Since when does stating factual knowledge-- regardless of whether these facts debunk someone else's opinion-- qualify as "flaming" anyone? I simply related an extremely knowledgeable, factual-- and less reactionary-- point of view to the capacitor debate. If Repairman wants to claim my stating facts as "flaming" against him... That's his prerogative-- but certainly NOT my intention... for the following two reasons: 1) I don't have time to get into a "flame war" with anyone. I am far too busy to get into a "virtual fight" with someone I do NOT know-- whether I agree with them or not. That's not why I posted here to begin with. 2) I simply came on this board to figure out how to save my Panasonic DMR from the trash heap. With the help of several folks I have discovered out what I need to do and I am very grateful for that. Best Wishes and Thanks to those who actually helped (you know who you are)! The others... You'll have to get into a "flame war" with someone else because I'm not playing.
Magnum, Responding to someone that their input is "off the wall" and then stating that being "certified" is not necessarily meaningful (when I think it's clear the qualifications of a board contributor are being targeted) - I would at least regard as lighting matches. If the same were said about your input - I doubt you'd like it, but I could be wrong. Obviously, simple disagreement is not flaming. Did I state your post was a flame? Perhaps you overlooked a post on this page.
I just finished recording a disk in my Panasonic but now I can't finalize it. I am able to play in the panasonic, although at first it wouldn't read it and the machine crashed on me a couple of times. I noticed a couple of spots on the disk that like voids where it looks like the disk wasn't burned. I think this might have been caused by dust on the disk. Anyway, does anyone know if there is a way to finalize a disk from the panasonic in a computer. I put it in my computer and the computer says it's blank.
Metal321, As far as I know you cannot finalize your disk in a computer. The finalization of the disk in your recorder writes to the table of contents which is near the centre of the disk. The info for this is in your Panasonic recorder and not in your P.C.Thats why your computer thinks the disk is blank. One possible cause is that your ram drive is starting to show signs of wear/useage.Can you put an RW or Ram disk in the drive and format it.If the format function will not work then suspect Power Supply trouble as it cannot supply current for long enough to format the disk. Hope this helps REPAIRMAN
be nice if we could get that (panasonic? third party?) software into the computer somehow...... (already available somewhere? I know nothing about video software)
Lcoop Are you saying that the unit will Still not finalize a disk but will burn one OK. If so there is something else going on. If the power supply was intermittent I doubt it would play much less burn a disk. Magnum19 Your Feb 20 2008 Post and your friend was as I said Right On, and was to the point The Feb 25 P0st was also to the point I’m 78 and retired. MY work with electrical/electroics goes back to when I was 15. Its bothersome when one throw’s out terms like my years of experience , flamed or other terms when confronted with questions or other info, Than proceeds to go off with double talk. That induces more to not see the trees for the forest I have 10 Liteon/ilo units and have never had a power board failure. A friend did [liteon 5005] He needed it NOW. Repair parts were not avail for a few weeks. An PC Power supply was used, [In the units open case } and worked fine for some 3 weeks I respect many engineers but found that many lived in a technical world and forgot there is a Real World that we live in. vulcanusa Your post blameing Magnum19 for the comment "Off the Wall' I believe you will find that I made that comment and IT STANDS
Lcoop, Its not a question of software on the P.C.The track and data info from recordings are copied into the Table of Contents which serves as a directory for other recorders/players to use. This is what happens when you finalize it.It tells another recorder/player what format the disk is,what is on the disk,how much space is taken up and most important file headers(name of tracks)I wonder if a programme called " File Inspector " could be used to recover the raw data, I don`t know as I haven`t tried it. The disk will play in its own unit because it has the Table of Contents in memory(probably flash memory, similar to memory in usb sticks)onboard the unit Repairman
LCSHG, I did NOT blame magnum for the "off the wall" comment. magnum interpreted repairman's post, or my post, or both as referring to magnum's post to furryface as the source of the flame. magnum's post was not a flame - as he was simply relating the facts from a friend as he knew them. Unlike magnum's post, your post crossed the line - in my humble opinion - as it was clearly personal instead of merely stating facts. It was YOUR post to which I was referring. That is why I suggested to magnum that he must have missed a post on this page (i.e. yours). No, yours wasn't a vicious attack, but it was nonetheless at least a mild personal attack. I believe repairman has been contributing to this thread long before your arrival on the scene, and I believe his posts have been helpful and credible. I didn't want him to get pissed and stop contributing. That doesn't mean necessarily everything he has posted has been 100% correct in an absolute sense. I know my posts have not been 100% correct. While I am a technical guy, I am not a EE or electronics expert - as I frankly admitted earlier. So, I don't mind reading repairman's input regarding his extensive experience in repairing the panasonic DVR's which are the subject of this thread. And I don't take offense to his warnings about avoiding burning down one's house. Anyone who worked full-time in electronics since WWII as 15 yr old youth until his retirement is also credible. Does this seem like "double talk" to you? I believe I am writing plainly. So, I don't mind reading your input as long as you simply stick to the facts as you know them. And I don't mind reading what magnum's friend had to say. When two guys contributing to a forum, who each claim a long history in electronics, provide opposing input, then whom do the rest of us (i.e. non-electronics expert participants in this thread) assign the highest probability of being correct?? Because that is all a reasonable man can do who is not expert in the field of the debate - we must assign a probability of correctness to each viewpoint or wait for additional input data. I have my own decades long technical intuition to guide me. Personal attacks - however mild - have been mostly avoided during the years long life of this thread. As forums go, that is a pretty rare condition. That was my only point. I believe someone flamed VideoBob way back in the middle of the thread, but that's been about it. I'm guessing you couldn't care less, but a poster launching personal attacks - however mild - loses some credibility with me.
The 10 liteon/ilo units I have The Accurian 2032 I got for my son in law The Daytek. Gateway units that friends have. I can record with any one of these units to a +/- disk and not finalize it. They will play or record in any of the machines un-finalized and can be finalized in any I also have a ilo 05 model unit that is a Cyberhome 1600. The format is different than the liteon units A disk burned in this unit [ilo05] is not recognized by the liteon units, unless finalized. A disk burned in a liteon unit, that is [un-finalized], is recognized by the 05 but as one that was not created in the Cyberhome It will ask If I want to convert the disk to the Cyberhome format. If I say Yes, It will do so and finalize the disk and it can be played in any machine and has the ilo05/Cyberhome menu, not the liteon If there is any info on the unit that did the original recording, It doesn’t seem to matter to the disk.
Guys, The DVD contains all the information. Nothing is "Stored" in the machine (excluding the hard drive of course). The "Un-finalized" disk is in a format similar to "Multi-session" recording. That way you can add more titles at will - until the disk is full. You can also re-name a title, or add a thumbnail, etc. When you "Finalize", additional info is written to the start-up tracks, and it is no longer a "Multi-session" disk. The format then becomes "DVD-RAM" like, and is playable on almost all DVD players. There may be a few old ones that might choke...but that's rare. As for reading them in a computer, before they are finalized, this would require Panasonic to release their internal file structure to be able to write a utility to be able to read the unfinalized format. This is doable, and I'm almost surprised no one (at Panasonic maybe?) has written such a utility. Frankly, most of the stuff I have archived on disks is not finalized. They work in any Panasonic recorder just fine, and even in some other brands that use the same firmware. I would also suggest trying some of the "DVD-RAM" disks. They don't have to be finalized, and can be put into a PC and read just fine. It's been my method to transfer a title to my PC. You can also copy from DVD-RAM back to the Hard drive - which you can't do with a regular DVD-R. This has been useful from time to time. As for being unable to finalize - if you can create the disk, you should be able to finalize. However, remember that when you are writing to a DVD, it takes more power than just reading. So, if the power supply is weak (bad capacitors) that might cause problems. By the way, I have 5 units here. They are on 24 hours a day. When they are idle (hard drive shuts down) they don't draw too much power. However, I have not had any capacitor problems either. I think that turning these things on & off all the time causes stress to the electronics. Like metal fatigue, the capacitors heat up, cool down, heat up, etc. Eventually, they start to fail (and leak...). A higher voltage rating would have probably helped the situation. Final thoughts - use a "UPS" on these units - sudden power loss or power spikes can really mess up a recording. Also, keep those DVD's clean - at least until you are finished writing to them and they have been finalized. I have a habit of blowing on the DVD gently just as I put it in the machine! So far, so good. Good Luck, Roger.
I don't think there is anything wrong with the drive. This is just one disk that is screwed up. Like I was saying, when I looked at it, I could see a couple of strange voids on the disk, roughly circular. The disk plays, but I can't finalize it. I am assuming something went wrong with the burning process. I have problem with lime-dust from a humidifier. When I took the disk out it was dusty, so I am guessing that was the problem. I guess my best bet is to try to move the recording back onto the drive and then burn another disk. K25MN. How do you keep your units from shutting down? Mine always shut down after I believe three hours. It's a problem for me because of the way I had to hook my unit up to the tv. The unit has to be on for me to view the cable programming. Thanks.
Metal321, Easy. Just hit "Setup" on the remote, then select "Setup" and at the top is ""Off Timer". Select "Off". That shuts the timer off, and the unit will remain on. Other settings I change (from the default) under "Disc" are recording time in EP Mode: 8hrs. DVD-R High-Speed Recording: On. It's always best to NOT leave a DVD disk in the drive, as that prevents the Hard Drive from shutting down after 30 minutes or so. Let it "Sleep". Saves power and wear on the Hard Drive. Roger.
The Power Supply seems to have failed on my two-year old DMR-E85HP. After deleting a couple shows, several of the buttons on the remote wouldn’t work, although some did work. I turned the Power button off at the unit, waited a few minutes, and turned the Power button on. Absolutely nothing happened. No lights on the Display. No cooling fan. Nothing. I unplugged the unit, waited several minutes, plugged it back in. Still nothing. I opened the unit and found power on the Power Supply Board (PSB) at the point where the power supply cord enters. Then I did research on the internet and found this forum. I enjoyed many hours of reading many of the 71 pages and promptly subscribed. But, found nothing about my situation. Almost makes me wish I had the “PLEASE WAIT” message. Anyway, I opened the case again, dismantled to the PSB, and the C1270 and C1271 capacitors looked okay. But, the two capacitors adjacent to them were bulging and had some minor brown stains on top. The PSB indicates they are the C1260 and C1261 capacitors, and are labeled 10V, 680uF. It seems obvious that they should be replaced. I prefer to replace them with the manufacturer’s parts. Does anyone know the Panasonic Part number for these 10V, 680uF capacitors? Also, if you have any suggestions or comments about my situation, I welcome them. Do you think I am headed in the proper direction?
gymmy Are you sure that the capacitors indicate 10v and are original I wouldn't worry about replacing them with a non Panasonic item as a matter of fact it mihgt be better. PS Did you check the fuse Don't bypass it It sounds as it may be open
Herb, Yep, they are definately the original capacitors and they read 10V. I was a bit surprised too, with all the discussion that has gone on in this thread about the PSB. They are a bit shorter than the 16V C1270 and C1271 capacitors. The fuse is good too. It was the first thing I checked. Thanks - I appreciate your input. gymmy
My unit doesn't seem to want to read any disks. The DVD light starts blinking on and off sometimes and it also starts to do self-checks. I'm wondering if the optical drive has bit the dust. Has anyone ever replaced one of these drives before?
I had this happen to all the discs I tried to burn to. Machine (E95H) would not read anything. BUT I had it under warranty and took it in. they replaced the "RAM DRIVE UNIT." Getting ready to take EH175V in for repair. It literally sounds like it is grinding/eating one type of TDK when I put it in. Does okay with Sony's. I hate these machines but cannot live without them!!
Does Panasonic actually even repair these things anymore? I go on their website and get numbers for independent repair stores. I call the Texas number and a really nice lady tells me that they will accept my sending a machine to them from Los Angeles but "it would most likely be more cost efficient to just throw the machine in the trash and buy a new one after all the expenses you will incur". I am lucky enough to have a very experienced friend changing out the capacitors on my E85 but now my E95 is barely reading discs I put in it anymore (like the above member). I'm sure that my friend could replace the "RAM DRIVE UNIT" on the E95 but since he's already an engineer for a TV network (and has a life of his own outside of electronics repair)... I don't feel right asking him to work on a second machine-- let alone do the research needed to properly repair the unit. I know folks have written,"Dial this number and speak to Kord" but is this even Panasonic?
metal, Go to eBay and enter dmr-e85h into the search string. Several units are up for auction this morning.
