting heat). If there is something very hot near the blaster or the cable box or in the line-of-sight between the blaster and cable box (i.e. your girlfriend?? <just kidding>), it's possible the IR noise environment is too great. I've never run into the problem myself with any IR remotes/equipment, but then I have never had a candle burning near the IR transceiver, nor a space heater, nor .... ??? Are the blaster and cable box transceiving ports clean? I suppose if they are really dirty/dusty, the IR signal is greatly attenuated.
Vulcanusa: 1. No known signal code conflict. I deactivated all other remotes. Reset the unit. Still have the error. 2. Line of sight/angle requirements okay. 3. Neither the cable box (Motorola), or the IR blaster in strong sunlight. There is no heat source near the blaster. I have cleaned both the blaster and cable box ports. I'm running out of possible causes.
capt57, I know you were hoping it wasn't a hardware problem, but I can't think of any other alternative. I presume you have a cable box remote and your cable box responds fine to all of its button presses? And no major heat source near nor in-line-of-sight to the cable box?
to pizzahemi.... It took me over a year to get the TVGuide system working. I believe at the time it was a problem with my Adelphia Cable company but I'm not sure. I also bought the panny in part for the TVGuide system and for about a year now it is working pretty well. It seems to go through fits where it loses the scheduled programming, one or two shows simply drop off but for the most part it works fine enough. I usually have about 6 to 10 shows programmed to repeat weekly (regularly?) and I'm thinking it might be related to the change in programming at the broadcast station that causes the problem. When they insert a filler program for one week or skip a week due to other programming, I think that throws the TVGuide system into a tiszy and so it drops the scheduling of that show. I guess I don't expect much from a poorly engineered piece of equipment and feel lucky when it works the way it was supposed to.
Well it finally happened. Last Tuesday evening (10/24) I came home to the dreaded U99. It was the first one I've had since I received the E85H as a gift. I powered the unit all the way down, no timer clock in display, unplug power for about a minute and reapplied. So far, no more U99 errors. I have a few blank days in the TVG, but it still seems to be downloading data, for now. Aside from a few other minor glitches, I have enjoyed this unit and the technology behind it. I am going to look at the Toshiba models that are out now that seem to offer the same functions as the Panny. Robert
Here's a little problem let me know if anyone has experienced this. We lost power here for about 12 hours last night. Of course it was the night to change the clocks back to standard time. When things came on this morning I noticed that the time on my E95 was off by an hour so I went into setup to change it. However, setup had grayed out both the automatic and manual setting controls so there is no way to change it. Any suggestions?
I have a Panasonic DMR-E85H that has been downloading the TV guide fine until the last few weeks. I live in Dublin Ohio and Time Warner must be doing some upgrades to make everything digital. (There is about a 5 second delay now for output out of the cable box as opposed to directly out of the RF cable) I have e-mailed Time Warner and they say that there should be no problem downloading the Channel guide. I have reset EVERYTHING multiple times over the last 2 weeks with no effect. Did a Factory reset many times according to directions from Roger Amidon on "The Great DMR-E85H Snafu". Still "Data Failed" after trying to download at night. My setup has not changed in any way and I am trying to download from the L3 S-Video input as before. The channels change fine, one-by-one,looking like it is trying to download at night, but no success? Any one have another magic way to get it to download? Jim in Ohio
Odd as it may seem, as long as I view the sponsor ads I haven't had a bit of trouble getting a full populated program listing even if the download is interupted. It never used to be the case. I can burn discs during the most crucial morning hours and when done shut off the unit. All the program contents fill in perfectly on the next download. I've started a 2 1/2 hour burn at around 1 am and left it unattended until around 8 am. Woke up the unit by pressing the disc eject button and then promptly shut her back down. Later in the afternoon I checked the listings for the whole week and they were there. I'll do this two or three days in a row and still not have a problem. I solved a problem of scheduled recordings not recording after doing a defrag by simply doing a manual recording so something is on the hard drive first. Haven't missed a recording since. I also solved a freeze frame problem I mentioned awhile back. I was transporting blank discs from one room to another inside a paper sleeve. Now I use blanks directly from a stack instead. It's cleaner.
I'm curious. Maybe I missed this in the manual, but how do you do a defrag on the drive when it's in the unit? Or did you remove the drive, defrag, then put it back in the unit?
It would be nice if defragging was possible but obviously I meant format. My cat knows if he claws my leg he'll get my attention and throw my train of thought off. I hope I didn't cause you too much confusion.
Did anyone found a E85H firmware for the european ones? I have problems with mine (after more than 2 years of flawless working), when I am writing on DVD-R (disc title or dubbing from hdd) the unit power down by itself then after restarting it works! Any advice is welcome!
I have been experiencing the same problems with my Panny e85 in regards to losing the TV OnScreen listings. I understand "host channels", etc. I am in San Diego and have Time Warner Cable with a Pioneer BDV1000 digital cable box. I went a long time getting the channel lineup with no problem. Lost it for several months back around January. Got it back about 8 weeks ago and lost it again about 3 weeks ago. My question is, how do I find out what my download host channel is? You say to use the 753 159 852 code to identify them. How/where do I use this code? Thanks for your help!
Hi y'all, I have a DMR-E85H that's been working fairly well since March 2005, but the other day it quit in the middle of burning a DVD-R. The tray just opened, and it was "Please Wait" all day and night. After 3 days of fruitless reboot attempts, turning on and off, unplugging, trying the recommended button combinations, I only succeeded in changing the time to a flashing 12:00. I phoned up a local electronics store to see what the cost of a new one would be, and the salesman said "Your unit might just need a cleaning. Send it in to our technicians." and I thought, "yeah, RIGHT! $50 to do WHAT?" I opened it up myself and found the little circuit board on the right side totally covered in a thick layer of dust. I vacuumed it off as best I could, put the lid back on and it started up like nothing had ever been wrong! Probably just a fluke (well, I prayed a lot and thanked God for answering), and I'm lucky I didn't generate a static spark with the vacuum cleaner, but hey, I was desperate...
