My machine was also not starting on an early afternoon recording. I vaguely remember someone mentioning it could be the unit downloading an update for the TVG+. I found if you leave the machine on, it will record everytime. Also, since my unit does not have a functioning TVG+, I can now leave it off and it records all the time. Robert
Well the double-zapping may have done the trick. The machine recovered enough this morning to pull in a crude program guide and lineup. I scheduled an 11:30am and 2:30pm recording. The 11:30am program recorded fine and has never been a problem. Just checked the machine and it recorded the 2:30pm program, something it failed to do on its own for the past week. So now I'm left wondering, was it the double resetting (clearing something by holding in the power button and the factory reset channel up/channel down), because it was friday, or maybe the thing really is fixed now? There used to be a time when no matter when things would be scheduled to record, the machine would do so. It seems like when the thing starts to skip recordings, it first does so with shows scheduled to record during the day. As time goes on it starts skipping shows scheduled to record in primetime. That's when it was really bad and I was ready to just take a hammer to the thing. There just don't seem to be any new hard drive recorders on the market worth buying yet. Maybe when the official switchover to ATSC happens, Panasonic will release a new machine. They did so in Japan but not North America. Japanese Panasonic DMR-BW800
FurryFace, One could argue from reviewing this thread that the DMR-E85H is much more reliable when the EPG is disabled. That's how I use it. You're trading off convenience for a greater risk of missing a favorite show. Obviously, I decided I'd rather program manually and greatly reduce the risk of missing an episode of one of my favorite shows. However, I have very basic cable and not a zillion channels, so I might not fully appreciate the convenience of the EPG compared to some of you who have chosen to continue using it despite its questionable history (and ads ;-).
For me, the EPG is central to the functionality of the E85. If it weren't for the TVGuide, I might as well go back to a VCR. Really, the TVGuide has been a really great feature. I have on one machine a week's listing of every show that will air on my cable system. Not only can I browse each day by channel but also see individual shows listed alphabetically and by category. There have been so many cases where I saw a show coming up I didn't know was airing. When the E85 works without problems, it truly is a great piece of home theater equipment. If there was one feature that I don't care about, it's the DVD drive. In the 3 years I've had this machine, I may have burned 15 disks. When I first got the E85 I actually disconnected my standalone DVD player. But after using the E85 for a few months as a DVD player, I reconnected the standalone DVD player. The E85's player can't remember where a DVD was playing when the machine is turned off. Overall I found the mechanism too clunky to deal with. Seems ironic that the latest offerings for DVR's got rid of the hard drive and EPG, but kept the DVD. If I had my way it would have been the other way around, keep the hard drive with EPG and ditch the DVD mechanism. That describes a TiVo. Unfortunately the TiVo requires a monthly fee to make the machine functional. They no longer even offer a liftime activation. With the Panasonic E85, the TVGuide is FREE, which is my favorite price
I've been fighting the missed recording problem almost as long as I had my Pany. As far as I know (and I go back several years with this forum) the problem is that the machine is in the middle of downloading TVGO data and does not check for scheduled recordings while doing so. If a show is scheduled to start while it's in the middle of a TVGO download, it will miss it completely. If you are unlucky enough to have the TVGO download coming up during a time period when you are recording shows, you will miss shows. This is a bug in the firmware and has no fix that I know of. Powering up the machine during a download will stop the download. The machine will then check for scheduled shows and immediately begin recording if one is scheduled. Apparently it does not do this when a download ends normally. This behavior explains the symptom some of you have recently reported. You can prove that TVGO downloads are the problem by going to the 753159852 maintenance screens and looking at the last and next download times. Sometimes a reset will cause the unit to switch to another host channel, with a different download schedule, and the problem will go away for a while. My unit prefers to get TVGO from ABC and I have not been able to keep it off of ABC very long. Changing your ZIP code can also get you onto a different host channel, but it's a krap shoot. Even disabling the errant host channel will not work, the machine will find it anyway. To get to the 753159852 screens, do the following: [I don’t remember who posted this, it’s from one of the early pages] I know of only two solutions to the problem: 1) disable TVGO and manually program your shows (which takes away a lot of the usefulness of the machine, IMHO); 2) turn the machine on just before prime time (or whatever time block you are having trouble with). I have my machine set up to automatically power down in (I think) 6 hours, so I don't have to remember to turn it back off. The reason #2 works is that the machine has to be off to download TVGO; leaving it on keeps TVGO downloads from blocking recording. Some folks have set up timers to cycle the power on the machine shortly before their recording time block starts. I have not been having problems with missed shows recently (touch wood). Cal
thanks cal great post - every once in a blue moon one of my two machines will fail to record - good explanation of probable "why" - wow this forum and thread is the best vein of consumer info on these machines that I have found (if anyone knows another one please let me know - I also apologize for not reading this whole thread yet where maybe that info is already given) (its a long thread!)
Thanks vulcanusa and Kassel for the replies to my post re not being able to record programs due to "copyright protected" pop up box. The day after I posted, I was getting that message for EVERY single show and I realized something had to be wrong! I backtracked and realized I had earlier been watching a local "Pay for view" Asian channel where nothing can be copied or recorded. The cable company here has been having problems with all the "pay for view on demand" channels and I think I was locked up in the copyright thing when I changed channels. Being very careful with this now and will also let the cable company know that this happened since they do admit to problems on the pay channels for the past month. Still can't figure out how 2 other programs had that "one time only recording" symbol next to them in the Direct Navigator list but just hope I do not see those again!
Ok, new to this thread but I have spent the better part of the last 3 days looking through all 68 pages. Here is my problem. 4 days ago I turned on my E85H and I received a PLEASE WAIT message on the LCD display. I tried everything that I cound think of to fix the problem. Note: I had not yet found this thread. Thinking that the hard drive had some how been corrupted, I removed it and inserted it into my XP PC and proceeded to reformat it. There was nothing on the hard drive that I really wanted. After formatting the hard drive I reinserted it back into my E85H, but the same PLEASE WAIT message appeared. I then began my search of the internet for possible solutions. That is when I found this thread and the comments about the 2 bad capacitors. I did find these bad capacitors on my machine so I replaced them. I then restarted my E85H and walla, no more PLEASE WAIT message. But now I have a bigger problem. When I formatted the hard drive in my PC, I unknowingly did something that now makes the drive unrecognizable to my E85H. I get an error message that asks me to change the disk. I found some threads that talk about using Fdisk to unformat the drive and set it to a state that my E85H will recognize so that it can format it. I reinserted the hard drive back into my XP PC and used Fdisk to try and fix the problem. I am not to familiar with Fdisk so I am not sure if I did something wrong but the drive is still not recognizable in my E85H. When using Fdisk, I created a boot floppy disk utilizing windows XP and some Fdisk files from a website called FREEDOS. What I would like some guidance on is: (1) Can I in fact use Fdisk to reformat the drive to a state that is recognizable in my E85H. I have read some threads that talk about Fdisk not working on XP computers with NTFS disks? (2) If so can someone please provide me with some detailed instructions on how I go about doing this? (3) If I cannot use Fdisk is there any other way to get this hard drive formatted so that my E85H will recognize it so that it can format it? My last resort is to just go out and purchase another hard drive but 120gb 5400rpm hard drives that match the original are pretty slim pickens now-a-days.
Wilsonsm, You probably created a "Partition" on the drive. Use FDISK and remove any or all partitions from that drive. That should probably work. Roger.
You might also want to try a low level format of the drive using the drive manufactures utility program. That should put it back to the origional state as shipped from the factory. What make and model drive do you have? Cal
Over a year ago I had U99 messages, I disconnected the Panasonic hard drive and connected another drive (80 gb Maxtor, formatted for use with Win2000) - and powered the unit up - it warned that the drive needed to be formatted - whereupon I shut the unit down and re-connected the Panasonic drive - and the unit fired up OK - with all previously recorded programs intact. No U99's since (knock wood). As suggested previously - try using the manufacturer format software... or try re-connecting the old drive and see what happens. As an aside - I did manage to pick up a Maxtor 5400rpm 120 GB drive for $59 via Pricewatch.com...
Roger, I just finished doing Fdisk again. However, when I choose option 3 - delete partition or logical DOS drive the program informs me that their are no partitions to delete. When I choose option 4 - display/modify partition information the program informs me that their are no partitions defined. What next??????? Cal, the hard drive is a Maxtor Diamondback 16 ATA. I downloaded a utility software from the seagate/maxtor website. I will try that and then respond with the results. Scan10, I think I have an old hard drive that I might be able to try your swap technique. If cal's advise does not work, I will move on to your suggestion. Thanks to all of you for your fast advise. to be continued.............
Usually, with Windows, you can't format a drive unless it's partitioned. In fact, Windows doesn't even seem to know the hard drive is there. Perhaps you used another method to format it. Also, remember to have it jumpered as either "Cable Select", or "Single" or "Master/with no slave". If you put it into a computer to format it, you might have made it a slave, and forgot to switch it back... (Gosh - I'm listed as a "newbie"... I think I started this thread. Guess I have to figure out how to upgrade my status - Roger.
Roger, I did find a snafu on my part. I did in fact have the hard drive as a slave. I have now reinserted the pin in the master/no slave position and will try Fdisk again. cross your digital fingers. Sean
Roger, Fdisk will not start now. It says "Invalid drive designation...Operation Terminated". Is this because I have two master drives now; My c: drive and the E85H drive? Or is it because I removed partitions on the E85H drive with it as the slave?
Roger, Here is what I did after Fdisk would not start. I took the drive out and made it a slave and then partitioned it. I then removed it and made it "cable select" and then reinserted it. Fdisk started up as it normally does. I then proceeded to remove all partitions. Success. I then took the drive out and reinserted it in my E85H. Still no joy. I get the "PLEASE WAIT, followed by "BYE", followed by "PLEASE WAIT, followed by "L1" followed a TV screen error message "SYSTEM ERROR, PRESS RETURN TO EXIT", followed by "PLEASE WAIT", followed by "L1", followed by a TV screen error message "CHANGE THE DISK". I will wait a day or two for some more suggestions before I breakdown and get a new hard drive.
Cal, I went to maxtor's website and downloaded the hard drive utility that they had. It did not have an option to perform any sort of low level format. ????? Scan10, I was able to find a spare hard drive and i did what you said, but I still got the same error messages. Was I supposed to reformat the drive so that it was blank or was it ok to insert it into the E85H with windows XP data on it? Sean
As I remember, the drive I connected was formatted to NTFS. At one point (long ago) I remember reading that the Panasonic unit looks at the drive and if it does not recognize the format - it goes into the format routine... I forget the exact message displayed - but if memory serves it was on the video display (rather than the LED on the front of the unit). I'll take a look in my service notes when I get back....
As I remember, the drive I connected was formatted to NTFS. At one point (long ago) I remember reading that the Panasonic unit looks at the drive and if it does not recognize the format - it goes into the format routine... I forget the exact message displayed - but if memory serves it was on the video display (rather than the LED on the front of the unit). I'll take a look in my service notes when I get back....
Wilsonsm, You need the drive as a "Slave" in your computer, but NOT a slave in the Panasonic. You also should make sure you haven't skewed the flat ribbon cable that connects to the hard drive. Your first post said you had put the drive in your PC and formatted it. You then put it in the Panasonic and it didn't work. But you MUST have changed the jumpers in order to format it in your PC. I didn't want you to put it into the PC as a master! You'll be in a world of hurt with two masters! I wonder if, assuming the hard drive is functioning in the Panasonic, you can get into the disk maintenance menu and select to format the hard drive. It seems odd the machine would ask you to change the disk (not a "user" function.) Are you sure you don't have a defective DVD in the unit? Check those cables. Make sure when you power the unit up, you can hear the hard drive "spin up". Then try using the Panasonic to format it. It will format it in the way it needs it to be. Good Luck! Roger.
